A complex question for you gaming-gurus out there...

[Cedric]

Plantation implies established, old, large and with a built in reputation.

Initial cost - 250,00gp (though shrewd bargaining may reduce this to as low as 175,000gp)

ROI - Roll percentile dice, 95% chance of profit, 5% chance of loss.

In the even of loss (2-5%), it's d6x1000gp (One a roll of 1, something special and bad happens)

Profit is on a sliding scale, (6-25%) d6x1000gp, (25-75%) d10+2x1000gp, (76-99%) 2d10+2x1000gp. (on a roll of 100, something special and good happens).

ROI is a factor of both production rates for the year and market share for that year. She can count on everything she makes being sold, her commodity is rare enough and valueable enough.

Harvest season on this 200 acre Coffee Plantation is from October to January, during which time they will harvest and export about 20 tons of Gourmet Coffee. (A good picker can bag 100 lbs of beans in a day).

A one pound bag of their regular Coffee will go for about 1gp. They will have 19 tons of this. This will sell for just short of 40,000gp.

They will also produce about one ton of their special reserve beans for sale to individuals, inns and countries of great means. This will go for 5gp per pound, selling for a total of 5,000gp.

They will also produce 100 pounds of "Plantation Select". Hand picked by the Master Grower of the plantation and cured/prepared individually with great care and attention. This sells for 50gp per pound, producing 5000gp.

So the total take for the year (gross) is 50,000gp. But replanting, security, pest/vermin control, pickers wages and the like will take a great deal of that money.

If a smaller or larger plantation is wanted, just scale this accordingly to the size of plantation desired.

Cedric

 

[Arravis]

Goddamn! Cedric, that's exactly what I was hoping for! Thank you bro .

Now... to translate those coffee pounds into coffee brewed and sold, lol... but I like the setup and equation, i'll use it as my base for the othe one. It'll lower the invesment cost of the actual coffee by whatever amount she wants to bring over to the coffee bar. Also, as far as profit etc... I'm considering changing your d100 roll to a DC check, with perhaps a DC 30 being the "ultimate" profit as you have set up and figure out the rest from there, including modifiers (such as advertising for the coffee bar, etc.)

 

[Cedric]

I think the coffee house will be a huge hit in Waterdeep.

Ahh...now in the event she is going to be the retailer for her coffee as well. That changes matters somewhat.

First of all, the Lords of Waterdeep are going to take a large share of her business through taxes. They are going to tax each of her incoming shipments, and tax her Coffee House. So she's going to get double ended on taxation.

Provided that competition is slow to arrive though, and even when they do she'll already have an established reputation, her business should be really good.

Assuming that she sells 5 tons of her coffee herself, 500 pounds of special reserve and 25 pounds of special select, this will reduce the income from her normal sales by a gross factor of 13,750gp.

However, she can then see a return on this investment which will be far greater then her normal sales as she is cutting out the middle men. So this 13,750 becomes 41,250gp. Reduce this by 25% because of taxation, and further reduce this for operating expernses and she should see a raw net of about 15,500gp per year, net.

In the first 2-3 years though, she'll need to pay at least half of this amount out to Hotel and Mercantile Guilds to account for the amount of business she is stealing from them with her unorthodox means. At this time the idea of direct to market will be met with great reluctance.

She might be able to recoup most of this expense if she can keep the Plantation and the Coffee House separate, but that will always hang over her head as a secret waiting to be discovered. And if it is discovered as a secret, she can count on great resistance from the City Guilds and far reaching repercussions.

Cedric

 

[Cedric]

I'm considering changing your d100 roll to a DC check

Can I suggest a combination of the two? Mother Nature sometimes doesn't care how good you are. And the percentage chance of losing money is already so low, because it's assuming the master grower is a Druid and you have a respected and well maintained shipping fleet, capable of operating with little threat from pirates or brigands.

Cedric

 

[Arravis]

***First of all, the Lords of Waterdeep are going to take a large share of her business through taxes. They are going to tax each of her incoming shipments, and tax her Coffee House.***

She is also looking into smuggling/bribes. Our group has allies in Skullport and throught some of the sewers of Waterdeep. Now... how to keep this from the Lords, we're not sure. Anyway...


*** she should see a raw net of about 15,500gp per year, net.***

Is that from both the plantation and the coffee house or just from the share of her coffee beans that go to the coffee house.

***In the first 2-3 years though, she'll need to pay at least half of this amount out to Hotel and Mercantile Guilds to account for the amount of business she is stealing from them with her unorthodox means. At this time the idea of direct to market will be met with great reluctance.***

Hmm... she'll likely try to find a way around that or try to intimidate them. She is an epic level character married to an epic level wizard... so she'll be hard to push around. If they decide to try underhanded tactics and try to ruin her business that way, they'll likely end up loosing that sort of battle. Where they might win out is a political battle, perhaps establishing laws that dissallow such direct to market tactics. (Though knowing her, she'll join the merchants council [or send a simulacrum] and sell to herself that way, lol).

***She might be able to recoup most of this expense if she can keep the Plantation and the Coffee House separate, but that will always hang over her head as a secret waiting to be discovered. And if it is discovered as a secret, she can count on great resistance from the City Guilds and far reaching repercussions.***

Lot's of cool game politics there for future plots .

***Can I suggest a combination of the two? Mother Nature sometimes doesn't care how good you are.***

I'd think that rolling the d20 would do that... but I see your point. I'll likely combine the two then. Oh... she's hiring druids.. that's already in the works, lol.

Can I mention again... thank you VERY much!

 

[Utrecht]

Here is how I would approach it.

Since she is an investor looking to make some sort of capital investment - she needs to have some level of understanding what her expected return on investment is going to be.

I would use a ROI of about 8% per year- with a minimum investment of say, 10,000 GP. This will purchase a fully functioning coffee plantation - complete with building, land, crop and assosciated experts.

Then I would charge her a 100gp per year fee for having the coffee consortium run things for her (This will also include such things a bribing custom officials to get her crop in etc....)

Then as the variable component, I would roll a d10 to generate the variable factor. for a roll of 6-10 add 1-5 to the 8% ROI. For a roll of 1-5 - subtract that value. Giving a Range of 3-13% - pretty fair.

 

[MarauderX]

Let him wait until "Fields of Blood" comes out (July). It is supposed to have all the rules for kingdoms, mass combat, and economics for world creation. I am chomping at the bit to get it...

 

[Cedric]

*** she should see a raw net of about 15,500gp per year, net.***

Is that from both the plantation and the coffee house or just from the share of her coffee beans that go to the coffee house.

That's just from her share of the Coffee Houses. The plantation itself will have the same income, assuming she sells the beans to herself at fair market price (which is not what I was assuming, I was assuming a discount on the beans of "sell at cost").

Of course, she could take the Coca~Cola* route and screw one part of her business the help the other. In which case, you would need to take the 13750 right off of the top of what the plantation makes. Meaning she could have losing years reasonably often at the plantation, but then she would recognize a much larger reward from the Coffee Houses.

In light of taxation and such though, this is probably not the optimal plan. The optimal plan would be a result of selling her own beans to her own Coffee Houses at cost (about $7500 a year). This is already figured into the Coffee Houses ROI, and will leave the Plantation largely unaffected, with just a small reduction in yearly profits (1500gp).

End result, plantation makes it's profit as described above, then subtract 1500gp.

Coffee House returns a profit of 15,500, but from this profit will come unaccounted for expenses like bribes, campaigns and deals with the mercantile houses. At the very least, she'll likely have to purchase a guild membership and pay 10% of her profit in dues. (of course, everyone tries to lie about how much profit they made that year).

Cedric

* Coca~Cola routinely "Screws" their bottling division out of a TON of money, in order to pad the revenue of their other marketing, production and sales divisions (then writes off the loses from the bottling divisions for a tax break). Investors closely watch the finances of the Bottling Company, because if Coca~Cola ever messes up the math on this juggling act, Wall Street would be years in recovering from the aftermath.

 

[ElectricDragon]

I agree with maddman75 on most points. I disagree that most businesses break even. Most businesses fail. Most businesses do not last more than one year.

Here's what I would do:

1. Quote a price for the plantation, workers, defensive structures, supplies, defenders, etc.

2. Use the place for many plot hooks: monster attacks, worker rebellions, supply ship disappearances, shoddy materials delivered, local wars, pirate attacks, crop diseases, etc. Each plot hook raises the price by about 25% if the player takes an on-hands approach; by 50% if otherwise. Also increase the building time for all required buildings by the same per cent.

3. After the building is done (this should take more than 2 years because of the distance involved, unless the player is willing to be the "teleport ferry" for at least a year-this means no time off for adventuring or fixing the plantation's problems), list three to five ways the business could be improved to increase "profits" (laughable at this point, less than 100 gp profit if any). All will involve more money, more time, and more player involvement.

4. After the end of the second year, let a minor profit be shown (say 1/10% of amount invested if you feel generous, half that otherwise). After the end of the 3rd year, allow the profits to pay the upkeep. After the 4th year, there should actually be a profit of up to 2% of the investment. All of these assume that the player is deeply involved. If the player does not involve herself, the place should become a money pit, sucking up whatever the player puts into it and producing little or nothing.

5. The Coffee Shop in Waterdeep should go under, or almost so from supply problems (can't sell anything if the shop is empty). If coffee is not a new or nearly new item in your campaign, this should be enough. For new items on the market (what's that black drink? It looks gross, smells gross, and tastes gross; gimme a brewsky), problems of "spreading the word," called advertising in our world, should abound.

6. If number of bushels is needed, use this: 1st year-4 to 5 of poor quality. 2nd year-40 to 50 of average quality. 3rd year-400 to 500 of good quality. 4th year and beyond-400 to 500 of excellent quality. All this assumes the player is taking an "on-hands" approach (hiring druids and rangers, training farmers and workers, patrolling the area around the plantation for monsters, etc.). If not, reduce the bushels by 75% and the quality will never go above average. Don't worry about the acres (I'm assuming over 500). This time period is notoriously deficient in modern farming methods. Poor soil could ruin the business before it starts.
And poor soil can ruin it later because crop rotation is something not unheard of yet.

7. Upkeep: 1/10 of the building price. Keep in mind that the price keeps going up as more things are added (druids, defenders, keep, patrols, supply ship escorts, etc.).

As far as coffee not being from the new world: play it the way you want it; do not be railroaded into following what happened in real life; this is your game.

This is the way I'd do it. It will take a lot of work from both you and the player. The player will have to give up adventuring to get it "off the ground;" but xp can still be awarded for overcoming (economic) problems.

Good Luck in your game.
Dave

 

[Cedric]

As a side note, I wrote up my thoughts based on the idea that the PC wanted to start a business that would be large, respected and be in it's own rights Epic.

As such, I assumed that the player was going to make sure a profit was recovered (as reasonably as you can assure that anyway).

The Plantation aspect could grow large enough to have it's own name and it's own voice in the Coffee world. Known far and wide as the case may be. With the regular beans being the equivalent of a good Folgers and the gourmet beans ranging from your local Coffee House variet to Jamaica Blue Mountain (which is about $45.00 a pound).

The Coffee House further offers all kinds of opportunities for roleplaying and intrigue in and around Waterdeep, especially with the local Lords and Merchants.

Cedric