While shopping around on the half a dozen or so planets I regularly visit, I notice one thing, everything is so expensive. I can understand how some late game items could reach into hundreds or even thousands of coin per one, but even early tools such as iron hammers are sold in most shops I visit for over 100c apiece. Most of the time, when I need a few items, the prices are so high, it’s just more feasible to go solo, since buying a reasonable stock with coin can take a huge chunk or all of the meager sum I’ve managed to scrape together over the two months I’ve been playing.
To say the least, it’s disheartening. So I have a question for the community:
I think there are more shops that have outdated pricing than not. I don’t sell tools, only ingredients. My prices are generally based on other local shops. I don’t try to undercut, but I also recognize coin scarcity and try to price accordingly. Iron and copper tools, at this point, should be marked under 100c and probably more likely below the 50c range.
I’d say that 100c isn’t a lot of coin. It IS overpriced, in my opinion, but scrounging together 100c shouldn’t be difficult for anyone. You get that much just for logging in and playing each day.
I would say generally, that prices on average are below where they should be, because we have a bit of a glut due to what I call “The Forged Tool Bubble.”
If you struggle to buy 100c hammers, then you may need to participate in the economy a bit more from the bottom. Check around for request baskets with money in them, and for resources you know you can gather, and then go grab some of those things and sell out. You should be able to afford iron tools pretty quickly.
All that being said, I tend to calculate prices based on the cost of the materials and the amount of time it’s going to take me to gather and craft the item.
I’d estimate my cost of making 1 iron hammer, without mass craft or anything, to be around 45c. I’d probably sell at about 70c.
You also have to see what your competition is doing. If everyone is selling at 100c, and they’re actually moving merchandise, then maybe you could afford to sell at 85 or 90c and increase your profit margin a bit, while also undercutting your competitor.
I base my crafted products on prices of the raw materials, tax and time to craft it.
Raw material prices are either what i think they are worth or average sold by others.
Best advice I can give to any aspiring shop owner is to start with selling raw materials before you get into selling finished goods. You’ll gain alot of insight and data into what sells and at what price. From there, you can pivot over to finished goods which makes it easier to get into.
If, however, you want to dive deep into finished goods from the beginning, then I suggest creating spreadsheets and enjoying it. Otherwise, you will be at a severe disadvantage. Sure, you can do what 80% of shop owners do and just price comparison shop but it’s a shortcut that hurts you in the long run because you don’t truly understand the value of raw materials and your time.
This will come into play if you have to get into price wars with competition and try to either undercut or price match. This can really hurt you depending on whether you gather everything on your own or try to buy via baskets or direct buys. Both have their pros and cons.
I’ve seen many a shops try to be the cheapest by gathering everything on their own but they inevitably get their stuff bought out by competition. This hurts them they can’t sell their goods to the end customer. No one likes walking into a shop with empty stands.
And someone who always tries to price match or undercut can actually lose money if they source alot of their materials through a 3rd party. They never did their homework on material cost so they are simply reacting to competition.
You also should check out the Boundless Discord - Shops and Trading channel. People are always talking about what they have to sell or what they want to buy in there and you can usually find people who are willing to budge on prices when you’re talking to them!
I personally price items in my shop at about 20-30k per hour of labor it takes to gather, sometimes I add a modifier if I really don’t like gathering said item (subtracting expenses obviously).
I don’t need a ton of money, nor do I have dreams of hording millions of coin, and I really just use coin as a vehicle to add a minor bonus to buy items I need more of. For example… If I’m mining for gold and I get gems, I just try to sell whatever extra gems I get for a nominal amount of coin (usually 25% below market) and then use that to fill request baskets for more gold.
Usually I determine my values based on the lowest averages I see; averages I’d be willing to pay myself for certain items.
At the moment though, I’m underpricing most things at my shop however, because:
It mostly pays for what I want to buy if I sell some of it.
It gets shifted quickly.
I won’t use all of it; some of it is extra stock I’m not using, which I can let go;
For example, I have for sale some titanium furnaces that are cheaper than averages I see, because I already have 5 of them and I don’t really use them all the time, so these 5, if they sell, great, because I wasn’t using them. If they don’t, I can still use them if I decided to.
I’ve never had more than 45k of coin on me at any one time, but I have probably spent around 200-250k in total over the last month and a bit. As long as I’m selling enough stuff to buy what I want, I’m content.
The only caveat is that I won’t underprice certain items because they already have a low base worth, where a 1c is a reasonable difference in price, since there are no fractions of coin (not suggesting there should be).
Id say i have ‘average’ prices… most things are cheaper than average, but things im low on stock are higher, or things im using and dont really want to sell are overpriced. It always varies depending on what i feel like gathering, what im using, how much stock, others prices, and how popular things are etc. Constantly adjusting things.
I look at market average (as best as I can determine…), put up for sale at 10% or 15% lower than this, then just keep lowering prices till they sell.
Some coin is better than no coin.
Lot of other factors that can help sell though…no use having the cheapest prices if nobody ever visits you.
After the game has been out a while and there is a lot of experience around, iron is one of those things only new players buy. Worth having around on stand with normal yams and other early easy ingredients for cheap,like 49c. Cost me about 2c to make an iron hammer or less, without mass crafting.
I think a huge misconception is that this game always has had a great economy. This is not Sim City. This game is designed for everyone to enjoy building stuff. That’s the main meta. A resemblance of an economy exist solely because not everyone wants to craft, and some of the crafters do not like to get their own goods sometimes. Also there are some pretty good forge masters that are consistent, and some people do not want to labor over a forge.
This is not a economy game. There are only so many items in the game. Most of which can be obtained by anyone. However there is full reason to have shops. People eventually need stuff. At first everyone jumped into the idea of having the best shop in the game. But there can only be so many shops. So the convenient ones, and best stocked and best priced ones will be the ones that stand out.
In this economy one needs to know what the crafters are burning through most. But at some point everyone needs to go outside and gather and hunt and play the game.The shops are only there for convenience.
At some point though a profit has to be made. While it’s nice to buy them at 60 - 80c , what’s the point in actually making them for a handful of c profit. Folk tend to forget that although Iron is easy to get and wood for sticks is also easy to get etc etc. It does still need to be gained and that takes time and effort.
I think the average price for Iron tools is around the 100c mark which seems fair to be honest.
It’s very easy to make so rather than trying to buy at 10c, why not make them yourself
