Latest trends in SL economy (shopping)

Just wanted to see what every one's opinion was about the latest trends with shopping in SL.
Since the economy is pretty flat by my opinion, knowing that many newbies that come to SL quickly learn to build themselves.

I've noticed lately a lot of businesses are lowering their prices to attract consumers, these are not freebie places, they are original items just at insanely low prices! Does it work to do this?

What about quality? I always wonder "if the prices are so low, the quality has to be crap then". Eh?

Things need to be fresh and new all the time I find. Items have a shelf life. Move your stores around.

There is a lot of price lowering because the majority of new players refuse to put much or any money into the game. They want to take out, but not put in.

Plus there does come a time when you just have all you need. I bought new shoes today, for the first time in a couple of months.

I appreciate everyone's comments so far.

I've been thinking of all this for the last couple of weeks while trying to improve our store.

stopped spending money since age verification was added
stopped spending money since all i collect is junk that never gets used
stopped spending money since it`s 1 of the 10000 things that i`ve allready bought
stopped spending money since why spend money?

got more then enough money ingame for 2-3 months of normal shopping, but why bother...?

According to the Economic Statistics from Linden Lab, which are probably slanted to make things look better then they really are, the number of hours users spend in SL is fairly flat but the number of dollars spent has been dropping significantly.



Complete statistics
http://secondlife.com/whatis/economy_stats.php

Complete graphs
http://secondlife.com/whatis/economy-graphs.php

Well you can't blame customers for thinking the same thing causing a downturn in your sales
Personally age verification hasn't been even considered in any purchase I made ever. I can't figure why age verification would affect me trying to wear a set of Australian flag swimshorts, or use a Roleplaying weapon, or fly a Space 1999 Eagle. The other reasons not to spend make sense.

I wonder if the drop indicates items are now cheaper or less items sold?

One trouble with the stats available right now is that US$ spent only goes through September, having been compiled in October. The drop after July is to be expected from the casino ban, the missing October and November numbers make it hard to see where things have headed since. The huge amounts that were apparently being thrown away by gamblers also make pre-September figures somewhere between hazy to useless for measuring what may have been happening with the rest of the SL economy.

Most newbies don't learn to build themselves. In fact, classically less than 25% of residents have been content creators, and the figure seems to be going down based on attendance at show and tells and similar events.

The main reasons for falling sales are IMHO: lower publicity for Second Life; a different kind of publicity for Second Life; the gambling ban making the real money to L$ link more definite; and the fact that it's Christmas.

I thought Christmas would increase sales a bit

Most people IRL go home or spend time with their families at Christmas, so they spend less time online to virtual worlds. As others here have observed, the biggest RL festival in SL is (usually) Halloween.

Yup, it does.


Not necessarily. Some people just don't think things should be so expensive in SL - I certainly wouldn't pay the equivalent of $4 US for just one outfit, no matter how nice it is. I'd rather enjoy something I could get in RL. And it adds up over time. Not everyone feels they have to have the highest quality items anyway. To most people, Second Life is a pastime, not a serious endeavor.

Good luck with everything. You have a cool store. If I was into blood fountains and such things, I'd be a customer.

~Looks for that "I told you so" button on here someplace

Tons of people thought when winter got here the magic would be back and everyone would have a twinkle in their eye... What happen last year for SL is over and I really do not see it coming back unless Linden Labs decides to do some major PR stunt to get attention back on SL but I do not see that taking place either.

I truly think except for the people who have been here and for the random people who join now... The steam in the SL engine is poof.

I think that as long as the CSI stunts continue, and until the partnership with IBM and the open sourcing gets going full steam, we will continue to see growth, but not like it was last year.

I did realize what went wrong when I saw the drop in spent money in the graphs. The drop compared well to my own sales.

Perhaps those incredible sales around Halloween were too good to be sustained.

I remember when I joined with my original av in Nov. 06 during the big boom, and sold my flat green first land to someone for $22/sq.m. around Christmas. People threw money around left and right and everyone wanted to jump in and get rich. When it slowed down after the holidays, people said, oh the college students are back in school, it'll pick up again in the summer. In the summer they said oh, the weather is too nice, everyone's outside, it'll pick up again in the fall. In the fall, people started suspecting it wasn't going to pick up again, but those hopeful few said, just wait till the holidays, there was a huge boom that time last year, it'll happen again.

It hasn't yet.

When I first joined I spent plenty, mostly on landscaping. Then I started building and earning money, and suddenly I spent less because it reflected an amount of work done and L$ earned. Six months in, and I'm still not spending much, but I am covering all my expenses and making a profit.

I think the issue is there is only so much average person will or can spend.
When I was spending more it went towards land, what was left went to things like textures and uploads.
When I did shop always something went wrong or something that made experience stressful.
Also after you start to learn to create things there is only so much you really need to really buy so why buy it?
Truth is most of your customers don't really need your products.
If you're selling same old whatever that every one else has that isn't
that impressive or is going to give them something to add to their experience
why spend money on it?
If its going to cut into their budget they have for real life, they won't spend it.
There is only so many who are going to be able to shop and spend money at any given time and if the experience is unpleasant to them they aren't going to keep doing it.
Sorry to be blunt but as residents we aren't obligated to buy your crap just because you open a business and want our money.
And if we have unpleasant experience once they aren't going to return.
I don't need to buy products and when I do it I tend to be pretty picky and
have reasons to do so.
I know I am not only one alone with the experience or who thinks this way.
In fact lot of the creative types like myself don't like buying other people's products unless its like really impressive texture or they need a skin or new
avatar but after while they don't need any more new outfits or skins.
And smarter newbies who come in with their eyes open aren't going to just buy any product out their in the market or at least I hope not.

Very true, FD. Although I wouldn't say that newbies that come in are necessarily smarter, just tighter with their money, and less willing to part with it in any form.

I believe there is definitely a lapse due to:

- seasons
- the gambling ban
- the fading of hype

...but the winter effect can't be seen or not seen from the graphs yet. The strong month there is January - holidays over, cold, nothing else to do. Though the run-up months (in general) have been soft.

Personally, I've been lucky. *Very* lucky so far. Caledon just outperforms like crazy, but it's land-tier based, and that is the one thing in the entire metaverse that hasn't changed. Yet.

Even so, we are dependent upon the success of vendors. Caledon vendors have a *great* niche market (Victoriana, Steampunk, gaslight fantasy) but even so, if the grid in general fades economically, they will feel it.

Personally, I'd prefer a cooler economy with less hype - the real economy. Which may not be instant cash for everyone who holds their hand out, but isn't going away ever again.

The metaverse is now part of the human experience - forever.

Walking away from the metaverse economy in 2007 is sort of like giving up on corporations just after the East India Trading Company's troubles.

I think the reason people like Desmond are doing so well they aren't just selling products, they are selling a experience and tools for fantasy life.
Personally I would love to see more of this, something that creates enjoyment, communities and provides unique, creative experiences that be the focus then going to shop either filled with zombie bots or empty that is huge box with same old same old products.
I don't if gambling really had major impact because personally I always figured it was scam like banks in SL.
I do know there is less places for inexperienced or those on tighter budgets those players to get jobs there fore there is less spending in world.
And those new residents who been burnt once are tighter on what they spend.
I know I spent less since I can't find work.
I spent over 1000 usd this last year on land and lindens, and I am growing less willing to spend because I just don't have it to spare.
What really turned me off to buying L was the new billing changes.

With the amount of new users and US$ put in SL being stable/slowly declining, and the amount of land still growing. We see multiple effects:

1. Land prices dropping (this was an immediate effect) and land sellers merging or dropping out. (Esp european ones as they can't compete, due to VAT)
2. People focusing on paying rent/tier first, then using the rest of their 'budget' for content , and content prices dropping. (This is a delayed effect) Then content creators merging/dropping out, we see that happening now.
3. A saturation of the content market and a huge growth in competition. The amount of available (high quality) content in SL and the amount of content creators has been rising, and esp. now spending budgets are going down, the only way content creators see they can keep people buying, is by creating more content for less L$.

As far as men's clothing is concerned the clothes made are terrible. Now, you'll find places where the clothes are well made but for the most part they suck.

Take shoes. Shoes for men are terribly made. You'll see them look huge almost like the ones worn by clowns. Or they will be the opposite, extremely small. Or the left shoe looks like it should be on the right foot and the right on the left one.

Tops and pants. Shirts and sweaters, again badly made. Many of these tops are above the belly button and then with the pants also made just as bad which means the pants will be very low when you wear the two you'll have your mid section completely exposed like a female.

If they try to make the top/shirt longer, they'll add another piece to the shirt/top but then its so badly put together you can actually see where the two connect leaving a visible line going around your mid section.

Prices: I can't say they've gone down as I still see clothes being over-priced. But the quality of men's clothes is terrible at best. Then to top this off, they come non-modifiable in many cases which makes it even worse for those who buy non-mod clothes. It's the reason I tend never to buy non-mod clothes and the very rare times I do I gamble I won't get burned. Recently I did and I did get burned as the pants were really bad and they wouldn't respond to my messages.

But it doesn't end there. Once you buy a badly made product many times you're stuck with it as the person you got it from won't acknowledge your calls for an exchange or a fix up. (see above)

Men's clothes are terrible, the prices haven't gone down and the only thing thats gone up is greed.

I have had similar experience looking for male clothing products and shoes.
After so many negative experiences it doesn't become enjoyable activity but just stressful.
When I played The Sims years ago I really loved searching for new content that different content Artist made.
In SL I must confess the experience isn't as pleasant. I don't know why but it often has to do with issues of quality of content, everything tends to be geared to one gender, one size, if you buy content example texture related there often issues either you buy image that has restricted permissions because of content creator wanting to protect their product from theft or you discover the texture been stolen after paying the thief.
Shoes come in two sizes female, then male sizes often don't fit if you're small elf shaped guy.
It easier in long run for me just to make the shoes then go through hassle of paying for item that isn't what I want in first place.
Skins for longest time I didn't understand that they didn't look right unless their was specific shape, often you spend so much on them and their are restrictions on what you can do with them in first place, once again its about the Skin Artist wanting to protect their content which I understand but in long run if I can't modify and copy its just not worth it.
The thing is spending 300 here, 3000 there isn't much if that is all you're spending but eventually it adds up. And if there are issues with asset server or something doesn't work
and items disappear its like oh crap I just spend tons on tons of money on all these items and I can't find them or I lost them or they aren't working right.
I know personally I went on shopping spree bit back ago and before I knew I had went through a lot of money majority of the products after I bought them I couldn't figure out how to use i.e scripted related products with complex set up system for tp to different floors for example. Majority of those items like clothing I wore once or for few days then never wore again because for one I like making my own things.
The only real activity here for most people who are interested in staying in world is making their own content, unless they are into role playing, listening to music or going clubbing, sex or socializing.
If you can make item or your own content without the hassles of dealing with someone
else's content the need for buying others content is less unless their is some type of personal importance is doing so is often far and few in between.
If you're not here for content building or understanding scripts you end up having to
just use certain products or become total discouraged and leave.
When every one is trying to sell content, and there is so much out there its hard to find all that is out there that might be worth spending L on.
Anyone Resident or potential Customer around who explores and looks around for a period of time figures this out or becomes burnt out especially if they aren't able
to have good experience when they do shop.
Majority of products I see their just not that magical I got to have it feel any more.
I get that feeling from projects I am doing with friends or when those closest to me make something really wonderful for the fun of it.
I don't get excited by seeing endless of the same thing I see when I go out.
And also if I allow myself to spend too much on virtual products I am going to be stressed out and broke in my first life.
The thing is if you got lot to spend in real life or you're making lot of content and doing
well you're often focused on your own business due to that is your reality you may
not be getting full picture for those of us who are experiencing another reality in SL.
Not everyone has hundred of real life dollars to spend if they are already shelling out lot already on tier, membership fees or rent.