KittyCatS! Market Improvement Suggestions

[Unicorn Blackburn]

First of all ty for all the responses.

I hope EVERY marketplace and KittyCatS! will respond to this thread.
I did discuss this matter with Equinox Pinion and she suggested to open this thread.
So it is not like I am trying to back stab KC.
This thread was meant to open discussions on what we can do to help ourselves and KittyCatS!

With that said, we all need to do our part and that includes KittyCatS!
Help us keep you in business... show some acknowledgment of our efforts.

With the United Kitty Friends we have managed to unite 3 marketplace with blood, sweat and also much fun...
We do have a lot of auctions however we also used to be 3 marketplaces.
We have already given away 3 auctions to the Co-Op, however what is the use if someone else just jumps the auction.
This won't reduce auctions just re-arrange them.
We could discuss transforming auction times to classes, fishing events or whatever else we can come up with.

All in all we do need to work something out that benefits the KC community.

Generally speaking, it sucks that to know there is so much backstabbing, jealousy and threatening going on.

:idea:Say what you think with all honesty, but do it out in the open.
I am missing cooperation and talks face to face rather than putting one another down.
If this changes then maybe things will pick up and get better and return the fun to all of us.

A team is only as strong as their weakest member and it can only work when everyone is communicating and get to voice their opinion and agree on it or even disagree to come down with a final decision...TOGETHER!

A team has rules and they apply to all team members.

Wish you all a HAPPY breeding Day :-)

[Malayaa Resident]

Hi,

I've been breeding KittyCats for almost 3 years now (not as long as some!) and the main reason I got solidly into breeding was stumbling across the Nachts and Kitty Kottage and their educational KittyCats classes, which were fun and informative and then going to their auctions and feeling like part of a community. The suggestions in other posts (both in this thread and other threads) to enhance the KittyCats experience for new breeders by creating social and educational events I think have a lot of merit. Megapuss races, fishing, hunts, photo and collar contests and classes...The new coop could be a positive force for a multi-sim KittyCats experience, anytime you can get people working together and sharing ideas, its a good thing!

Breeding costs have actually dropped a bit since I started, due to the KittyCats innovations with the low 2 prim modes and then the online cattery, eliminating the need to rent land for the gazillion cats we all seem to wind up acquiring I remember having giant platforms in the sky with 500+ prims of cats to rearrange and pair together LOL.

Dropping food costs might seem like a good idea, helping the breeders that run their cattery like a business. But for those who do this as a hobby or use outside income to play with, this could result in thoughts of "oh great now I can afford to keep more cats in my cattery", and subsequently even more cats on the grid LOL. However, if there is ever a food or permapet sale, I will be TPing to the Main Store in a heartbeat.

I vote for new menagerie cats too! I am saving my boxes ...

[jwenting Resident]

remember food sales are what keeps KC in business more than anything... I'm pretty sure they're not surviving on selling starter cats, especially with cheap kittens being in the market.

The main problem for the commercial breeders isn't food prices, it's the number of commercial breeders as compared to the number of potential customers.
If you're breeding 100 kittens a week (and the really big ones probably do more than that) and there's 100 of you (and there may be more) you're flooding the market.
I seriously doubt there's that many potential sales (those 100 theoretical breeders would together produce 10.000 kittens per week, 520.000 per year).
And that's just the big breeders. Add a few thousand more who produce 10 or so kittens a week and there's now 25000-40000 kittens per week, millions per year.

[Beryl Landar]

Thank you Unicorn, and all those that have responded. I especially love reading the insights of those that have been breeding for 3 or more years. It truly helps us that are more new to the game.

Here are some specific suggestions that I would like to see:

~Ability to transfer food in world that we purchased when we were breeding on land, back into the online cattery if we want to, and maybe vice versa. That would be VERY useful.

~Searchable database of each of our KittyCats pedigrees, and have it go back 4 generations. This idea came to me when I knew I had a fur in one pedigree, but couldn't remember which cat it was! lol

~That the cats eat food slower (food lasts longer). as well as milk. Food and milk prices can stay the same.

~More KittyCats Main store events.

~New and interactive Kittycats accessories, at least once a month. We still will benefit from people going back to the main store more often, to keep interests sparked.

If I think of anything else I'll post it here on this thread. This is a wonderful idea, and I'm glad we are trying to come to agreements, together.

[LyricaBlues Resident]

Quote:In general, it would help if the cats stop being able to make so many offsprings, somehow reduce the cats flooding the market.

This is something I totally understand in a very real sense...Overbreeding destroys any breedable market whether SL or RL. There are just so many "homes" to go around and even with most of us having hundreds of cats, that is not even a small percentage of the tens of thousands produced by just a few thousand breeders each month -Nevermind the total population of box makers! So it should not surprise anyone that the market is littered with kitties and causing many to sell fairly high quality cats for 50-75L and therefore further depressing an already depressed market.

So, I would think its in our best interest to apply some Real Life selective breeding strategies here on SL...I know these are just pixels, but the economic damage is real...i'm jus sayin....

[Shamu077 Resident]

(10-06-2014 12:59 PM)PrettyPoizen Resident Wrote:  

Quote:In general, it would help if the cats stop being able to make so many offsprings, somehow reduce the cats flooding the market.

This is something I totally understand in a very real sense...Overbreeding destroys any breedable market whether SL or RL. There are just so many "homes" to go around and even with most of us having hundreds of cats, that is not even a small percentage of the tens of thousands produced by just a few thousand breeders each month -Nevermind the total population of box makers! So it should not surprise anyone that the market is littered with kitties and causing many to sell fairly high quality cats for 50-75L and therefore further depressing an already depressed market.

So, I would think its in our best interest to apply some Real Life selective breeding strategies here on SL...I know these are just pixels, but the economic damage is real...i'm jus sayin....

Well the real solution lies in Real Life as well: Eliminate the "birthing" of KittyBoxes and ONLY allow live kittens to be born from breeding.

Now the cats get old and "die", or at least become pets. The tens of thousands of Kittyboxes being displayed as musuem pieces at the secondary market sims would be useless. Probably give the boxes a 3 month grace period before they no longer "Unpack".

The only exception would be starter boxes which might contain new traits, including the SE Collection cat boxes. KittyCats could still compete with breeders by selling the collection cats for a Limited Time, meaning NOT an entire month.

The old unpackable kittyboxes not unpacked during some grace period could be sent to the menagerie for $K credits, which would also be able to purchase food for the Live cats.

Of course this does not fit the highly profitable business model for the KittycatS owners, and the secondary market owners would scream about losing the rent from their museum shops. Live cats as 2 prims would need to replace the kittybox business for them.

This will never happen, since it would solve the oversupply problem at the expense of the sim owners and kittycat owners, and make the real breeders think before breeding another kitten.

But think of the effects - old traits could truly become extinct unless some breeder keeps the line alive - by breeding live cats. Rare retired traits could still be gotten from older Special Cat Kittyboxes, which would retain the ability to be Unpacked. Now the special cat collectors might have a reason to birth their dusty boxes.

As far as the rest of the discussion - I take offence at anyone who claims breeding is only a hobby and you have to be stupid to think you can even break even. If you run your breeding business as a business, it is still possible. But remember that 90% of all small businesses fail anyway, in RL or SL.

Shamu

[Ayaami Resident]

(10-06-2014 07:23 PM)Shamu077 Resident Wrote:  I take offence at anyone who claims breeding is only a hobby and you have to be stupid to think you can even break even. If you run your breeding business as a business, it is still possible. But remember that 90% of all small businesses fail anyway, in RL or SL.

100% Agree with this. The reality of it is that the KC community would be a hell of a lot smaller if it was certain that no one could never earn a single $L from it again...

Don't say "it's JUST for fun" and "ONLY a hobby".... The moment you opened a shop and/or profited from your "hobby" it became more than JUST that....

[Tad Carlucci]

I agree. To honest, there seems to be a misconception that it should be a guaranteed money-maker.

There are certainly those who do more than simply cover expenses. But they WORK at it.

The vast majority rent a shop, plop out a pile of boxes, and expect the money to roll in. Ain't happen'n!

It never ceases to amaze me when I check when the last object was placed in a shop and it's been MONTHS. Seriously? The tier is paid every week/month/whatever, but NO objects placed? Frankly, when I see that I carefully forget the owner's name because I really don't want to know if they're one of those who complains so vociferously about how poorly the markets are doing and how they never make enough to cover their tier.

[LibGwen Resident]

I've only read up to partway through page two of this thread, so perhaps someone has already said this:

I don't get it. People in this thread keep suggesting things that would help them make more cats for a purportedly saturated market, e.g. cheaper food, cheaper limited editions. How would putting more cats on the market help? It won't help you, because you'll have even more cats not selling. It won't help the market, because there will be even more cats not selling.

If you really think there are too many cats on the market, you need to *reduce* the number of cats on the market. In real life you would spay and neuter; in SL that's turning off Breeding (which also cuts food consumption in half). Also, the Menagerie tigers take pressure off. I'm wondering if people don't know about them? Or are tigers a glut on the market? Or are they fine but perhaps there should be another item with a lower goal that more people can reach--aside from the entire storeful of food, milk, vitamins, wearables, and decor that one can already get with menagerie money? So few mention it, I'm wondering if they even know about *that*.

(Edited to add: Hm, reading a little further, I'm concerned about how some owners regard the menagerie. Several posters give the impression they would never ever menagerie, which in principle is fine, except those same posters seem to expect other people to quickly buy up the surplus cats that they themselves wouldn't buy from other people. Folks, you're making your own problems. It's unkind to regard other people, including the KittyCatS company, as a bunch of pigeons for plucking.)

[Shamu077 Resident]

(10-06-2014 11:01 PM)LibGwen Resident Wrote:  I've only read through partway through page two of this thread, so perhaps someone has already said this:

I don't get it. People in this thread keep suggesting things that would help them make more cats for a purportedly saturated market, e.g. cheaper food, cheaper limited editions. How would putting more cats on the market help? It won't help you, because you'll have even more cats not selling. It won't help the market, because there will be even more cats not selling.

You should keep reading through Page 4. I offered a "radical" solution, and so far no one has commented on it. It would ruffle too many feathers to actually force the removal of the excess kittycat boxes on the market, even with a good incentive to do so, I guess.