Architect Archive

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Alukolli wrote:

and yet again it happens. player (before puplish 23) are dropping price on harvys..

seen ber 13 with good hooper sizes down to as low as 95k..

i think thats to low come on fellow arch. take pride in your product. dont sell to cheap....

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I do agree with you to a certain extent. I take lots of pride in my work. I can afford to sell prettylow (not cheap)because I mine 100% of the resources I use. One thing most of the players dont realize is that it takes several harvester runs just to be able to make 1 harvester. Lots of work is involved in architect, and thats why I sell low (100k per ber-13) and not cheap like some I've seen in the 80-90k range.

I've been an architect since day 1 of launch and I've been making and selling harvasters at lower thann average prices the whole time. I see it as open competitiveness. I also mine all of my own resources, so I still turn a nice profit. If I can sell a BER 13 for 90k, and now BER 14's at my old ber13 price (125k) , I see it as free enterprise. I'm all about low prices and quantity of sales. I cook up 200 harvesters at a time, so when I go to sell, I want to cater to my customer base that expects top quality at a fair price. And If I can gain some new customers this way, I see it as a smart business move.

It's not a lack of pride, it's shooting for a different economic strategy. Not a strategy I particularly care for though. I've seen 75k heavies. And actually my heavy waters cost 60-65k.

Course they're not very popular, water harvs aren't exactly as useful as they used to be.

This is a problem that only seems to appear with archi, people undercutting all the time, I see a poster already saying 125k for BER 14 mineral, that's going to knock 13's even lower. . I feel the problem is panic selling, in that they charge lower because they fear the competition. It's not about selling cheap and offering a good service for Archi's, Once are products are made then they have them for life as long as the keep up maintenance. A BER 13 Mineral at these lower prices pay for themselves in 1 day.

Edit to say thats it's not that hard to knock out loads of BER13 harvies and now 14's from the looks of things. We don't exactly make things that are resource critical like WS or AS, so everyone knocks out the same quality, but don't under value the work we have to put in to find/harvest resources and build the things.

Message Edited by Sharenna on 09-02-2005 02:24 PM

well gonna se if i can start to make some ber 14. just need to stock up new omus. and i will most likely produce 2-4k of em.

btw how can you make 200 heavys on 1run. i only can run max at 166units(with the one used to make schematic)?

When I arrived to Radiant, 4-5 months ago, heavy ones went for 75k, so I, as a newbie architect, had to go with it. Now they´re stucked at that price. I´m trying to keep ber14s for 250k: let´s hope undercutters don´t appear here.

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Sharenna wrote:

This is a problem that only seems to appear with archi, people undercutting all the time,...

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The reason we have so much price competition is just due to the nature of our profession and products. We lack of other things to compete on. Theres no differentiation in quality. We've got high supply and low demand. Our product is not to hard to make. Our goods don't decay. There is no real barrier to entry into our profession (grind gungans 2 hours to master). This all adds up to price competition being a typical differentiator. There are other things of course, like : location, stock, little bit of quality in hopper size, etc.

Hey if everyone sells for the same prices then your sales (I suppose) will be totaly dependant on where they are when they search your goods. I for one am not gonna just hope that I'm the closest vendor to them when they search bazzar enough times to make money. Competetition is the name of the economic game here as in the real world.

People can undercut all they want, the only thing it'll do is make the competition match or beat your price. In the end you're just cutting down your own profits as well as the competition. I for one only match, I don't undercut because I believe in fair trade, not being ruthless and try to put people out of business. There have been a few price wars on Radiant in the last like 1.5yrs I've been selling, and each time profits drop but sales continue. Only reason I can still sell is because people keep buying. Customer satisfaction and marketting are keys. If people like you, they will be loyal and keep coming back.

So instead of trying to drum up business by just undercutting, try providing great service and keep at it w/ advertising. Without advertising, no one will no you're there and without great service people just won't come back again. Harvesters still sell well cause there's always new players and new crafters, otherwise the idea of the harvester biz eventually dying would have already happened. So it's all about attracting new customers and keeping the ones you've got. Undercutting just hurts yourself and others.

Advertising and service are the hallmarks of your business. How you choose to advertise and what kind of great service is for you to figure out. My clients keep coming cause they know I'm there, cause I've always been there and I've always got what they want. I'm not against competition, I like it and I've made some great friends of architects. I've always liked that some of the friendliest people were the competition. =)

Well I must say you guys are great. I fully expected to have you guys rip me a new one over that post. I guess my perspective is different cause I'm a small operation still. I've been driven by the need for building capital quickly to expand. Now that I have more cash maybe I can get my stock up and get more in line with prices. I must say though that I never under cut very badly on things but I'm having a hard time getting my head around a 250k harvester lol. Now if it was the old days on Radiant when harvesters went for 100-120k then maybe. But they routinely sell at 75-90k now for 13's. I'm going to trythe price range others have setthough and see what happens. Time will tell if they will come. Thanks for being so civil with replies. As I said I fully expected to be flamed to oblivion. lol