OFB Business Type Questions
Kyna:
I have a startup business lot that I used for Mary-Sue, and have lotbinned an unplayed version of it for use when needed. It had to be cheap as most of the premades are dirt poor.
It's an outdoor 3x1 lot, with 2 tiles of wall at one end of it. The hammer & sickle and wall phone are on one side of the wall and the open/closed sign is on the other side of the wall. The BRY controller and other hacky objects are at the end of the lot behind the wall. One counter with cash register on it. And then flamingoes, at ridiculously expensive, all over the rest of the lot. I do cheat, by using TJ's energy sculpture on the lot.
I make sure the sim's needs are up before I send them there, and send them home when their bladder and/or hunger needs get too low, until I can afford to add a bathroom.
If the sim doesn't have family that can help I hire a townie when the business is around level 4 or 5 to help out. By the time it's level 10 and sold (to a customer at ridiculously expensive) the sim can afford to buy a regular business.
I haven't used it since installing Seasons, and I'm not sure how it will go. Maybe if I add a weather controller to stop any storms, and don't run it in winter it'll be ok.
Count Four:
What's with employees in small businesses? Screw that. Get the owner a servo, get the servo a cash register badge and let it stand at the counter all day while your sim does sales. No stupid employees, no paying stupid employees and if the servo gets an idea to go make sheep tongue fillets, you can cancel it. And when you go home, park it in a corner and tell it to power down. Unless you trust it to do the housework.
I fucking hate employees.
J. M. Pescado:
Quote from: Hook on 2007 May 10, 02:57:27
I must be doing something wrong, because I've run many businesses, never charged more than average, seldom used anything but "basic sell", and have always made money. Never used any of the shiny macros to help the business along either. Some businesses have snapdragons, others do not. The ones that don't will require you send employees on break at least once per day, but they go eat, pee and play without problems, and come back to work when they're feeling better without my asking. If you have an employee who can't get his motives green on his own, replace him. Just make sure you have everything he needs to get his motives up.
Problem is, they don't manage to do this in the limited time they have, and don't efficiently manage their time. Also, they still eventually all stop working despite having everything.
Quote from: Hook on 2007 May 10, 02:57:27
Since a lot of my business sell things to other playable Sims, I'm not going to jack the price up just to make more money I don't need.
But I *LIKE* inflation!
Quote from: Hook on 2007 May 10, 02:57:27
For example, one business is a flower shop, selling mostly catalog items but also snapdragons. Got a cashier, a salesperson, a manager (who is assigned to stocking), and most recently another employee to make snapdragons so my playable Sim doesn't have to do it all day and all night (after she goes home for the day) to keep up with demand.
Snapdragons currently run for $5000 apiece. Screw $500. That doesn't even pay for the time and effort it takes to make them. And you know what? That's a perfectly fair price. Servos? $50K. Maxis seems to think a measly $6000 compensates for the effort it takes. Screw that. :P
Quote from: Hook on 2007 May 10, 02:57:27
A real estate business, either out of your home or on a community lot, is special because it doesn't need a cash register or restocking. You simply go to the phone and buy the lot back from the community (after selling it to some Sim) and place it for sale again. You might want to make a few smaller commercial lots for "speculation" so you have something to sell.
Real-estate is as good as printing money, what with the endless swampland scam.
Quote from: Hook on 2007 May 10, 02:57:27
Restaurants are a pain. I ran one once, but got tired of it quickly.
BRY is absolutely essential for a restaurant, due to the sheer amount of labor involved, and the terrible efficiency of Maxis code that runs employees at this. Otherwise there is simply no way to make a profit with employees sucking down a minimum of $15/hr apiece. Even if you don't use any employees, it doesn't pay for your time.
witch:
Hook, I don't understand what you mean by depreciation at midnight. This will be affecting the vampire-run lot overnight I guess.
How does one sell real estate - do you display the deeds and sell those? I've never tried that business.
Soylent Sim:
Hook's plan involves selling the business after a day's work to cash in on the stars earned as well as the actual money made through "normal" business means such as sales or venues. The reason depreciation hits so hard is that the combined depreciation of everything on the lot eats into your profit margins. If you're the sort who pays attention to such things, this scheme also seems prone to memory spam.
Putting deeds on display is the most obvious way to do real estate, and the one that allows for a good markup, but using the Hook method you can earn a fair profit by just selling the deed from your inventory. It all depends on if you want to put aside the time and effort to make a space for this sort of thing.
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