Critterman's Modding Site

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Table of Contents

Page 1..........Front Page
Page 2..........Introduction to Shop Owning
Page 3-4..........Beginning a Shop
Page 5..........The Basic Principles of Shop Owning
Page 6..........Customer Satisfaction
Page 7..........Shop Class
Page 8..........Item Price
Page 9..........Variety
Page 10-11..........Employee Management
Page 12-13..........Specialize or Generalize?
Page 14-15..........Buying from Suppliers
Page 16-12..........Tracking Shop Progress
Page 21-27..........What to Notice and Change
Page 28-29..........Why You Should Avoid Going Bankrupt
Page 30..........The Dark Side of Shop Owning
Page 31-32..........What Makes a Good Shop
Introduction to Shop Owning

Shop Owning is a life long ambition that once started is hard to stop. The twists and turns of business make it both exciting and painful. But in the end, if you become successful then it will be all the more rewarding.
This book will hopefully take you from a simple novice to a merchant ready to start his/her own shop. If were never interested in shop owning then you should still read on, because you might just realize the fun and exciting side of shop owning and want to start your own shop immediately. Though you are probably interested in shop owning since you picked this up and are now reading. That is good and I encourage you to never loose hope wherever the twisting road of business takes you.
Beginning a Shop

The first thing to think about when deciding to own a shop is money. In most cases you will need money to buy your shop. This is the most recommended thing to do, although you might be tight on money and decide to sell items from a market stall. Working from a stall might lend you enough money to buy yourself a real shop to work from, so definitely keep this option in mind.
Another option is to speak to your local banker or count. They might be willing to lend you a loan to buy your shop with. This option varies on location and the banker and count. Check around you town to see if this is a viable option. If it is then I will highly recommend it. It is much easier to pay every month than to completely raise all of the money up.
Of course you could buy a small building for your shop too. Some shop owners have even bought beaten up shacks and turned them into grand shops to save money.
Once you have secured a reasonable shop the next step is to decide on what to sell. This depends heavily on what your personal preference is. It might be wise to check around town and see what your town needs. Even though competition can be good for the consumer, it can drive up costs drastically for the shop owner. Being the only shop that, lets say, sells flowers in your town would make customers more likely to shop at your shop when they need flowers since you specialize in it. This topic is more explained in the chapter "Specialize or Generalize?." Also explained in that chapter is the benefits of being a general store.
Now that you have chosen your shop type you can create your shop name. It could be anything you mind can come up with, so try to come up with the most unique. Even though your shop name has really no impact on your shop, it is nice to come up with a crafty name for your shop type.
Next thing to do after deciding on your shop name would be to secure furnishings for your shop. TO BE COMPLETED!!!!! IF YOU SEE THIS THEN CONTACT CRITTERMAN AND REPORT THIS BUG!
Once you have done that then you are ready to let customers in. You should read on about the shop principles to get a better understanding of how shops work though before you sell to many things.
The Basic Principles of Shop Owning

In this chapter you will learn about how your choices effect your customers and in turn how they effect your income. This is a crucial part of shop owning and knowing these five principles will give you an advantage when it comes to competing with other merchants.
The five principles of shop owning are Customer Satisfaction, Fame, Shop Class, Item Price, Variety, and Employee Management. These five principles can be changed by your actions and all good merchants try to achieve the perfect balance between them all. All of these principles will be explained in more detail in their own separate chapters following this one.
Customer Satisfaction

This principle is the one that all good merchants want more of. It is how much your customers like your shop in general. This is influenced by everything you do and it directly influences your income. The higher the satisfaction the higher the income. So this is one thing you want to keep high. It is a gauge on how well your store is doing and tells you if you need to improve on something.
Shop Class

This principle is like customer satisfaction, in that you can use it to track your store's progress. A shop class is classified as lower class, middle class, or lower class. Unlike the other principles it is not necessary to keep this high or low. This can however can effect your income depending on your location. For example, if you live in a town where almost everything is in the slums and beggars fill the streets, then a lower class store would be advisable. If you had a upper class store in this town then not many people will buy things from you. The same goes for a lower class store in an upper class town. Most people do not bother with this principle too much as they get many different classes of people.
The only thing this principle effects is how many customers you get and in-turn how much income you receive. This principle is not thought of much in a Cyrodiil town, as many classes of people enter their store.
Item Price

This principle can make or break your store. This is a critical principle to think of when running your shop. This is the principle that is the hardest to keep in perfect balance. If you raise the prices you will earn more money for the people who buy the item but at the same time loose money because people will not want to buy such expensive items. When choosing to specialize instead of generalizing then you should try to raise the price a bit too. This is explained in depth in the chapter "Specialize or Generalize?."
If you lower the price of an item then you will get more customers but less money for each customer. If you balance it just right you can get many, many customers to come and get a reasonable amount of money for each item. Lowering the prices of items and combining it with lots of advertising is a good combination.
A good price to put an item at is 120% than that of the warehouse price. At this rate you are right in the median. Some merchants like to stay at this rate so they feel safe. But sometimes it is worth while to take the risk and raise or lower the price. Variety

This is a big part of being a specialty shop or a general shop. It is also another principle that is hard to keep at the right balance. This is where you choose whether to specialize in only a few items or being a "joe of all trades" and not be dependant on only a few items.
To specialize in a type of item you have to gather a lot of one type of item. Preferably you should gather the more expensive kind of that item. This is so that people will be more willing to shop at your shop to get a certain item than at general shops.
To generalize in all of the items you must try to gather all of the different kinds of items you can. Choosing to be a general shop will definitely be a big thing for this, as you will have access to all items. The benefits and disadvantages of this are explained in the chapter "Specialize or Generalize?" along with the benefits and disadvantages of specializing.
Employee Management

You will probably only come across this principle once your shop becomes ready to employ workers. To identify when it is time to employ workers, you can look at your stats (see "Tracking Shop Progress") and see if your shop needs it. This is generally determined by the stat "Employee Workload." This stat explains in percentage of how much effort your employees are putting into your shop. If you are working by yourself then this stat will show your workload. You will most likely want to employ an employee if the stat reaches over 80%. If you are working by yourself and the stat goes over 90% then you will start to experience fatigue loss. Don't be afraid of employing workers, this is a good sign that your store is becoming successful; it is only the side-effect of shop successfulness.
Once you employ workers you will have to pay them well and not let their workload become too large or they will quit and then go tell others of how you treated them lowering your customer satisfaction. 15 to 20% of the income should go to the employees. Going any lower than 15% will start to make employees angry, maybe leading to them quitting. Raising the pay over 20% will start to make your employees happy and this will increase their workload so you don't have to pay for another employee.
There are many stats that can be used to monitor employee status (how happy or angry they are) and their workload. You should always keep a weary eye on these stats once you employ workers.
Specialize or Generalize?

As you might have noticed, this chapter has been mentioned a lot in previous chapters. This is because this is a crucial part of making a new shop. Deciding which way to go can be hard as they both have their pros and cons. Hopefully, after I explain the benefits and disadvantages you will be able to decide.
Specializing is sometimes described as the risky way of shop owning but it can be very rewarding also. The benefits of going this way is that customers are more willing to pay more if they know your store's specialty is the item they are looking for. This means you can increase the price to almost 150% more than warehouse price. The downside of all of this is that the less variety you have the less likely a customer is going to need an item in your store, decreasing the amount of customers. Also sometimes your specialized item will raise in demand and you will have to pay more to keep your store supplied. In some cases the item you are specialized in could be completely extinct from merchant suppliers and warehouses for a few weeks or months. This is probably the most risky part of choosing to specialize but it is all dependant on chance.
Generalizing is a much more fast paced kind of shop owning than specializing. This is because generalizing will draw much more customers that specializing. This is one of the benefits of generalizing. It is also much less risky and if one type of item goes down the drain for a week then it is not a major hit to your shop. The downside is that you will receive less money per customer and if you do rack up the prices then customer satisfaction will drop because they are not willing to pay more money at a general store. General Shops rarely get to upper class because of this. It is much more cost efficient to buy the low cost items than the more expensive items that specialty shops would have in their supplies. It is also wise to try to increase customers in all possible ways (decorations, advertising, etc.). Since you can't increase prices too much when a general store you should try to get lots of customers flowing through your doors.
Hopefully you are now capable of choosing which way to go. If you aren't then you should try to find the median in between. That is a viable choice also. There won't be any benefits, but there also won't be any disadvantages.
Buying from Suppliers

To buy from a supplier you must fill out the order form in given to you by clicking it and transferring items you want from the supplier's supplies to your inventory. The correct amount of gold will be subtracted from your funds and you will immediately receive the items in your inventory. If you do not have the required amount of gold then the transaction will be canceled and you will have to either retrieve some gold from your bank account or earn up the gold to pay for the items.
The type of items that the supplier offers will vary depending on your store. If you own a general shop then you will have access to all of the items. If you own a beverage shop, for example, then you will only be able to buy beverages from the supplier.
Sometimes the supplier will not have the item you want. This is because he simply did not find this item in his/her travels or there is a shortage of that item. You can often solve this problem yourself by finding the item in the wilderness and adding it to your supplies. This brings us to another topic.
You have to add the items you buy from the supplier or retrieve yourself to your supplies. A good practice is to have a supply room or two, or a basement dedicated to holding your supplies as it can be an eyesore in the open. You buy supply crates, barrels, chests, cupboards, and sacks with your furniture. These containers that are designated as "supply" containers are the only containers that can be used to store shop supplies. These containers have a limit to how much weight they can hold though, so keep track of the "Supply Capacity" stat to make sure your containers don't become too full. You can always visit your local store to buy supply containers just like you buy furniture.
Tracking Shop Progress

You must track you shop progress often to have a successful shop. Fortunately we shop owners have devised formulas for this. You will receive a daily shop report every morning so that you can easily see what state your shop is in. There are many stats available for you to view and assess your shop's status. The stats and their descriptions are listed below:

Customer Satisfaction: Measured in percentage; the overall rating on how much people like your shop. Directly influences your income.

Shop Class: What class your store is (see "Shop Class" chapter for more info). Lower Class, Middle Class, or Upper Class.

Paying Customers: Number of customers that walked through your shop and bought something.

Total People: Total Number of people that walked through your shop, whether they bought something or not.

Shop Variety Class: Shows whether your shop is a Specialty Shop, and Normal Shop, or a General Shop.

Income: The amount of gold you received the previous day.

Tax: The amount of gold subtracted from your income for taxes.

Shop Management: Amount of gold subtracted from your income for general shop maintenance.

Employee Payment: Amount of gold subtracted from your income for paying your employees.

Loan Payment: Amount of gold subtracted from your income for paying off your loan.

Advertisement: Amount of gold subtracted from your income for paying for your advertisement.

Sale: Shows how many days left on a sale. Clicking this stat will let you start a new sale reducing item's prices a certain percent. You can only have one sale at a time.

Bank Interest: Amount of gold added to your income depending on interest and the amount of gold in your account.

Total Income Received: Amount of gold that you actually gain.

Employee Workload: Measured in percentage; how much effort all of the employees are putting into the shop (see "Employee Management" for more details).

Employee Status: An adjective explaining how happy or angry the employees are.

Employee Enthusiasm: Measured like soul gems (petty, lesser, common, greater, grand); how much work employees are willing to put into the shop without complaining. This effects the Employee Workload.

Employ Worker: Gives you a random worker who's initial status and enthusiasm will also be random. Their payment will automatically be added to Employee Payment.

Loan Amount Left: Amount of gold left to pay on a loan.

Funds: How much gold in your bank account.

Interest: Measured in percentage; this percent is the amount of gold you receive daily. It is a percent of the total gold in your account.

Get a Loan: Not a stat, but where you can request a loan from the bank. You cannot get a second loan until you pay off your first.

Withdraw/Submit Funds: Not a stat, but where you can add or remove gold from your bank account.

Advertise: Not a stat, but where you can send out an advertisement to every house in your town for a sum of gold.

Supply Capacity: The percentage of supply usage. this stat at 100% means that you are using up all of the weight in all of your supply containers.

Notices: Lists some of the province-wide shortages of items. Also shows recent events that happened to your store (robberies, employee quit, etc.).

Awards: Lists the awards given to shops in your town and in Tamriel. Updated weekly.

All of these stats can be clicked on for a quick explanation. Some of the stats can also be altered. What to Notice and Change:

The stats in the last chapter can sometimes be overwhelming, but in fact, they are very helpful to a merchant. Without them, it would be like trying to kill a bird with a bow and arrow blindfolded. There were many things mentioned in previous chapters on what to look for in the stats, so this chapter will cover the rest.
The "people" stats (Paying Customers and Total People) tell you how many customers you are getting. These stats can reflect many things so it is a good idea to watch them. If you have a low Total People number then that means you need more decorations (low is under 20), though this could also be reflecting your Shop Variety Class being "Specialty." Even with a specialty shop you should have at least over 15. If Total People is high that is generally good, but you should check with the other stat to make sure. If you have a low Paying People stat (low is under 10) then your customers don't like to buy your items, if you have a high Total People stat with this low stat then that means people are attracted to your store as far as decorations but they do not want to buy your items (this might be because your items' prices are too high). If you have a low Total People stat with a low Paying Customers stat then you are in real trouble. You need to lower your prices or get better items and get better decorations and advertise a little. If you have a low Total People and a high Paying Customers stat then you have good items but need more decorations and advertisements. If both of these stats are high then you are doing well.
Shop Variety Class is the stat that tells you whether your shop is a specialty shop a general shop or a normal stat. If you own a general shop then this stat will always be general. If you notice this stat is not what you wanted it to be (you are wanting to be a general shop but it says normal or specialty), you should either play along with it and change your habits to accommodate this change or stop buying too many or too less different items (depends on your situation).
All of the income stats (Income, Tax, Shop Management, Employee Payment, Loan Payment, Advertisement, Bank Interest, Total Income Received) tell you what you earned the previous day. The "Income" stat tells you how much gold the customers gave you. The rest of the stats (excluding Bank Interest and Total Income Received) are numbers subtracting from the initial income. Bank Interest adds money to the equation if you have money in your bank account. Total Income Received is the amount of money you got with the new shop report. Clicking the Total Income Received stat will give you an option to transfer the sum into your bank account instead of directly to you. It is always a good idea to have some kind of money in the bank because of the extra Interest you earn every day. These stats all show you how much money your shop is earning. You can change some of the stats so that you receive more money but get less customer satisfaction. It is generally a good idea to leave the income stats alone unless you are tight on money. Having a "Sale" is a good option when you are doing good on gold. This stat tells you how many days are left on the sale and clicking on it will let you fill out a form telling customers how much prices are reduced. Having customers will bring a swell of customers but you will not get as much gold per item as normal. Using this along with an advertisement will practically bring the whole town to your shop.
The next stats are "Employee Stats." These stats are explained in the previous chapter "Employee Management", but to explain here; the "Employee Workload" stat shows, in percentage, of how much work the employees are putting into the shop. If this goes too high then you should hire another employee (choose the "Employ Worker" button to do this), raise the "Employee Payment", or raise the "Shop Management." "Employee Status" tells you in an easy to understand adjective on how happy or angry they are. If this stat sounds nasty then you should consider raising the "Employee Payment" and "Shop Management" (the employees keep your shop clean). If the stat sounds happy then you will not have to worry about your employees, as they should have a bigger enthusiasm then an angry employee. That brings us to the next stat, "Employee Enthusiasm." This explains in a level (like soul gems) of how much work they can take. Making the employees happy will increase this level, and in turn reducing the "Employee Workload" so you don't have to hire another employee. You should keep watch over these stats, because having an employee quit is a nasty situation for you shop.
The next stats are the "bank" stats. These stats are probably the only stats that can be ignored without harm. Though I would not advise it, because you get benefits for adding money to your bank account. The fist one is "Funds." This stat shows how much money is in your bank account, so this does not include the money in your pockets and are carrying around. This is generally to keep watch on your funds and make sure you don't go bankrupt. Interest is the percentage of your total amount of gold in your account that gets added to your "Total Received Income" everyday. So if the percentage is 5% and you have 1000 gold in your account you will receive 50 extra gold everyday. The "Get a Loan" is a form you can fill out to receive some money to get out of debt or to get enough money to by that table for your shop. This is a useful tool when you are loosing money, but you must pay 10% of that loan back everyday. "Withdraw/Submit" is where you take out money and enter money into your bank account. Advertise is where you can advertise your shop, this is a great thing to use if you need more customers. There are few levels of advertising, choose one and pay for it the next day. All of these stats and actions can help you keep you self out of dept (see "Why You Should Avoid Going Bankrupt" if you are in debt).
The next stat is "Supply Capacity." This shops, in percentage, of how much room of your supply containers you are using. If this was at 100% then that would mean you are maxed out on container space and should buy more containers because you do not have any more room to store your items.
The next stat ("Notices") will show you (when clicked on) what kind of things are happening all over your province. If your store is located in Cyrodiil, then this stat is provided daily by The Black Horse Carrier. Notices of item shortages are usually found here, notifying you so you know why the supplier doesn't have that item you want. There are other events listed here as well. Sometimes your shop will get robbed or a employee will quit; those things will be listed here so you know about them.
"Awards" is the last stat listed on the daily report. Every week the Board of Tamriel Merchants votes on the best shops in the region. To be on the list of Tamriel-Wide winners is one of the best accomplishes a shop owner can make. If you are awarded one of these metals, then you know for sure that you are on the right path! Depending on the award you will get a metal or a trophy, and another prize pertaining to the category you won in. Along with the Tamriel-Wide winners are the town awards. These awards will be given out by your town's count every week. As a beginning shop you should be very much proud of one of these awards. Getting any award period is something to be proud of, so strive to accomplish one of these and get Tamriel-Wide recognition!
Why You Should Avoid Going Bankrupt

It happens often to small beginning shops and it is sad to see so much hard work get lost forever. Bankrupt is a shop owner's worst enemy and should be avoided at all costs. Being bankrupt means you loose everything; your shop, your decorations, and your bank account money. It is terrible but sometimes new shop owners get full of themselves and end up in debt. Hopefully this manual will help you keep out of this dreadful mess.
If you notice that the stat "Total Received Income" is a negative number one day then that means you need to gear up and do something fast. Luckily you have enough money in your bank account and with you to pay for the negative sum, because if you don't you are bankrupt. That is the definition of bankrupt; someone who cannot pay off their own debts. If you did have enough money then I advise to get a loan immediately, but please not that you pay 10% of that loan every day after that. So choose a sufficient number depending on your situation. You should look over your stats from the daily report and decide what you need. Do you need more people walking through your shop? Then advertise and buy decorations. Do you need people to buy your items? Then lower prices or buy better, quality items. Make sure your employees aren't too angry and overworked. Basically every situation is different. Reading through this manual should give you somewhat of an understanding of what needs to be done. So good luck and don't loose everything you worked for!
The Dark Side of Shop Owning

Unfortunately some shop owners choose to feed the evils of their town and become a drug trader. These shop owners usually mask their actual shop type with another so guards and other people will not know. The drug traders never really sell what their shop suggests they sell, only drugs. Whenever an honest customer enters their shop they usually say that they are out of supplies or they are busy. These shops only sell drugs to customers that have the money to pay for it. These kind of shop owners can often be very clever and hide their drugs in containers that do not look like containers at all (a chair for example). So that when guards decide to investigate their storage, all they will find is normal shop supplies. Hopefully you will not decide to wander down this dreadful path of shop owning.
What Makes a Good Shop

There are many qualities that make a good shop. One being a high customer satisfaction rating. A good shop takes care of their customers and makes sure they come back to shop again. Another is being the shop that your town needs. Being a general shop is sometimes not the best choice and depending on your location you need to specialize in a shop.
Depending on the path you took, specializing or generalizing, you should follow the qualities of that path. Favoring a few items while a general shop is not a very smart thing to do as you don't have access to the high quality items that a specialty shop would. Changing your initial direction of specializing or generalizing is not generally a smart thing to do. It is very difficult to change your shop type once you choose your shop type.
Employee Management is a very important part of shop owning. You must keep your employees happy or they will get angry and tear your shop apart from the inside. When employees quit they will tell everyone they can find that your shop is horrible and tell them to never visit the shop. This would obviously be a big hit to a shop so make sure you ensure trust in your employees and make them happy.
A good shop owner should be able to adapt to difficult situations such as item shortages. Buying other items instead and using the many options like "Sale" and "Advertisement" will still bring a steady stream of townspeople. Saving up money in the bank is also useful for situations like this. Having a emergency fund will help in item shortages or employee quits. Also, having a large sum of money in the bank will give you a significant amount of gold back every day.
Hopefully your shop will one day be awarded by the Board of Tamriel Merchants for all-around shop of the week. It might take a lot of time and patience but in the end you will receive gold everyday that you never thought that you could earn in a year. I hope this manual has significantly improved your knowledge of shop owning, and I wish you a good luck for you and your shop!

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