Architect Archive
Thread: Architect Poll Anyone Making Money?
BT-Trajan
Wed Oct 06, 2004 6:46 am
#15
Just increase your prices. If you have established customers, take a moment to reach out to them and tell them of your price increase and that you will extend to them a discount (say 10%) on all future purchases. Do this as a reward for their loyalty and...then increase your prices 13%. 
I have kept 95% of my Arch inventory at the 3.5 cr/ut price point. Occasionally I increase the prices, occasionally I decrease the prices (almost never ever). I do sell some items at higher than 3.5 cr/ut though, such as BER 10 med mineral harvs and paintings and a few pieces of furniture. For items such as lamps and candles I trade on volume. I sell lower quality items at cut rate prices and have a 200% turnover rate each week.
Cheers!
Harric
Wed Oct 06, 2004 7:02 am
#16
guys pls wake up 
just note to yourself that 1 yes 1 mission on dantooine brings a master fighter class around 30k cr.
so this all takes me 5 to 10 mins including traveling from the terminal to the mission.
now see hwat is high price for a 1 time sales item and whats low.
if you sell to low you actually make fighters a gift. (thanks )
)we dont care if a medium hjouse costs 100k or even more, cause we can get that cash in under an hr but we never buy again from you, cause we can pay maintain and keep it forever.
so in your own interest, do not make prices to low, you sell 1 time goods and everybody can make that cash very fast.
lets make it totally clear, then you maybe know that you can for sure charge more then you do.
1 mission on dantooine jantas is about 30k payout, then with luck we can loot janta hides (AS), jantas blood (doc) or even an loot item adhensive. so i get mission pay plus eventually a loot item adhensive and get up to 2 or 3 million for it.
its your profession and your win, but what architects in my opinion do right now is definately not smart or businessmen like
no offence but in real life i am businessman you do no successful business in terms or reqal life (all other crafters got the point better and make really profit)
you do no successful business in terms or reqal life (all other crafters got the point better and make really profit)regards
Tempus_Blackthorn
Wed Oct 06, 2004 4:20 pm
#17
Pawlin wrote:
I'm glad you're getting sales. But 50k-75k is much too low. You say so yourself that your prices are low. Your customer even told you so and when they do that its a definite, cusotmers don't often go out of their way to tell you if your prices are low.
So whats keeping you from raising your prices?
I try not to raise my prices too fast becauseI don't like getting comments like:"But you sold for X credits to my friend!!!". Since I'm very new to this, and that my guild's city is fairly new, I don't want to chase my clients away. And I harvest like 90% of my resources. Today, for the first time since I stopped grinding, I bought 140k of ore and 100k of iron, to make stuc mods. Why? Because I wanted to put more heavy harvesters on my vendors. Once my 'reputation' gains in status, I will raise my prices. And the fact that I only have one factory is really annoying me...
Anyone wanna lot trade??? 
Shameless plug...
Shameless plug...I wish I don't have to do another Dant mission run again!!! They're SOOOOOOOooooo boring!
Pawlin
Wed Oct 06, 2004 4:47 pm
#18
If customers are going to nickle and dime you over 5k here or 10k there then those customers will also leave you the minute that they findsomeone else cheaper. And if they are going to complain then delaying the price increase won't keep them from complaining, it will just delay the complaint and give you lower profit and be a bargain for them in the mean time.
It isn't fun to upset your customers, but better to do it soon and quick. Otherwise they'll just get more and more used to the lower prices and it will be even harder to change.
I originally had fairly low prices. After building business for a few months, sales were great. I wasn't the cheapest but I was pretty close to it. Then demand got out of hand and I just couldn't keep up with it so I decided to raise my prices 10-20%. It really didn't cause that much harm. I probably lost some customers but nobody complained to me and I retained most customers. Since then average prices have gone down below what my original prices were and now I'm closer to the highest price. But business is still good and profits are great.
Splic
Wed Oct 06, 2004 6:59 pm
#19
Well, I'm an Architect to be an Architect, not to make money. I sell most of my furniture anywhere from 1 to 2.5 CPU, depending on how specific it is, etc. I'm also a Master Swordsman, so I do missions to get money. My prices are very cheap compared to others when it comes to furniture, about the same for buildings, and I don't make harvesters.
I don't make much money from Architect, the majority is from missions.
Alzanob-CH
Wed Oct 06, 2004 10:54 pm
#20
No-Ni wrote:
I guess what I'm asking is, wouldn't it be better to take the uber materials we use and sell them for 5CPU, not have to have 5 structure factories churning out sub-components rolling through millions of units of resources to only get paid less than what we could sell the raw materials for?
I have stopped my production of some architect's items for this, the only thing i continue to sell are the factories and furniture. I think it's not worth make BER 13 for 100k. Some weapons use 35-40u of resources and can be selled for at least 4k. For us architect this would be charging 2,7mil for a BER 13.
GummiShooter
Thu Oct 07, 2004 1:53 am
#21
Pawlin wrote:
If customers are going to nickle and dime you over 5k here or 10k there then those customers will also leave you the minute that they findsomeone else cheaper. And if they are going to complain then delaying the price increase won't keep them from complaining, it will just delay the complaint and give you lower profit and be a bargain for them in the mean time.
It isn't fun to upset your customers, but better to do it soon and quick. Otherwise they'll just get more and more used to the lower prices and it will be even harder to change.
I originally had fairly low prices. After building business for a few months, sales were great. I wasn't the cheapest but I was pretty close to it. Then demand got out of hand and I just couldn't keep up with it so I decided to raise my prices 10-20%. It really didn't cause that much harm. I probably lost some customers but nobody complained to me and I retained most customers. Since then average prices have gone down below what my original prices were and now I'm closer to the highest price. But business is still good and profits are great.
This is a good point.Hadrian made a good point too. If I'mgoing togo through with this, I will make sure my best customers know about it and get an appropriate discount. Thanks for the advice!
Manusara
Fri Oct 08, 2004 9:57 am
#22
I'm making acouple million a week on average. I sell everything that we make except for Crafting stations and stock everything except city structures (custom order only) I sell heavies for 125K and I'm always stocked and close to Coronet. Am I the cheepest? No. My customers come to me because I always have what they need and they love my customer service when online.
Message Edited by Manusara on 10-08-2004 12:58 PM
Perelay
Fri Oct 08, 2004 2:14 pm
#23
I sell furniture for 3 to 4 cpu. The elite Master furniture I sell for over 5cpu. I sell heavy harvesters for 100K. 125K for fusions and gas. I also sell city structures for over 5 cpu. I don't make a Mcr a week like some of you do, but I do make a continuing profit. It pays for the harvester farm and the floaters plus all the maintanence and leaves me with more than I spent. I'm in the 7+ million bracket and climbing. I too give (or sell Really low) to guildmates, so I'm sure there's a few million lost there . All in all I make a profit and can afford to fiddle aroundin between major factory runs.
. All in all I make a profit and can afford to fiddle aroundin between major factory runs.Spryte [Haven] -Haven - Corellia - Scylla
Master Artisan / Master Architect
Scout 4/0/4/0 - CH 0/0/0/1
Marksman 4/0/0/0 - Novice Rifleman
Mechant 0/0/0/3
Master Artisan / Master Architect
Scout 4/0/4/0 - CH 0/0/0/1
Marksman 4/0/0/0 - Novice Rifleman
Mechant 0/0/0/3
Zarcath
Sat Oct 09, 2004 6:33 am
#24
Back when I was playing I would make most of my profit off furniture. Sell the house for cheap and throw in a few pieces of "free" furniture, a lot of time people would ask for more, and that's when I'd gouge them
Evialla
Sat Oct 09, 2004 9:55 am
#25
I always make a profit, but sales are sluggish in general, since many months ago.
Furniture does the best, harvesters the worst (and they are top of the line and reasonably priced too).
Lamps and lighting do real well also, but they're rather inexpensive.
Ebonfire
Sat Oct 09, 2004 9:30 pm
#26
I basically gave up on the profession because overwhelming monotony of bulk this and that. After 9 month of my alt being Master Architect, no more. The bottom line is that the profit is just not there for the time you put intomaking products. Great I was making a little over a million a week on harvesters, but for the most part it was nothing more than a time sink. Consider that a master melee profession can make a million in 3 hours running missions, and compare that to the time you put into making a million on your products, followed by limiting factors like the volume of resources you can harvest. Because of the lowballers on my server.. I'm willing to bet that there are more jedi than architects.
So, I have given up on arch for awhile, and am going public with my armor. Its great for the most part. You check for new resources everyday, and if something good pops, then you drop everything you have on it. Haha 600k of an armorsmith resources will keepyou good forpossibly upto a year.The best thing is that I've harvested most of my resources planning this out for a couple months, and I'll turn around selling them for 60-80 cpu in the finished products. I know some say that it takes awhile to produce a product, but I think its a plus for the most part. You start your layers,two days later you turn them into segments, and two days after that you make a couple schematics for pieces, run them, rinse/repeat. Hide is kind of an issue, but you can get away with paying 100 cpu for the good stuff when it spawns, and still make a kiling in the end.
Bottom line is this.. the community has been undervaluing our products almost from the beginning, and in the inflated servereconomies our profits are now completely dwarfed by the earning potential of almost everything else in the game.