Why full service restaurants on GTA World are very scarce

[DLimit]

16 minutes ago, mrtnzi said:

You're completely ignoring my points so I'm just gonna stop @'ing you, have fun though.

I actually addressed your points, completely. More cars & expensive mapping? Live within your character's means. A chef and waiter is a minimum-waged laborer. Why would it matter if there's "more cars" if they shouldn't be able to afford it? On 4K an hour, you can own a 100k vehicle in 10 shifts. People can't do 10 shifts for proper character development (and they shouldn't even have an expensive vehicle after 10 shifts, any way) then why are they on an alleged heavy RP server.

Houses are actually much cheaper than they use to be, as-well. Average unit, right now, is $120,000 - $200,000. Back then, housing limit was non-existent... people could sell a unit for a million. 

People want to rush having every asset possible instead of slowly earning it through character development. 

You can also lease vehicles, today, so it's 100x easier to own the vehicle that you desire. Struggling to OWN a residential property? Rent one, like most people in the U.S.

Edited December 2, 2024 by DLimit

[rainbowlarva]

29 minutes ago, DLimit said:

I actually addressed your points, completely. More cars & expensive mapping? Live within your character's means. A chef and waiter is a minimum-waged laborer. Why would it matter if there's "more cars" if they shouldn't be able to afford it? On 4K an hour, you can own a 100k vehicle in 10 shifts. People can't do 10 shifts for proper character development (and they shouldn't even have an expensive vehicle after 10 shifts, any way) then why are they on an alleged heavy RP server.

Houses are actually must cheaper than they use to be, as-well. Average unit, right now, is $120,000 - $200,000. Back then, housing limit was non-existent... people could sell a unit for a million.

the point is inflation and money on the server means nothing now

you will not find a mapper that doesn't charge high, for example, even if you're looking at tossing together a shitbox apartment in the middle of Rancho

 

rest of the economy is in the shit, and business concepts like that have to pay high or else they won't find employees, whether or not you personally agree with their pay doesn't change the fact that it's a requirement of these business types to do so to survive - that's if they're not wholly a faction ran business, because those are more sustainable with the rp they offer than others running it. sometimes people just want to roleplay working at a restaurant, and they don't need any overarching plotline or significant development to be made by just roleplaying at the store any particular day, and expecting them to only want to do it for the rp value it provides diminishes the concept of paying a player for anything that they do - why offer pay for trucking, garbage delivery, government jobs and so on, if they're meant to be doing it solely for the roleplay it provides?

 

10 shifts can range anywhere from every day of the week, to once every week or two, to once a month. it's a major discredit to people to hold individual businesses to the same monetary standard of pay in the same concept despite vastly different circumstances between them. one business may only have the time to open twice a month, so they're making 16k each month - getting a car for 100k after half a year working there versus a guy working the same business concept that opens more frequently who can get that done in two weeks. people shouldn't be expected to sink that much time of their life into getting a mediocre vehicle in the first place, heavy rp or not - standards of living, how fast people accumulate wealth, and how they portray that are down to the individual, which is why RPQM exists in the first place instead of an 'assets portrayal rulebook' with everything set in stone. saying that 10 shifts for everyone shouldn't net them a 100k vehicle puts everyone into the same category of character portrayal despite vastly different IC backgrounds, living conditions and OOC time investment

 

similarly, most modest cars split anywhere between 15-150k, and I wouldn't claim that anything within that range is considered high end - money is so worthless these days that I really don't even see why it matters how fast people get their funding. if there was any hope at sorting out economy problems it'd have been done ages ago, but now the standard has shifted to 'your money is OOC, rp what you would realistically have.' and if someone doesn't do that then they get RPQM'ed after a few months

Edited December 2, 2024 by rainbowlarva

[Momo's Revenge]

I have run both takeout & full service.

Full service is not worth it and a complete headache. With that being said, you can do things like carrying it out to tables after a order and its not that bad. Having a wait staff and time inbetween and drawing it out a long time for each customer? That's the issue. And the interiors are typically a lot bigger meaning you're spending more time traversing too. My experience is also that it has way less people in terms of customers and at that point I had side-by-side comparisons between Kowloon Palace/Jade Cafe/Lumbini Tea House. The two takeout places always outperformed the full-service. If its slower in a takeout you can still manage to do sit-in service and do that anyway, it'll just be more on initiative and that's fine. 

It is already rather difficult to consistently have people at a takeout business if its not a faction (and if it is, its just a stepping stone for a lot).  A takeout business even can struggle with that stuff, more than others depending on location. I followed a similar approach in training. I'd go through the basic interview process, show them around, train them on a few things as examples to help them get more familiar before they work. 

And for paying people it isn't an issue of people having too much money. The fact is people play games for fun and repetitive activities eventually stop being fun.  Oh and also on top of this you spend your IRL money to provide RP for others, something that shouldn't have ever been the case or alternative you tank hours upon hours to again provide RP for others in addition to your efforts running the business/organizing it. 

[DLimit]

24 minutes ago, rainbowlarva said:

the point is inflation and money on the server means nothing now

you will not find a mapper that doesn't charge high, for example, even if you're looking at tossing together a shitbox apartment in the middle of Rancho

 

rest of the economy is in the shit, and business concepts like that have to pay high or else they won't find employees, whether or not you personally agree with their pay doesn't change the fact that it's a requirement of these business types to do so to survive - that's if they're not wholly a faction ran business, because those are more sustainable with the rp they offer than others running it. sometimes people just want to roleplay working at a restaurant, and they don't need any overarching plotline or significant development to be made by just roleplaying at the store any particular day, and expecting them to only want to do it for the rp value it provides diminishes the concept of paying a player for anything that they do - why offer pay for trucking, garbage delivery, government jobs and so on, if they're meant to be doing it solely for the roleplay it provides?

 

10 shifts can range anywhere from every day of the week, to once every week or two, to once a month. it's a major discredit to people to hold individual businesses to the same monetary standard of pay in the same concept despite vastly different circumstances between them. one business may only have the time to open twice a month, so they're making 16k each month - getting a car for 100k after half a year working there versus a guy working the same business concept that opens more frequently who can get that done in two weeks. people shouldn't be expected to sink that much time of their life into getting a mediocre vehicle in the first place, heavy rp or not - standards of living, how fast people accumulate wealth, and how they portray that are down to the individual, which is why RPQM exists in the first place instead of an 'assets portrayal rulebook' with everything set in stone. saying that 10 shifts for everyone shouldn't net them a 100k vehicle puts everyone into the same category of character portrayal despite vastly different IC backgrounds, living conditions and OOC time investment

 

similarly, most modest cars split anywhere between 15-150k, and I wouldn't claim that anything within that range is considered high end - money is so worthless these days that I really don't even see why it matters how fast people get their funding. if there was any hope at sorting out economy problems it'd have been done ages ago, but now the standard has shifted to 'your money is OOC, rp what you would realistically have.' and if someone doesn't do that then they get RPQM'ed after a few months

"It's a requirement of these business types to do so to survive"

How have I been able to find workers for 4k an hour, then? I ran a restaurant, without being a faction member/leader, in 2024. It is possible, just don't cater to the people that expect 3x-4x above the minimum wage.

"10 shifts can range anywhere from every day of the week, to once every week or two, to once a month."

Average minimum-waged laborer works more than 1 job in 2024. What's stopping characters from working more than 1-2 jobs if their other jobs are only opening once a week? 

" saying that 10 shifts for everyone shouldn't net them a 100k vehicle puts everyone into the same category of character portrayal despite vastly different IC backgrounds"

Well, most minimum-waged laborers aren't driving sports cars after 10 shifts. If daddy pays for it? Then, fine, but we're talking averages, here. People can lease vehicles in 2024, as-well, so it isn't harder to attain a vehicle. It's 100x easier.

"why offer pay for trucking, garbage delivery, government jobs and so on, if they're meant to be doing it solely for the roleplay it provides?"

This is allegedly a heavy RP server, that's why. There's dozens of other servers that value assets over RP.

"you will not find a mapper that doesn't charge high"

Found many that only charge 1.5x the furniture value. Work to earn it, and if inflation means that every one's OOCly wealthy, then why is this a problem?

Edited December 2, 2024 by DLimit

[rainbowlarva]

Just now, DLimit said:

"It's a requirement of these business types to do so to survive"

How have I been able to find workers for 4k an hour, then? I ran a restaurant, without being a faction member/leader, in 2024. It is possible, just don't cater to the people that expect 3x-4x above the minimum wage.

I don't really believe this is a true statement in the first place, but if it is then you would be a unicorn in that business concept

1 minute ago, DLimit said:

"10 shifts can range anywhere from every day of the week, to once every week or two, to once a month."

Average minimum-waged laborer works more than 1 job in 2024. What's stopping characters from working more than 1-2 jobs if their other jobs are only opening once a week? 

they don't want to spend their time coming home from their second job IRL to then hop on to their second job ingame, I know I don't - I would rather be roleplaying

2 minutes ago, DLimit said:

" saying that 10 shifts for everyone shouldn't net them a 100k vehicle puts everyone into the same category of character portrayal despite vastly different IC backgrounds"

Well, most minimum-waged laborers aren't driving sports cars after 10 shifts. If daddy pays for it? Then, fine, but we're talking averages, here.

the averages of real life shouldn't apply to GTA World, otherwise it'd take me 5 years of gameplay to buy a house. it can be a model to base things off of, but the timescale shouldn't reflect 1:1. most minimum waged laborers also don't get mugged twice a week, get their car jacked once a week, only work 1-2 shifts a week or get free healthcare. obviously some things are left to interpretation and don't necessarily reflect your real life experience.

 

5 minutes ago, DLimit said:

"why offer pay for trucking, garbage delivery, government jobs and so on, if they're meant to be doing it solely for the roleplay it provides?"

This is allegedly a heavy RP server, that's why. There's dozens of other servers that value assets over RP.

things cost money on gta world

[DLimit]

11 minutes ago, rainbowlarva said:

I don't really believe this is a true statement in the first place, but if it is then you would be a unicorn in that business concept

they don't want to spend their time coming home from their second job IRL to then hop on to their second job ingame, I know I don't - I would rather be roleplaying

the averages of real life shouldn't apply to GTA World, otherwise it'd take me 5 years of gameplay to buy a house. it can be a model to base things off of, but the timescale shouldn't reflect 1:1. most minimum waged laborers also don't get mugged twice a week, get their car jacked once a week, only work 1-2 shifts a week or get free healthcare. obviously some things are left to interpretation and don't necessarily reflect your real life experience.

 

things cost money on gta world

"I don't really believe this is a true statement in the first place, but if it is then you would be a unicorn in that business concept"

Okay 👍 Indian Taco Farmer was leased, and we hired 3 people working at 4K an hour in Harmony.

"hey don't want to spend their time coming home from their second job IRL to then hop on to their second job ingame,"

So, they'll log on to RP as a chef, for ten days, and then quit and own their pariah.

"the averages of real life shouldn't apply to GTA World, otherwise it'd take me 5 years of gameplay to buy a house. it can be a model to base things off of, but the timescale"

On here, it takes maybe 10-20 days on 4k an hour. Amazing. That's 1:1, I guess, right? I never asked for 1:1, but here we are. I asked for proper development. I don't witness people RPing in a restaurant, for ten days, and then aging up by 5 years to justify owning their sports car. Too many 20 year olds living like 40 year olds who used their life-savings to finally afford something luxurious for themselves.

People wonder why quality declines, and it's because they want assets, not RP. "Realism for me, not for thee" slogan continues.

Back to the whole "inflation" argument. If OOC money meant nothing, then people wouldn't be working for 3x the wage. It's not like vehicles and housing have been much more affordable compared to 2021.

 

Edited December 2, 2024 by DLimit

[rainbowlarva]

2 minutes ago, DLimit said:

"I don't really believe this is a true statement in the first place, but if it is then you would be a unicorn in that business concept"

Okay 👍

"hey don't want to spend their time coming home from their second job IRL to then hop on to their second job ingame,"

So, they'll log on to RP as a chef, for ten days, and then quit and own their pariah.

"the averages of real life shouldn't apply to GTA World, otherwise it'd take me 5 years of gameplay to buy a house. it can be a model to base things off of, but the timescale"

On here, it takes maybe 10-20 days on 4k an hour. Amazing. That's 1:1, I guess, right? I never asked for 1:1, but here we are. I asked for proper development. I don't witness people RPing in a restaurant, for ten days, and then aging up by 5 years to justify owning their sports car. Too many 20 year olds living like 40 year olds who used their life-savings to finally afford something luxurious for themselves.

People wonder why quality declines, and it's because they want assets, not RP.

and this is why RPQM exists, you've caught up

[DLimit]

2 minutes ago, rainbowlarva said:

and this is why RPQM exists, you've caught up

So, RPQM businesses that are paying their workers 3 times above the server's established minimum wage, as-well? Last I've checked, business owners would never resort to paying workers 3x above minimum wage for waiting tables.

Surprised people aren't making tips mandatory or heavily pressured on to their consumers. Gratuity fees exist.

Edited December 2, 2024 by DLimit

[rainbowlarva]

7 minutes ago, DLimit said:

So, RPQM businesses that are paying their workers 3 times above the server's established minimum wage, as-well?

if you find it to be unrealistic, then knock yourself out. there is absolutely nothing stopping you from doing that

 

there is plenty of business concepts that pay far, far above what is reasonable. ProTech for example pays their security what, 60k? that's extremely high - more than the script pays out your average cop by nearly 20k

Edited December 2, 2024 by rainbowlarva

[mj2002]

5 hours ago, Blade said:

So I’ve seen people wonder both IC and OOC why the amount of restaurants on the server is limited, despite the desire from consumers for this kind of RP. I’ve owned and ran a restaurant since July 2023 (Al Dente’s) which puts me in the position to elaborate on the difficulties of running such a business on the server, as well as give some insight in how engaging and how much fun it is to roleplay working in one.

 

To give you some insight in how it all works behind the scenes with restaurant rp, I’ll give a brief runthrough.

 

I was given my restaurant and after everything was mapped, the first thing I had to do was set up a small handbook for employees. This handbook explains the different roles in the restaurant and how these roles work together, shaping up into the kind of restaurant I wanted it to be. For my restaurant, I kept things simple so the front of the house is composed of solely hosts and waiters (these are servers too). 

 

Hosts welcome in the guests, assign tables and let the waiters know which tables need service. To keep things clear for everybody the host usually assigns guests to tables close to each other to keep the work area for the waiters small. I usually have one host per opening.

 

Once the guests are seated the waiters come into play. They give out menus, take orders for drinks, appetizers, mains and eventually desserts and process everything to the kitchen. Since a restaurant script doesn’t exist on World, we are forced to rely on a discord text channel where we post the table number and order (you literally CAN’T work without this) and update the orders when more is ordered. Working as a waiter in a restaurant on World is a very time-consuming process, because front of house roleplay requires constant attention, engagement and being able to handle multiple tables at once. This is why you need at least two waiters, MINIMUM, but at least three is preferred for everybody to have fun and to keep everybody sane.

 

Now the kitchen comes into play. In my restaurant, I usually operate the kitchen alone or with another line cook. Kitchen roleplay is different in the way that when it’s a busy opening, I can keep my roleplay simple and general so I can keep an eye on the rest of the opening too. When it’s not busy, I can go more in-depth with my roleplay because there’s less pressure on the front of house staff.

 

All-in-all, for a ‘fun’ opening you will need AT LEAST 5 other players (1x host, 3x waiters, 1x line cook) and this is where the first struggles arise.

 

Ever since I owned my restaurant there has been one major cloud over my roleplay, which is finding the suitable people to roleplay with. I started out by paying 8k per hour for staff, which at the time was competitive pay. This includes 4k startshift money so I paid 4k myself. I constantly pushed ads on Facebrowser (boosted) and advertised in game too. The response varied, there were days where people responded and there were days, sometimes weeks, where nobody seemed interested.

 

Once I did think I found the suitable person, I interviewed them, ran them through the process of an opening and helped them set up. This process takes about an hour, hour and a half so you’re investing a lot of time in newcomers so they’re not overwhelmed by an opening and so it still seems interesting to them.

 

And don’t get me wrong, I have had a lot of fun doing so and I’ve managed to meet a great deal of people who were genuinely interested in the roleplay and I’m very thankful to them, because when you can have a normal opening, restaurant roleplay is incredibly fun and engaging!

 

However, the majority of people I interviewed either never showed up again, or they come to one opening and disappear. This can be very demotivating to look for people since you’re investing all this time and effort into them for them to simply stay away. And this is IF you manage to find somebody interested in the roleplay.

 

The amount of people you need for a fun opening compared to the amount of response you get to the ads is very difficult. It also becomes more difficult when you have some people in your discord to roleplay with in the restaurant but you have to plan an opening. People have lives, people have other roleplay going on their characters or play on different characters, so people are not always available, which is understandable. 

 

If I try to plan an opening on Friday, person A or person B can’t make it and if I plan an opening on Sunday, person C or person D can’t make it. This makes planning openings with the limited amount of interested people extra challenging too, because you REALLY need players to run this type of business, you simply can’t NPC anything. Also take into consideration that when you finally picked a day and time to open, people might still not be able to make it due to real life getting in the way, or something else related to their characters. This happens a lot too, but is also very understandable because people simply have lives too. It just makes planning openings even more difficult.

 

I’ve managed to have a lot of openings in my time of owning the restaurant and the majority of them were very fun and allowed my character and other characters to develop, but it is very time-consuming when you’re constantly looking for people and trying to pick the right day to open, because as invested as I am in World, I also have a fulltime job and (a bit of) a social life next to it. So what do I do to make things easier?

 

First thing I’ve been doing is increasing the hourly pay to 12,5k per hour from 8k per hour, which is (slightly?) above competitive to make the roleplay attractive and rewarding for people. But even with 12,5k per hour, it’s extremely hard to find the right people. This also includes the 4k startshift money. However, when you take into consideration that you need at least 5 people for a good opening, this can become a very costly endeavor.

 

Let’s say you have a three hour opening. The /openbusiness money you get is 40k, max, which you only get if openings are busy. I haven’t really had problems reaching this limit, so it’s not really the issue here. Other than that I get 12k startshift money from the 3 hour opening. This adds up to 52k script money.

 

If I have a 3 hour opening, the following amount is what I need to be able to pay employees.

 

5 (employees) x 8500 (hourly pay) x 3 (opening hours) = $127,500.

 

Or

 

4 (employees) x 8500 (hourly pay) x 3 (opening hours) = $102,000

 

So other than the 52k script money I get, I’ll need at least 50k if I have 4 people working and 75,5k if I have 5 people working. This is very hard to get by selling food items because let me tell you, if you charge more than $1,000 for a single food item, people are just not interested. They won’t order it or they’ll start taking things IC and complain about prices. And honestly, the latter always pisses me off because players are very impulsive when they blow a lot money on other things.

 

My character has enough money, so money is not an issue for me. When I’m not roleplaying, I take mapping projects and map apartments and houses for players which earns me enough money to be able to afford my roleplay, because yes, every restaurant opening costs me money, and that’s when I have ENOUGH people to open with. But because I love the roleplay so much, and because it’s so unique and rewarding in terms of roleplay, I don’t care about the costs and I’d rather reward the players who choose to roleplay with me. My character also runs a bakery which doesn’t need as much staff, so the earnings I get from the bakery I can blow on the restaurant again. But not everybody is in the same position as I am. Not everybody has thousands of dollars to blow on restaurant openings and not everybody is willing to put in all the effort to look for people, which is exactly why there are only a limited amount of restaurants around, or why restaurants generally don’t last long and also why there are not really any consistent openings.

 

I hope this clears things up for people and perhaps this gets the ball rolling for solutions. This topic is not a plead for anything. I just wanted to vent because I’ve seen people complain IC and OOC about there not being any restaurants or consistent openings. I know Property Management has funds for unique businesses but they are tied to consistent and regular openings. Money is not the issue for me at this time, it’s about finding the right people and staying motivated to do openings when everything’s so complicated and time-consuming. Because I believe constantly pushing up the hourly pay will not just hurt my business in the long run, but also the competition. It just makes restaurants less and less attractive to operate if the costs are becoming increasingly worse and not everybody who’s interested in starting up a restaurant has thousands of dollars to blow on making it operational.

 

I try to open the restaurant at least once a week and mostly I manage, but sometimes I just can’t because of the reasons mentioned above. I’m still invested in running my restaurant after all this time but I won’t lie that it can also be frustrating at times. The main issue can be described in a single sentence. There’s a demand for restaurant roleplay on the consumer side, but the demand for restaurant roleplay on the employee side is very limited

 

Your experiences are one of the reasons why I made this suggestion.

 

 

This specifically makes mention of restaurants, and should make your concept somewhat more viable by offering more entrance fees ($2000 per entry for select businesses and if you cross the 40 customer slots), $6.000 instead of $4.000/hour wage. This should make the financial side more viable.

 

However, the challenge of personnel will remain. I can totally feel your pain when it comes to employees. Even in a very lucrative business, its hard to maintain employees. I run a dealership, and have hired over 100 characters in the last 11 months. Turnover remains a big problem, to the point where even having dedicated HR to do nothing but interview applicants still means we're always short of regular employees.

 

As you explained, money is not what eventually drives you, even though it helps motivate players to join your roleplay project/business. The truth of the matter is that players don't really like working, which makes sense, because you're playing a game! But, GTAW also makes it so that your character doesn't need to do any of this. So why bother? This is great for putting players into a position where they can spend 95% of their time on hobbies and socializing, but it also causes a very short supply of potential employees to help run businesses that contribute to making this server a fun experience. I personally think the balance has improved over the last few years, most notably by restricting the $200.000 starter checks to only three characters, but we still have some ways to go.