Civ 3 Discount for Fanatic's Members?

[Sxythots]

I am at a loss TTG as to how we as a group would not be able to take our business to another supplier OR how we would miss out on buying Civ III. It seems to me that we are the customer (albeit a reseller)... if one supplier isn't willing to provide the product, we will simply find another that is(like maybe Walmart). If in the end, it turns out that no one is willing to be a middle man for us, then we always have the option of setting up our own business & ship the product ourselves (I have ideas as to how to go about doing this but would rather try the easier route of having someone else do it for us first)

We have just over 2 months before Civ III is released. I think it is time to actually start moving on this as we need to contact the other sites, gather orders, and make arrangements with the providers, not to mention clearing this with the moderators to use the Fanatics name as a business, arranging where the cash will be held, etc. Then would come the 'buy from us' motivator of arranging a tournament for those who do buy from us.

I am willing to start the ball rolling on this but have a problem in that the majority of this will be occuring during a time when I will be moving into my new house. When not at work or commuting, I expect to be busy either ripping down the old place or setting up the new (and all that entails). What we really need is for a group of us to co-ordinate our efforts towards that end.

Do we have any volunteers willing to contribute some of their time and effort? (even if only in a limited capacity)

 

[BlueMonday]

OK the business man has kept quiet long enough. My take on this; It's not going to work for several reasons:

<u>Number one reason it won't work:</u> Investment Capital -we don't have any. In order for us to set this up we need money to buy the entire infrastructure. Civfanatics doesn't even have enough money to cover the cost of wholesale pruchase. If You buy 500 units at wholesale (say $25; a number which is just a bad guess on my part) that will cost $12,500. I know TF doesn't have that kind of scratch on him. The only option to get that much money would be to take it out on loan.

<u>Number two reason it won't work:</u> Warehouse space. Five hundred units requires warehouse space, unless TF wants to spend the rest of his life using civ 3 boxes as chairs. Getting warehouse space requires even more money at a monthly fee. Unless CFC starts cutting a good profit right away, we go right into the red.

<u>number three reason it won't work:</u> Shipping. Shipping 500 units to the warehouse alone will cost hundreds of dollars (more money we don't have). Second, we'd have to contract a shipper to get it out to all the customers (unless CFC has a worldwide delivery net that I don't know about) and about half of those customers would not be domestic shipping. From NYC a package of Civ 3's wieght (shipped UPS) will get to California by ground in six business for about $6. Upgrading to three day will cost about $10; 2 day $15; and next day $35. (I used UPS's quick cost calculator and an Atlanta to Salt Lake trip because I didn't know Zip codes for New York). Those are very substantial shipping costs just for domestic shipping. Now if it were going to Europe that cost would increase two or three times. And if we shipped Fed Ex then the cost would double once again.

<u>number four reason it won't work:</u> E-business infrastructure. Add this to things we don't have. Substantial programming would be required to set up a page on CFC that could take and process orders. That would cost more money, not to mention that it would take some time -and money- for us to link electronically with credit card companies for CCN verification (a necessity for e-business).

By the time we add in all these extra costs (shipping, warehouse, e-business page, interest on the loan) we would totally negate any reduced cost we could offer unless we wanted to lose money. In fact, after all those costs we might even have to sell it at a higher price just to break even.

I have, of course, left my biggest problem with this plan for last: Customers...I don't think we have them. We have 1700 members here at CFC, only a hundred or so are active. I don't think many of us would buy through CFC when we can just make a trip down to the mall and get one. I sure won't, I can have the game in fifteen minutes by going down to Media Play instead of waiting four-five business days for UPS to ground ship it. And like I said, all the cost will negate any discount, so why should I bother paying more for a game through CFC when I can buy it at regular price at a store fifteen minutes from my home?

Now, as for linking to another site which sells the stuff. That's fine with me (we should leave the marketing to people with the money and infrastructure), but it won't bring a discount to the price of the game. An internet retailer is not going to allow a link site to sell one of their units at a discount from them. It's unheard of.

There are only two ways to sell through CFC. One is to start up our own business where we buy wholesale and resell it. That won't work because of the additional costs and risks of E-business. Not only that, if we started up a CFC vendor it would be extraordinarily stupid to JUST sell Civ 3. The only other option is to go through another internet vendor, that won't work either because he won't allow us to sell it a lower price than what he does.

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[starlifter]

Now that the Optimism is out of the way, GBM, so what's the first step for CFC to offer great deals on Civ III?

I was really worried at first that it might be impractical for CFC to get its members a great Civ III deal, but I see you've only found a few minor hurdles.

So can we pre-order Civ III from CFC? <IMG SRC="http://forums.civfanatics.com/ubb/wink.gif" border=0>

EDIT: Spelling

[This message has been edited by starlifter (edited July 15, 2001).]

 

[TTG]

I can understand them not being convinced by my uninformed doomsaying, but BlueMonday's response makes a lot of sense and he's obviously done all the research. The mindless mob is still not convinced, though. It's really quite sad.

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Civilization I Master of masters and webmaster of Civilization III Arsenal
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