Don't forget to account for the amount of griefing you will receive if you have an outpost open to all members. You might want to wait until the dragon egg update comes out so you can protect your land from the griefers. As for the franchise idea: Good Luck! Many people have tried. It is almost impossible to keep them all stocked and actively selling unless you play minecraft 24/7 with employees doing the same.
Buying a shop out with the intent to resell is a really quick way to guarantee you'll have your /move permissions removed on that residence.
[v.] buying a shop out: Paying the owner of a shop a sum of money so they will discontinue the operation of a business. [v.] buying a shop: A fair exchange of money between an investor and a shop owner resulting in the investor receiving the shop's profits and paying the former shop owner a fair salary to run the shop. It's irrelevant, I've decided against it anyway.
I don't know four words can be a verb, but anyway. As ignoramoose just said, buying a shop out involves buying out all the stock VERY quickly, which I know you won't do, as you want to make money, not spend it...
If that's the case, I'm sort of lost as to what I'm meant to do in terms of having shops in the servers.
Setting up a average sized shop on your res is one thing. What you're planning to do will need constant attention.
My advice: Start slow. No need to rush into trying to build a shop franchise immediately. Start with a server that needs a good stocked shop and build a modest building with about 20-30 items. The big mistake I see people do is try to start big. It takes them a heap of rupees and loads of time to just build the building. Instead, you start small and use the profits you make to expand into other areas. Example: Start a wood shop on smpX. Sell all logs and planks. Find a price for wood that people will pay to have it. (In my opinion about 23r for 16 logs is tops, but each server is different.) Then once you earn a good profit, lets say 10k, you expand to include a stone section and repeat the process. Another thing you want to do is start by just selling the raw materials (logs and planks only in this example). Not everyone is going out to buy wood doors and if someone needs doors, they can always buy the raw wood from you. People that want logs cant buy doors to make them. So back to the plan. Start off small, expand with the money you earn. Then once your shop has expanded to include all items you want to sell, then try to start up a shop on smpY to start your franchise. Just a side note, try building on the next server like you did with the original. Start small while you build the building. That way, the stock of your original shop doesn't falter while you are making your second. Rinse and repeat for other servers if you want. However, if you reach the point where you cannot keep up stock, don't make the mistake of still trying to build on more servers. At this point, you have reached your obtainable maximum and if you go past it, you will suffer a greater drawback. Understocked shops are known to be out of stock and most people won't waste the two seconds traveling to the shop to check. That's my shop tips for now. If you have any more specific questions, you can reach me in a private conversation and I'll at least give you my viewpoint.
The outpost will be occupied by at most 25 members, who will mainly conduct themselves from there, not bothering with the outside, with the exception of one messenger, who will travel to and from the outpost with auctioning resources. The messenger will not be able to manage all shops on their own, which is why we need a fair external system allowing us to commission non-LSCC members to run shops for us using our resources. Franchising won't work, corporatism won't work, and I'm struggling to find something that does.
I've thought of trying to employ a "runner" who would take items from the places where I'm working in the Wild into Town, or from Town into the Wild for a fee. I have so many chests of things in the Wild it's not funny: mining by product, like cobble , and grinder drops mainly. All of it is valuable... but more valuable if it were in Town. I've thought some of how I would pay them and we would arrange the pickups and that's where I usually let it go. I've just never come up with the right person for me. There would have to be some level of trust, since they would have to at least go partway to locations I would mostly like to remain anonymous, and some of them are a long boring trip. Instead I just bring things in as I need them, and let friends know if they want the stuff they can haul it. I think the key problem might be in how I've been defining it as a "Runner" instead of a person making a "Run". Most people aren't going to want to spend all their MC time running in tunnels and vaulting blocks. On the other hand, I'd bet most people do this for themselves regularly so maybe a team of people could share the responsibility of a business of this sort and be successful at it. If someone were to start this sort of business(Hint, hint), I think it could be quite popular if done right. I feel I definitely have a need for it.
Just have to say this. I was on smp2 one day and felt like saying something and asked AlexChance if I could buy his shop. His answer: For 20,000,000 possibly.
I don't know him personally, but he really seems to enjoy the economy aspect of EMC and has invested a lot of his time into it. I think this was his way of saying "No!".
Laughed wayyyyy too hard at this. In all seriousness, I wish to pose no risk to the economy, and I repudiate any attempt from others to do so. I merely wish to participate, like everyone else.
