RAW MATERIALS - FARMS

You can use either timber, or farms. Doesn't matter which one you use, the key here is to FULLY utilize all of the available raw materials before moving on.

Pro tip #1. Building a big farm, and then using only a small part of it wastes a LARGE amount of money.

BIG farm, with poultry, which gets you both chicken and eggs. Four square purchase for the chicken, two squares each for the processing, two squares each for the sales. Default internal sales.

Rinse and repeat until you have bacon, beef, and mutton.

I went ahead and created leather, and raw milk as well, to be used soon.

FIRST STORE

Build a very large store, and purchase a two square purchase, and a two star selling unit. Link to all of the first tier farm goods. Adjust pricing until the overall value is a little better than the local guys. If you have to reduce the price to make your product competitive, then that's normal.

You may have to reduce the price your store purchase unit uses to make your store profitable..but it doesn't really matter, one of your two businesses will book the profit, and your corporation doesn't care which.

ALL of these actions are done while the game is paused. ONLY unpause long enough for the next step.

SECOND RAW MATERIALS PURCHASE

Timber. It HAS to be timber. Big logging, small inventory, big sales. Default internal sale.

Create a large factory right next door, manufacture bookshelves, dining rooms, and paper. Default internal sale. Add these to your store

Create a medium factory, purchase paper, and the raw milk from your farm. This is the first synergy you have with two products. These second level products are highly profitable, and this one is easy. As always, default internal sale.

Create another medium factory, purchase leather and timber, and make recliners. SWEET! VERY profitable, and uses the leather from your farm.

Create a small factory, purchase your own beef, and manufacture beef jerky.

Create a small factory, purchase your own wool, and manufacture sweaters.

Create a medium factory, purchase a LOT of paper, and make both diapers and toilet paper. Default to internal sale, as always.

FINANCIALS

This maxes out all the products you can make with timber and farms. At some point, you ran out of money...so BORROW all you can. DO NOT ISSUE MORE STOCK. You want your stock to continue to go up in value, so that LATER, you can issue stock and gain another 130 MILLION dollars. The interest on your loans will only be about 100 thousand a month. This is acceptable, and you won't even notice it.

NEXT RAW MATERIALS

I chose Silica. Silica gets you cat litter, and glass. Glass and grapes get you wine. Glass is also used by a ton of other products.

Second call is Gold. Gold is made into wedding bands, which are hugely profitable. With glass and leather, you get Elegant Watches, with Elegant Profits.

The last raw material I purchased was Oil, which gave me plastics, which allowed me to product board games (with paper), and building blocks.

Final note..you see how I unlocked the next in a series of possibilities, fully took advantage of them, and then - SELECTIVELY - chose which products to diversify into next.

ADVERTISING

Buying an office, and then installing advertising units is a pro move...for games lasting longer than a year. Each product is sensitive to price, technology, or brand.

You control the price lever, and this is the primary tool you have, initially, to make your products competitive. Drop the price down, increase the value. I don't like that. I want to sell my products for MORE than the competition, and keep my market share. I'm greedy.

So...for products that are BRAND sensitive, advertise. I would go so far as to rank-order all the products in the game, to see which products can MOST benefit from advertising. Now..there IS a problem with this. If you have all six regions, EACH ONE'S BRAND IS DIFFERENT. Advertising in The North will not affect brand ratings in The South. You can really damage your profit if you spend recklessly in an attempt to improve your brand

RESEARCH

As with advertising, not all products can benefit from technology research. A couple of points...first, when you start a research unit, you have a choice as to how long to research for. Six months gets you a boost of two. Useless. One year is a boost of 7, and it goes up from there. That's the minimun time I use.

If there is a difficult market with high local quality, you will NEED to increase your tech to make YOUR product competitive..as you can only lower your price so far. A product that is highly sensitive to quality can benefit HUGELY from the pre-application of a tech boost through research. Essentially, research a product for a year or three, auto apply your tech upgrades, THEN get into the production and selling. The farther you look ahead, the better the benefit.

I have an advertising budget, and a research budget. I have a plan, and the plan is contingent on what the local guys are doing.

Recognize that the longer you wait to get into a specific market, the more difficult it will be, as the enemy IS improving their brand over time.

STOCK MARKET

We're in business to make money. You want to be Donald Trump, or Jeff Bezos? Would you rather purchase your own stock at $12 a share, or $50 a share?

Clearly, to sooner you purchase your own stock, the more you will make long-term. But....if you spend money buying stock, you're not spending money making even MORE money. There is no easy answer here. I try to purchase SOME stock the first of each month.

That's it for now...let me know if you have any questions.