Potterworld Merch!

[TheSquid_28]

Along with the in-app alliances and accessories, we should have a merch store for us real-life witches and wizards!
It would consist of house and alliance shirts, sweatshirts, accessories, and more!
Those who want to help out with designs and decorations should have to apply with a unique idea for a merch item!
Those that are on the merch team should have an in-game title such as "merch-design" or "design-team".

I attached some screenshots of a possible simple merch item. Let me know what y'all think! xo

 

[NotDetroit]

although a cool idea, only a small percentage of people would buy some. Idk from a business POV it wouldn't be a great idea to release merchandise

 

[luckiestblock]

Yeah it sounds cool but think about it, there are currently only about 130ish people on at any given time on average. If we are super SUPER generous we can say that there are about 1000 ACTIVE players any given few weeks. If this merch is released I would say that maybe one tenth (10%) would buy it, if we are generous. 100 sales for merch over a few weeks is not really profitable, especially because it will likely be lower over the next few months as many of those 1000 active players will be the same and will obviously not want the same merch over and over.

 

[Aurora]

Hey there!
Thanks for bringing forward your suggestion!
I will now discuss your suggestion with the other Poltergeists and we will get back to you soon with a response.
Have a great day!

 

[Honey_Dwarf1]

To add onto what luckiestblock was saying, I think 10% is extremely generous. I'm not sure many people would want to wear PW merch out and about, since it's not a thing that lots of people are interested in so I think very few people would buy it.

 

[Zadanthalion]

I don't know why they wouldn't do this with all the drop-shipping options out there that make it so they don't have to manage it or have an inventory or anything. They could link it up with shopify and use something like Printful to make products, and they make it and send it when someone orders it so there is no warehousing. Would be smart for them to do this, but I doubt they will honestly.

 

[Aurora]

Hello again TheSquid_28,
We are always looking for ways to improve the server, so any suggestions or feedback players come up with, is very valued by our team. So, thank you for bringing forward your idea!
After careful discussion, we have unfortunately decided to decline your suggestion for a couple of reasons. First of all we are unsure if players would want to buy something like this, as it is quite different from our current store and players might not want something that is not in-game. Therefore we have decided that we do not want our store to go in this direction at the moment.
Furthermore, setting up a shop with actual merchandise would be fairly difficult and pricey, as we would have to ensure that we can manufacture it, it is high quality and that we have it in stock. Obviously we could set it up differently as you have said, but that would also cost effort and money that we would like to put into other things.
Thanks again and we hope you will make more suggestions in the future!
Have a great day!

 

[Zadanthalion]

Unfortunately their reason for not doing it is either an excuse because of laziness or lack of knowledge. As I mentioned, it's actually free to create and run a store - orders are automated - there is no warehousing so this is one of those they just don't want to do it things.

It's literally free and they already have all the graphics and logos created they'd ever need. Hopefully someone in their staff team realizes how easy and free it is and gets on that before the market is gone for it. Gaming communities can last a long time - but they don't last forever so hopefully they capitalize on it while the interest is there.

Not trying to be rude to the staff that commented their decline, I'm assuming it's lack of knowledge for how the industry works, but I do this professionally for myself and for my clients all over North America so I happen to know what I'm talking about on this particular one. 😊👌

Would be happy to help put it together.

 

[Sunnya]

I understand where you're coming from and I think it really is a cute and fun idea, but again this is something that we're not looking into doing. The reason why this was declined is not an excuse and is definitely not due to laziness or lack of knowledge. I've personally done an extensive analysis of the store and I have a really strong understanding of online stores, businesses, PR, and most importantly of PotterworldMC. Our decision regarding this was made based on said analysis, as well as a study of the server's player base and the customers of the store. Based on our data, we do not believe that merchandise like this would be popular among our customers.

We don't want to put things on the store for the sake of putting things on the store. Instead, we are working towards putting items we believe a large number of players will be interested in. You might say that having lots of options is a good thing, and in some cases that is true, but having too many options can be detrimental. This is due to the psychological effect that choices give people. When there are multiple, equally good options, the individual needs to rationalize and determine which they prefer. Having more choices often causes us to be less likely to take action, and to be less satisfied with our eventual decision. In other words, “complexity leads to indecision, leads to stagnation.”

As you've said, it can be quite easy to set up a shop online for those items. Even if this is the case, we will still not be looking into having merchandise like this officially sold due to the reason I put above. If you'd like to make your own unofficial PotterworldMC merchandise, you are more than welcome to do so!

 

[Zadanthalion]

I understand where you're coming from and I think it really is a cute and fun idea, but again this is something that we're not looking into doing. The reason why this was declined is not an excuse and is definitely not due to laziness or lack of knowledge. I've personally done an extensive analysis of the store and I have a really strong understanding of online stores, businesses, PR, and most importantly of PotterworldMC. Our decision regarding this was made based on said analysis, as well as a study of the server's player base and the customers of the store. Based on our data, we do not believe that merchandise like this would be popular among our customers.

We don't want to put things on the store for the sake of putting things on the store. Instead, we are working towards putting items we believe a large number of players will be interested in. You might say that having lots of options is a good thing, and in some cases that is true, but having too many options can be detrimental. This is due to the psychological effect that choices give people. When there are multiple, equally good options, the individual needs to rationalize and determine which they prefer. Having more choices often causes us to be less likely to take action, and to be less satisfied with our eventual decision. In other words, “complexity leads to indecision, leads to stagnation.”

As you've said, it can be quite easy to set up a shop online for those items. Even if this is the case, we will still not be looking into having merchandise like this officially sold due to the reason I put above. If you'd like to make your own unofficial PotterworldMC merchandise, you are more than welcome to do so!

See, now THIS was an appropriate answer. Saying it's too expensive just comes off ignorant when you can literally create an entire brand store online for free and source all the merchandise with zero costs other than your time on the front end. Thank you for responding with a credible answer - I actually really respect that. Merchandising and advertising happens to be my forte which is why I happen to be so knowledgeable in how the systems work. I've been running brands since I was 13 professionally for companies all around North America so you learn some tricks of the trade along the way.

That makes sense to me though if the player base interest isn't there - I would be interested to see if you guys released a single shirt how it would do, but that's obviously you guys' prerogative. I just had to respond because they specifically said in half of their answer:

"Furthermore, setting up a shop with actual merchandise would be fairly difficult and pricey, as we would have to ensure that we can manufacture it, it is high quality and that we have it in stock. Obviously we could set it up differently as you have said, but that would also cost effort and money that we would like to put into other things."

Again, thank you for the taking the time to respond with a well thought out and credible answer to this. It's really quite annoying as someone who is in the forums VERY frequently to see, not even really on my own posts and suggestions, the exact same copy paste generic answers when people are taking time out of their busy lives to offer ideas and suggestions to better your project it definitely warrants valid reason for their ideas to not be accepted and as we both know - it is literally free to start up a store with physical merchandise. I am planning on starting streaming on the server really soon frequently, just waiting for my webcam when I get back in town that I ordered, and when I do I might make some merch for the server. If it's successful I'd be happy to work with you guys on scaling it by working together.