When I first started Eve, I was very intrigued as to how to run a market in isolated space. I have run a PI buying program in wormholes for a long time, and have more recently been seeding a nullsec outpost.
Recently I received an interesting juxtaposition of emails in the nullsec hub that I am seeding.
Email #1
SOV is changing and shit may hit the fan, If you got stuff in <nullsec> you don't want lost get it out now while you can. If you plan on not being around you may want to send you stuff to <highsec> while you can. Hope no one has to firesale there eve life.
Email #2
Attention
Someone is playing games in <nullsec> market and has bought up and relisted cruiser hulls to double their value.
If you need ships, there are builders that would love the business, don't get caught paying rediculous prices. Let them rot on contracts so that the numbskull who relisted them loses money.
Thank you, have a profitable day!
Details of systems have been obscured and who sent these emails are not included. Spelling error are (for once) not mine. For those that really want to know where I am in game, it's not hard to find out.
I had just manufactured several cruiser hulls and listed them on the market ... for double Jita price.
My market strategy is OK, but not brilliant:
- Find a T1 item not on market.
- Find a blueprint for that item (a while ago I went on an aimless BPO research spree that I am now tapping into, and supplementing with imported BP's)
- Buy raw mats locally
- Build it
- Sell it
- Find an item that can't be made locally (especially skillbooks)
- Import it
- Sell it
I use long sell orders, and revisit them very rarely, on average every 6 weeks.
When I am undercut, I pull the items from the market and put them into storage, and find something else to sell. I am also training for more trade slots. Far too often, then undercutter sells one batch, realizes it's work and then gives up. I then put my items back onto the market.
Some items move slowly. Some move quickly and I am not good enough at keeping on top of these. Some don't move at all and these are pulled from the market.
I have not 'flipped' anything in null. The closest I come is putting up buy orders on PI and then reselling it, and even that is currently rare. I don't have the spare trade slots.
I currently have 600 trade slots in null. Small fry for some of the bigger industrialist bloggers, but far exceeds most of the local players. Many of the better locals have 30 trade slots, and I encourage them to fill every one of them.
My strategy means that if I were not there, then no one would be selling those items.
If I wanted to make stuff for Jita prices, I would do so in highsec, with the risk that comes from being a station builder in highsec. Instead, I am currently trading in null, and add an 'at risk' component to the pricing. At the moment, all sales are re-invested into new raw materials or items. One day they will be taken as income.
I welcome people undercutting me. Buyers on the market use others undercutting as their trump card to 'force' me to lower prices, and find my attitude on this confronting. Sellers find it confronting because I should instead be defending 'my turf'.
Any seller, listing anything adds to the market. I have 600 market orders. There are thousands of items just in ships and their various fittings. Then there are just as many components in various stages of refining in order to make these ships and fittings.
For every item currently on sale in my nullsec patch, there are at least 2 other worthy items not being sold. I choose selling a new item that no one is covering over fighting over an existing one.
Buyers want to buy stuff. If there is no one selling it, they cant. My experience is that buyers want to buy complete fits. If they have to go to 5 different systems, they will often give up and wait until a jump freighter run, or simply go without. My experience is that if they can fit in one spot they will do so. If they come for a shopping trip, they also buy for their future.
There are some that think that Jita + 200% is too low. http://evenews24.com/2015/05/19/confessions-of-a-trader-you-are-blue-to-us-right/ makes for an interesting read.
So, if you happen to find yourself in a nullsec region, and you can not find what you want, at a price you want to pay for it, then import or build it, and put spares on the market.
I either don't have the patience or the skill for it but trading is less lucrative for me, i love the idea of juggling with numbers but in practice...
ReplyDelete200% jita price is justified? Are you friendly with the people on the station that you are 'seeding' (see "gouging")? Is your goal to build the station up, or to make as much isk as possible from friendlies, until the sov changes hands?
ReplyDeleteThe null sec station I am supplying is receiving goods at jita +20%, which is seen as fair universally, and allows me enough of a profit to continue to make and haul goods for the friendlies located there.
Crippling a stations market isn't seeding a market, no matter how you spin it
@anonymous. I think my prices are fair.
ReplyDeleteI am pleased you are finding you can supply your market at jita +20. I encourage others to seed at whatever prices they see fit. It sounds like you are pleasing all the people all the time.
I am not interested in trading at those margins, and would rather be doing other things.
I do need to restock. I am currently selling 515 unique items (and should be selling 600, the rest have sold out). Of my current trade orders, 315 have had some sales.
For these buyers, the convenience of my sale orders outweigh the costs.
Have you spoken with all your buyers? Any of them? Ask them if they are happy to pay twice the going rate for something just for the convenience of it being there. Pretty certain no person is going to want to line your pockets, especially when it's local blues you are ripping off.
ReplyDeleteWhen you have a chance, have a look at the blog 'are you blue to me'. It's a reflection of my stance when it comes to markets in allied systems, trading and selling purely with allied members. My logic has been. If I take a lot of money from people, and they can't afford to defend the sov of this system, then its a net loss for me.
@anonymous
ReplyDelete* Give yourself a psuedonym
* I have linked what I think is the post you are referring to in the main article, and came away with a view supporting what I am doing. If you are referring to a different post then please link it.
* I have looked at my wallet. I know what people are prepared to pay and not pay.
* I know that without these prices, I would not be in nullsec.
* I know that some are unhappy at the prices. Most of these players expect me to sell below jita, yet wont even sell the minerals they mine at any price.
* I know that others are very happy that I am providing the convenience. These are often the players that will sell me minerals
If your customers are unhappy with you prices, it is their right to not buy your product. The fact that they are still buying means that either 1) they are too lazy to haul their own things in, or 2) they don't mind the price increase. They are not being forced to buy, and there is a choice on their part. Nice work!
ReplyDelete