There are many reasons that you may want to buy a shop or stall. Some people get into it just to see what it is like, others buy them to build whatever the product maybe for their crew at a discount rate. Those are good reasons to get into shop keeping, but thats not what I am here to talk about. I am going to talk about keeping a stall for another reason, the profit. Nothing about running a stall guarentees that you will make any pieces of eight at all. Getting a shop to become profitable requires forethought before you even click the button to buy the place.
It is very important that you identify your profit before you start anything. This means stop and think, look around the islands and see what the prices of various resources are. You need to find a way that you can make a consistant profit. This means its time to break out the calculator. The ability to generate a profit anywhere you notice that you can provide something someone is looking for at a cost less then what they are willing to pay. Sorry for the economic lesson but its just a matter of punching in the numbers. So its not the carpentry puzzle but you still need to make the pieces fit.
It is important to remember that just because you have a shop or stall doesn’t mean that you have to make and sell everything that the place can produce. Infact this often makes it harder to profit. If you are trying to make a good consistant ammount of poe from your shop it may be better to just stick to doing one or two things that you know work out well. I have had stalls my self that have only ever made one kind of product.
There is one form of loss that can be easily prevented, the loss caused by theft. I follow one very simple rule, no managers. Why? It is quite simple really, the same reason I wouldn’t give a complete stranger I had only met in an Internet game the keys to my car. Making someone a manger for the sake of a title on their information page or because they are in your crew is simply an invitation to be robbed. The manager of a stall has the ability to sell any stock in the storage of the store and take any poe in the coffers. There are times when managers are necessary, such as at a busy shipbuilding shoppe, perhaps even a very busy shipbuilding stall. But these situations are the exception, be sure to take the rules about access to the coffers into consideration and take some measures to take care. The bottom line is be very careful and selective of the people that you make managers in your stores.
Now Captain Krakenhead is going to dip into his booty here and I’m going to give you a free business tip. I have been able to make some decent poe on this business opertunity. There is always some poe to be had by making small cannonballs. By using the deluxe ironmongers stall you can pump out litterally hundreds of small cannonballs at a profit of several poe each. The best part about it is that the stall requires absolute minimal management work. Just make sure that you order more small cannonballs regularly and the factory can chug along.
Some people are probly looking at me and waiting to ask how exactly that makes poe. Well there are two options there. You can always sell these things dockside. You can either hold on to them and wait for pillaging crews to buy some up when they restock their ships, or you can sell them off to other people buying them dockside. If you sell them off to other iron monger stalls you will usually make one or two fewer poe per small cannonball compared to selling them to a ship that is restocking.
This is particularly easy on Hunter ocean because there is an island with cheap wood and iron all the time. Just make sure to choose your labor rates carefully and you should be able to start a little poe factory.
When you are starting up it is imporant to select labor prices that will allow you to produce your small cannonballs. The important one for this is the basic labour rate. You will want to charge a rate that will attract workers, but still allows you to make a profit. You can also get a little tricky here, if you don’t intend to use your stall for anything else other then making small cannon balls. Sometimes you can attract more workers to your stall by inflating the wages for skilled and expert labor here. Since you aren’t going to be making anything other then small cannonballs you won’t be using those anyway. The large numbers look good to people so they may be attracted. Now don’t go and be a bilge rat here either, still be sure to pay a fair wage for the basic labor that you will be using.
The only thing you really need to remember is that really basic economics lesson in the beginning, your profit is the poe you can get minus the poe you must spend. Break out the pencil and note pad and do your research and you can run a profitable stall. The first place to start any new puzzle pirates shop business is really at the YYPedia. Just add up the cost of all the needed supplies and labor and then make sure that someone is willing to pay more then that to you.
Happy Sailing
Captain Krakenhead
