Business And Economy Archive
Thread: Vendor Search: Working out fine? Or to early to tell?
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Tumbler2002
Mon Mar 28, 2005 2:29 pm
#1
I remember a lot of people warning that adding the vendor search will cause massive price wars and cut prices down so low it would be almost impossible to make a profit.
So far I have seen my prices go up, and my sales go through the roof. I have expanded my business location and plan to add another merchant tent on another planet asap.
I'm wondering if the folks against this change have a different view now? or see bigger problems in the future?
So far I have seen my prices go up, and my sales go through the roof. I have expanded my business location and plan to add another merchant tent on another planet asap.
I'm wondering if the folks against this change have a different view now? or see bigger problems in the future?
Phaelyn
Mon Mar 28, 2005 6:14 pm
#2
Tumbler2002 wrote:
I remember a lot of people warning that adding the vendor search will cause massive price wars and cut prices down so low it would be almost impossible to make a profit.
So far I have seen my prices go up, and my sales go through the roof. I have expanded my business location and plan to add another merchant tent on another planet asap.
I'm wondering if the folks against this change have a different view now? or see bigger problems in the future?
Only the extremists were saying Price wars would ensue. What MOST of us said, and it DOES hold true is that an entire line of skills in Merchant have been completely devalued, and the other 3 lines have seen an impact as well. Shopping from the bazaar, nobody cares what the vendor looks like. Shopping from the Bazaar, it doesn't matter if it's an NPC or Bulky Vendor. Shopping from the bazaar, nobody cares anymore about empty vendors..
The other thing many of us said is that the interface would be hell - And it certainly IS. Page changes don't bring up new items. This is a system that was NOT thought out to give everyone benefits, period.
Pawlin
Mon Mar 28, 2005 6:56 pm
#3
Its certainly not the end of the world, but its also a little early to tell in general.
Some people over reacted a bit before the change was implemented. But it wasn't all just extremist alarmism. The potential for price wars was and is still a valid concern.
I'm still pretty sure this won't be a healthy change for the architect profession as a whole. Demand for a lot of our products is already low and our business is already pretty sensitive to price competition. This certainly won't help us in the price category.
My main architect business so far seems to have ground to a halt but I'm at the high end of prices for my server. One of my peers just dropped his prices about 33% to undercut the bottom of the market... If that isn't the first shot in a price war than I don't know what ya'd call it.
But things are different from server to server and profession to profession though. This will impact the Chef business on Bria a lot differently than Architects on Kettemoor.
Dawgypoo
Mon Mar 28, 2005 7:47 pm
#4
My sales have gone up and I have not changed any prices. Now most of it has been loot, but some of my med stuff and resources have sold to new customers also. So I have to say I like the changes so far!
bluejanus
Mon Mar 28, 2005 9:35 pm
#5
Pawlin wrote:
Its certainly not the end of the world, but its also a little early to tell in general.
Some people over reacted a bit before the change was implemented. But it wasn't all just extremist alarmism. The potential for price wars was and is still a valid concern.
I'm still pretty sure this won't be a healthy change for the architect profession as a whole. Demand for a lot of our products is already low and our business is already pretty sensitive to price competition. This certainly won't help us in the price category.
My main architect business so far seems to have ground to a halt but I'm at the high end of prices for my server. One of my peers just dropped his prices about 33% to undercut the bottom of the market... If that isn't the first shot in a price war than I don't know what ya'd call it.
But things are different from server to server and profession to profession though. This will impact the Chef business on Bria a lot differently than Architects on Kettemoor.
I'm the peer that Pawlin is talking about. My prices haven't stayed the same since I started architect. To compete with increasing competition I lowered prices before and after competition slacked off, raised back to my former prices. Yesterday, I decided to match or beat some of the other lower priced architects. Pawlin maybe be correct and this is just a slow period for architects, but I decided to make changes in advance of a suspected price war. My architect sales have been very slow. Most of my architect sales after the change have been via regulars. I'm still registering good revenue but that would be for resource sales (my business is 50/50 for architect/resource sales).
Two of the competitors I matched or beat are durable competitors, not fly-by-night hologrinders. It's too easy to compare now, it'd be foolish not to compare in such a small offering market like architect.
A contact on Naritus says the price war there is underway for architects.
Message Edited by bluejanus on 03-28-2005 08:35 PM
GraySeven
Mon Mar 28, 2005 10:20 pm
#6
I've made more credits since the change. Granted, its still early, but I've no complaints...
Well, outside of the fact that Merchant is being killed, sort of. I still need multiple vendors, and I really like having the planetary ads and the maintenance break, but Merchant needs some revamp to remain a viable profession in the face of this change.
Or....make the GWS option a Merchant skill. I don't understand why the Dev's are against this.
Phaelyn
Mon Mar 28, 2005 10:27 pm
#7
I'd imagine because the "Dabblers" in Artisan and Merchant far outnumber the dedicated Merchants. People have been asking for increased item limits, more visibility, etc for a while now - The majority of them were NOT Merchants.
GraySeven wrote:
Or....make the GWS option a Merchant skill. I don't understand why the Dev's are against this.
Vrond
Tue Mar 29, 2005 8:14 am
#8
On the first day it worked ok I could look and find everything I wanted with a bit of effort. Since then it has stopped working the only items I can see are the ones inside the major NPC cities. So right now all they have done is upped the cap on the the bazzar.
Drusan
Tue Mar 29, 2005 9:31 am
#9
So far so good. I've spent a few million on resources that I could never find before and at a good price. It's just so much easier to find stuff and my own stuff is selling well.
They really need to rework the bazaar now though and find a way to incorporate a search function or make more subdivisions to categories. I'm sick of going through 3000+ items in one category.
Yrab65
Tue Mar 29, 2005 10:23 am
#10
I've not noticed any change in my business from this and I must admit I like the ability to browse all vendors myself.
Just one thing I would like different. The ability for the search to be more specific. Paging through 2000 items of resources while looking for something is a right pain. 
IntoTheGarbage
Tue Mar 29, 2005 6:38 pm
#11
Drusan wrote:
So far so good. I've spent a few million on resources that I could never find before and at a good price. It's just so much easier to find stuff and my own stuff is selling well.
They really need to rework the bazaar now though and find a way to incorporate a search function or make more subdivisions to categories. I'm sick of going through 3000+ items in one category.
Me too. Finally able to build level 6 droid components with no difficulty. It may be expensive to buy the resources, but I can now find them. That said there are still problems.
- The search is clunky at best. As was pointed out earlier, changing pages does NOT bring up new items.
- Custom named items are difficult to identify, the 'variation of' characteristic should be one of the vendor listings.
- Finally, there is information overload, we should be able to limit the search to a single item.
- Woops and I almost forgot, this really should be a merchant skill. It makes sense to give it to the merchants, and denying it to them is a major merchant nerf.
Message Edited by IntoTheGarbage on 03-29-2005 05:41 PM
ipeacefrog
Wed Mar 30, 2005 2:47 am
#12
All I know is that my vendor sales have dropped dramatically since the change.
I have S'Mart vendorson Scylla @ Imperial Outpost onDantooine, Bestine & Helios on Tatooine & STC on Naboo.
I suppose it's time to check out the competition and see what adjustments need to be made.
Magwise
Sat Apr 02, 2005 9:35 am
#13
I had a spike in ship sales after the update, but then it has plummeted and I haven's sold ANYTHING for THREE DAYS!!! I think there are some bugs that are snowballing.
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