Shipwright Archive
Thread: Don't sell chassis, for the love of all that is sacred!
IIscandar
Fri Mar 11, 2005 8:53 pm
#40
This thread leads me to believe the following conclusions:
1. Crafting chassis to master shipwright, produces some lower quality results since most are made with grinding quality resources.
2. Resource quality does make a difference.
3. Running your business selling chassis alone, is not profitable.
4. Selling chassis in addition to your components adds value to your business as a one stop shop for parts.
5. Personal attacks have no place in business that's why they are called personal 
Some good info in here, and some good thoughts. Let's leave it at that or offer more constructive thought.
Message Edited by IIscandar on 03-13-2005 11:13 PM
Subcriminal
Sat Mar 12, 2005 1:50 pm
#41
here's some more general stuff:
1) Always use subcomponents in your ship parts if you want them to compete with most of the average loot. Yes it's a pain, but do it anyway.
2) Throw a mark 3 armor reinforcement into mark 4 armor and you have better "light" armor than you would if you used a mark 4 mass reducer. Dittums for mark 2, 3, and 5. Similar principals apply to other ship parts. Tinker and you'll see.
3) Make sure you have your shop set up in a high-traffic area, people are lazy and don't wanna travel far to get what they need. Sure, you can still get a decent amount of customers if you set up shop inthe boonies, but you have to work harder to market yourself and get people to come to you. It's easier and you'll get more sales (overall) if you find a prime location- save yourself the headache if you can.
Message Edited by Subcriminal on 03-12-2005 03:51 AM
Zavits
Sat Mar 12, 2005 11:57 pm
#42
I guess I'm just the odd one then... I'm working my way to Master SW just so I can make my own YT-1300. If I can sell parts and services along the way, cool, if not... oh well. 
DiceDuP
Sun Mar 13, 2005 6:00 pm
#43
DarkRDeepSea wrote:
I took up Shipwright for the love of the art. It just happens to make me a modest income, but i'm sorry, some of the prices I've seen on Chimaera for basic chassis are just scandalous. It seems to me that a lot of people smelled SW and thought 'hey, a fast buck' then started whining when they weren't making as much money as their WS or AS friends, or as fast. Or at least not enough to feed their non-crafting alt.
My personal aim is to have more stock than anyone else, at a better price than anyone else, with a more personal service than anyone else. This surely is the same criteria for most crafters who AREN'T in it just for the money. I find the whole undercutting argument redundant, excuse the pun, but I just don't buy it. It's not hard to undercut someone who is charging stupid money for a chassis, just by charging a REASONABLE price for it? I make my chassis and parts from the best stuff I can find or mine. If I knew I was putting cack in, regardless of the result, I'd just feel guilty selling it... lol.
If you offer a good service, word of mouth will aid your business and wrench it away from the careless Space Cowboys whose heart wasn't in it from the offing. I, for one, am in it for the longhaul because it's what I love to do. I like to think of all the people using MY parts and MY ships with MY name on to have fun with, and pride alone would be enough even if I only broke even (which some months, is the case!). Sure, it can sometimes feel like a chore- but seeing the finished results, and how pleased people are with them, makes it all worthwhile. If someone came to my Mall and said 'hey Deep, have you got XYZ chassis?' and I replied 'Nah, no profit in it' it would speak volumes for my atitude. Put it this way, if I was the customer, I'd probably walk. Anyone who knows me knows the pride I take in my business, and my ever lengthening repeat customer list is testament to that.
/moral highground off
Those who will never drop Shipwright because they love it, stand firm and weather the storm, stick to producing quality goods at reasonable prices and you'll be just fine (this INCLUDES chassis). Those who took it for fast money then realised it wasn't so fast after all, I have no sympathy for you whatsoever.
I am on the same server as you. I charge more for my chassis and parts than you do, and I sell out of my parts every 3-4 days and have to craft 4-500 parts every time to replace it. I stock 3-4 BP's of every ship there is. I very rarely ever advertise my SW services on the forums, I never spam in starports, or have a barker droid.
So, why do people still buy their items from me knowing that they are more expensive? Ill tell you why. Coz i use matching component levels for the parts they relate to. I use resources I know would sell for 20cpu if i wanted to, and basically the quality of the parts I sell far out-stat any other shipwright on the server. People WILL pay a lot more for chassis and parts that give them a couple of K' extra mass, or say, 19.5k energy off a reactor than to goto a SW that sells sub-par items for 1-2cpu just coz he thinks he is clever. If you take REAL pride in what you sell, get on the forums or visit some resource sellers - pay 20cpu for the res and then sell your parts for 1.75cpu. You wont last long, but at least you will feel a "sence of pride" coz u have provided a good service eh?
The other reason people shop with me is the fact they know 9/10 they will ALWAYS find the part they need. Selling at a stupidly low CPU sure will lead to you selling more, but it'll lead to you getting more and more frustrated customers who can't find what they want when they want it. A fair profit margin + quality resources = quality parts sold to more satisfaction for the customer. The better you craft the chassis the more they can fit in it - the higher quality the parts are - the more parts they can use. This leads to easier progression thru the tiers, and that is what makes them happy.
I've been SW since beta, and master since day 1 of the US release date, in that time i've seen every single decent Shipwright this server has had quit. Not coz they were after a "fast buck" but because lo-ballers are the scum of the earth who don't have the brains to realise they are involved in an economy where instead of having insecurities about people in your profession by constant vendor visits to under-cut them, they ought to be concentrating on quality of product and their own business. your comments and your sig to me shows that you do have some of these insecurities.
Message Edited by DiceDuP on 03-14-2005 01:05 AM
Message Edited by DiceDuP on 03-14-2005 01:07 AM
Ewach
Sun Mar 13, 2005 6:37 pm
#44
PaleGT1 wrote:
Crafter A: {SNIP} For whatever reason, this person is more prone to buy the resources required to build their stuff as they might be in a tight squeeze with their housing lots.
Crafter B:{SNIP} By harvesting their own resources, they are getting resources for dirt cheap at far less than 1cpu. They can set their prices however they want, usually lower than Crafter A types.
PaleGT1 - The flaw not address in your post is that the resources mined by Crafter B have a market value. That market value being what the Crafter A's of the server would pay if the resources were sold in a vendor or on the bazaar.
So Crafter B is taking some commodity, putting in labor (time & energy) to turn the raw resources into a final product and then selling that product for less than "market value" of the raw resources.
Give me ANY long term example of where this could happen in a true (RL) market. Any businessman that sold goods for LESS than what the inputs were worth would not be in business for very long.
Unfortunately, there's a very poor representation of overhead in the SWG virtual economy so people can get away with such ridiculous business decisions.
Subcriminal
Mon Mar 14, 2005 7:47 am
#45
From her past posts it's clear that PaleGT1 has no concept of, and is complete denial of resource value.
Ewach wrote:
PaleGT1 wrote:
Crafter A: {SNIP} For whatever reason, this person is more prone to buy the resources required to build their stuff as they might be in a tight squeeze with their housing lots.
Crafter B:{SNIP} By harvesting their own resources, they are getting resources for dirt cheap at far less than 1cpu. They can set their prices however they want, usually lower than Crafter A types.
PaleGT1 - The flaw not address in your post is that the resources mined by Crafter B have a market value. That market value being what the Crafter A's of the server would pay if the resources were sold in a vendor or on the bazaar.
So Crafter B is taking some commodity, putting in labor (time & energy) to turn the raw resources into a final product and then selling that product for less than "market value" of the raw resources.
Give me ANY long term example of where this could happen in a true (RL) market. Any businessman that sold goods for LESS than what the inputs were worth would not be in business for very long.
Unfortunately, there's a very poor representation of overhead in the SWG virtual economy so people can get away with such ridiculous business decisions.
IIscandar
Mon Mar 14, 2005 8:18 am
#46
Sub, I understand tensions are high regarding that matter, but let's get back to business. People can learn. Not that I have any say it of course. Just suggesting.
Calvintus
Wed Mar 16, 2005 2:52 pm
#47
PaleGT1 wrote:I, as both a pilot and shipwright, am glad someone decided to do this so-called "undercutting". Othwerwise, I'd be ready to buy yet another Nova Courier and the price would probably be well over 10 million. That would put the price of a Z-95 at roughly 1 million. I make all my ships in practice mode, i'm not in it for the money, hehe.
Wow PaleGT1. You really don't know too much about your profession. A Nova Courier takes 150k Resources. A Z-95 takes 5k. Resources. And why would you buy ANOTHER ship if you are a shipwright? And last but not l;east you practice made tier 4 ships? You ARE AN IDIOT!
Now I've seen too many idiot shipwrights (and pilots alike) ruin the profession on Farstar. This is the server flooded with amateur shipwrights like nobodys business. They figure it's an easy grind, and they give up halfway through.....Dumping their blueprints on the intergalactic bazaar for 1k. I routinely buy chassis for low low credits, only to destroy them. Today I bought 2 chassis for 1 credit each! What else did I buy today.....Hmmmm A level 5 re'd generator for 6k. It was an awesome piece. over 14k generatin rate. I'm going to dump this into the chassis dealer for 5k, because I dont sell what I dont make. So if you want to sell your blueprints for 1k or so...I'll keep buying them and destroying them. Pretty soon, you'll soon go broke and leave the profession. Too many children don't understand the game economy. If they were in business in real-life, they'd be in the poor-house very quickly. So go ahead. Keep dumping your stuff on the bazaar so I can destroy it. And thanks for ruining the economy on Farstar. You guys suck.
PalpGutz
Wed Mar 16, 2005 8:55 pm
#48
I've sold chassis since day one, on my vendor I only keep a few low level ones that go with some low level parts, chassis will NEVER make me a profit from a vendor HOWEVER when I have people asking me for a ship, or they want to know what I have, I give them a quote that covers the cost of my resources (1-2 CPU) and a bit of a profit for myself, this is almost always T3 or higher ships. Basicly Chassis for me is only upon request, my vendors are stocked with parts, missiles, paint kits, etc.. which brings in a nice steady income. It took me 12 mil to grind out SW, I rerolled a FS character for the one I have now and gave up a ton of other stuff, but so far I'm happy with it. I get good word of mouth advertising, I have (in my opinion) good prices and it's worked out for me on Intrepid. Most of my friends have also gone SW as well and we're all fairly happy. The key is to remember it's more about helping the other guy out than making a profit, if you're in it for pure profit you're missing the important part of this being a GAME and COMMUNITY.
There's my 2 cents, but um.... yeah, chassis are decent upon request only.
4Bidden
Thu Mar 17, 2005 12:20 am
#49
My main business has always been architect and selling resources. I never had SW as my main means of making credits. My biggest problem with chassis is that it takes only resources to make, and doesn't require quality resources. If they added components to assembly of chassis, it would increase the work load, and in turn, increase the price. Make it to where people need to go several steps to make a chassis.
Jagged-F3l
Thu Mar 17, 2005 12:11 pm
#50
I make ship chassis out of grinding quality resources and sell them for 3 CPU. I don't make much per chassis, but I do keep enough stock to satisfy a shopper looking for a particular chassis.
amandastarcrest
Sun Mar 27, 2005 9:44 pm
#51
Gold mine? I did not say or suggest thatchassis sales werea gold mine, conversely selling chassis will not drive a novice SW into a fast bankruptcy either. The impression I gave the novice SW wassimplyif they were to offer a variety of items in their shop, they could also profit from the sale of ship chassis. The title or your post implies that having a chassis on a vendor will guide the novice SW right to the poor house, which is misleading and dishonest on your part. Since my initial reply to this postI have found that the more chassis I stock the more I sell (who'd a thunk it), but w/ minimal effort on my part I move 5-6 blueprints a week and that is'quite well' imo.
Subcriminal wrote:
amandastarcrest wrote:
I do quite well selling chassis, of course that's is not all I sell, but since I mine my own resources I can afford to sell high quality, high mass chassis using good components at around 2cpu and never more than 3cpu. Since that is what I'd sell the resources for it works for me. The key is having other items to sell in my shop to supplement and compliment my chassis sales. I sale about 5-6 chassis a week and w/ the dwindling number of pilots (it seems) I think that is a fair percentage of the chassis sales on Ahazi server.
If you only sell 5-6 chassis a week, then it's your ship components that are your bread and butter. I'dprobably conclude that your statement"doing quite well selling chassis" isa bitmisleading. Don't give newer shipwrights the impression that chassis are some kind of business gold mine, or that it's easy to profit selling them. We all know chassis are a hard sell in light of all the undercutting. Any novice SW who would like to run an accomplished business is going to need honesty from those of us who have been around the block.
Message Edited by Subcriminal on 03-09-2005 04:24 PM
:** A'manda Starcrest **
BonesDragon
Mon Mar 28, 2005 3:20 pm
#52
I'll throw in my $0.02 here...
I'm a relatively new SW. I've got a long way to go on the grind, but I can make up through Tier-4 chassis. You might accuse me of being a "lowballer", but let me explain a few things--
Firstly, I didn't start with a resource stockpile or lots of money. I could afford harvesters, and that was it. Since I run my own harvesters, if you ignore the cost of buying the machines in the first place, it costs me less than 0.2 cpu to harvest the material... even including running the fusion generator to power it all. If I sell a chassis for 1.2 cpu (which I'm doing with most of my grind chassis.. I'll probably raise prices later), that's a 500% markup. I don't see a problem with that. They're cheap chassis in more ways than one though, since the mass is on the low side from using grind materials.
People will pay insane amounts to have slight advantages. People want the best. Even though the difference in chassis quality is minimal, it makes a difference for a lot of pilots. I can't compete with established SW's who have good quality materials, and lots of time to craft quality parts. I'm a more casual player, and will never offer such a wide selection or high quality merchandise. Even with the vendor search, I only sell one or two Tier-1 chassis in a week. I don't have much of a business, and that's fine by me. I'm doing it for the fun, not the money. And at the rate I'm going, the grind will have taken 2-3 months by the time I'm done.
But also remember, a price crash on chassis was inevitable, since they generally don't wear out, and people get rid of them quickly (when they level up and want the next ship). It's hard to compete with deeds on the bazaar from pilots who just want to unload their old chassis.
And others have had the right idea here... if the chassis isn't what earns you lots of money, use it more as a general service for your customers, so they have a one-stop shop. In the real world, there's also something known as a "loss-leader". That's an item that you sell AT A LOSS, to get people into the store and to buy related accessories. Chassis may soon fall into this category.
Anyway, I certainly won't be impacting your business. Actually it's quite the opposite.
I'm a relatively new SW. I've got a long way to go on the grind, but I can make up through Tier-4 chassis. You might accuse me of being a "lowballer", but let me explain a few things--
Firstly, I didn't start with a resource stockpile or lots of money. I could afford harvesters, and that was it. Since I run my own harvesters, if you ignore the cost of buying the machines in the first place, it costs me less than 0.2 cpu to harvest the material... even including running the fusion generator to power it all. If I sell a chassis for 1.2 cpu (which I'm doing with most of my grind chassis.. I'll probably raise prices later), that's a 500% markup. I don't see a problem with that. They're cheap chassis in more ways than one though, since the mass is on the low side from using grind materials.
People will pay insane amounts to have slight advantages. People want the best. Even though the difference in chassis quality is minimal, it makes a difference for a lot of pilots. I can't compete with established SW's who have good quality materials, and lots of time to craft quality parts. I'm a more casual player, and will never offer such a wide selection or high quality merchandise. Even with the vendor search, I only sell one or two Tier-1 chassis in a week. I don't have much of a business, and that's fine by me. I'm doing it for the fun, not the money. And at the rate I'm going, the grind will have taken 2-3 months by the time I'm done.
But also remember, a price crash on chassis was inevitable, since they generally don't wear out, and people get rid of them quickly (when they level up and want the next ship). It's hard to compete with deeds on the bazaar from pilots who just want to unload their old chassis.
And others have had the right idea here... if the chassis isn't what earns you lots of money, use it more as a general service for your customers, so they have a one-stop shop. In the real world, there's also something known as a "loss-leader". That's an item that you sell AT A LOSS, to get people into the store and to buy related accessories. Chassis may soon fall into this category.
Anyway, I certainly won't be impacting your business. Actually it's quite the opposite.