Taking the fun out of shopping

I am the first one to admit that I am a shopoholic, but when I find prices for clothing jacked up, it takes the fun out of shopping. I applaud those of you who are keeping your prices low. I refuse to pay for an item that is outlandishly expensive. Ok, sure, maybe it would be a couple of dollars in US currency (and sometimes less) but every little thing adds up. I check the forums on an obsessively regular basis on new releases and I jaunt all around SL to see all these new items. But I will leave a store in disgust and empty handed when I find the high prices. Again, thank you those of you designers who are not jacking up your prices. I hope you appreciate my business as much as I appreciate your creative efforts. Uggg at the rest of the designers. LOL Ok I had my moan, hopefully these designers will hear my cries and lower their prices to be shopping friendly.

I don't understand. Do you mean that people have increased their prices due to the falling value of the Linden? I have not observed this happening (at least yet).

It's happening everywhere.

Really? Must be that I'm not much of a shopper. I'm usually too busy either building something or writing an article.

Its about time people start raising their prices!!

Not everywhere, Angela, just in those motivated by rl money. those of us (like me) who create for the sheer joy of it and keep lindens in world will keep our prices low. Keep looking around!

Its about time people started LOWERING their prices.

For me always being broke really takes the fun out of shopping.

Partly that, but most of the shops I've visited haven't raised the prices on their standard items.

What's gone through the roof has been anything with flex prims. Flex hair, flex skirts, flex robes, flex wings -- for some reason "flexy" is the new "sexy", and I've seen designers charge up to $700L for a flex prim skirt.

Needless to say, they don't get my business. Part of the challenge for us Shopaholics is to find good prices to go along with good quality. I've seen good flex-prim outfits going for $300-400L which, to me, is a fair price if the textures and design are high quality. (Kudos to Simone here, I bought several of her outfits yesterday and she always has great stuff at a fair price.)

I keep my prices low, but then I'm not in it for the money. This is an attempt for a self-sustaining hobby for me, so I have no problem just keeping my prices low. The only time I plan on selling my L is to pay the teir.. if then. Otherwise, I spend as I get.

well i have not raised my prices i actually lowered my prices with in the last few months





may ask why do you make it seem evil for people to be making real life money from second life. My first and foremost reason for making the clothing i do make is for the shear joy of it.
I make the highest quality clothing i can muster and spend oodles of hours making them and marketing them. the pittance i get in rl $ compared to the hours and hours i spend making Crucial Creations really is not that much at all.

just because someone makes real life money in second life does not make them evil.

i will say that there are profiteers in second life but not so much in the clothing design area most people that make really nice clothing are good at what they do because they enjoy making the items that they make.

Flexi prices will drop as the market saturates. I'm working on a basic low prim floppy ponytail (for men) myself. Probably sell it for 50L, and only that high because of my trouble finding a good hair texture..

Never said it was evil, just that they can find lower prices at peoples shops whom create to create, and don't cash out.

To me, raising prices because of the so-called "falling Linden" is simply stealing.

It's all about the greed.

In the first place, despite copious threads every single day about the falling Linden it has only recently, (and very slightly) begun to fall anyway.

In the second place, in RL, the reason a company raises prices in such a situation is that their costs go up and the cost of producing their goods is higher. There is no parallel in SL to this effect. SL "goods" are created only once, allowing the maker to produce infinite perfect copies thereafter. The cost of "producing" them is usually paid back with the very first sale. It is also especially heinous to charge more Lindens for something that you have made long before the cost of the Linden went up.

In RL, it is the idea that the price of a product should be "whatever you can get for it," (a radical Capitalist stance of the last 50 years or so), is what is at fault. A product should really only be worth what it costs to produce said product plus a reasonable profit margin (the original capitalist stance).

In SL there is not even this excuse.

I haven't changed prices in going on 2 years.

igh: Its too bad ExxonMobileBPAmoco can't say the same...

It's supposed to come out in the wash Angela. The linden costs less than it did a few months ago so you can afford to purchase more of them for the same amount of US dollars. Are you telling us that prices have increased more dramatically than the linden has dropped? I have to ask not being a shopper myself.

My prices increased under 1.10 but only because I rescripted the plants to add optional fireflies, flexibility, and tinting. Time was also spent rebaking several of the older textures and cleaning up the code so that they a bit less laggy and less likely to crash. For instance you can also drag copies of them across the landscape now rather than having to rez each copy from inventory.

I can imagine that others have raised their prices a bit after this release because of hours of work devoted to rebuilding and improving their products. Good Luck balancing you linden purchases with your shopping habits. Hopefully it'll all fall comfortably into place for you.

In photoshop: start with blank image. add noise, auto contrast, mosaic, threshold, gausian blur, motion blur. Add highlights by hand, drawing across in linear/colour dodge modes, warp filter to wave it slightly. Composite a few layers like that, tweak it a bit... there's your hair texture ^^

Danke:0 will do.

None of my favorite designers have raised their prices. As a matter of fact, last weekend Simone had a huge half price sale!

The people that say it's happening everywhere are lieing in an attempt to make you think everyone is doing it.

Let's analyze this. I have to use rough figures of course.

Top & pants outfit - $L 100 ($0.28 US)

Cost to produce:
-1-2 hours of designer's time depending on if they bake their own base textures, etc. More if very elaborate hand detailing. (entry level graphic artist makes about $15-25/hr depending on where they live)
- Upload fees.. I can't remember ever getting something perfect on the first upload... $L 50 average.
- 10 minutes prepping for sale, creating box, setting perms
- 5 minutes to shoot box cover, then $L 10 to upload pic.
- 15 minutes to update vendor locations, including SLEx and SLB.
- 5 minutes to post new ad to forums
- % of total advertising costs including classifieds, and anything like Metaverse Messanger and Snapzilla.
- % of any capital investment like Photoshop or Poser
- % of computer expenses purely devoted to SL creation.. hardware, ISP charges, electricity
- % of time spent for customer service

It takes many sales over time to get back what a creation actually costs if you figure in everything - like a business would. Which is why most content creators do it for pleasure as well. SL content is still a bargain.

Nope. I could care less about making RL money. Don't need it. What I do care about is paying for my sim, so I don't have to spend RL money. It looks like price hikes will definitley be necessary to do that at some point.

same here

I to have noticed that anything that has flexi.. the price is jacked up.. why I dont know..
My own flexi hair is only 150L and non flexi is 100L been like that for 6 months and I wont change it. I will never raise it. Like I said almost 2 years ago, my prims shoes will always be 200L and they still are, expect for the ones that come with accessories etc... Clothing is between 50L and 120L. I like selling quality for a lower price. I get great feedback from others, thanking me for not charging an arm and a leg.

I have noticed that in the last 8 months or so.. greed has really come out in sl.. what a shame

time=money

I agree, and it's getting old.

It's all about the Benjamins...

Yes time is money.. but... if you make quality products, then... i would say your turn around would be quick... so why charge so much??