(04-27-2014, 01:46 PM)freeman2344 Wrote: Again, aim for really low performance figures when designing a car that is not supposed to be especially sporty. 10HP is actually quite alright for your initial vehicles, but I suspect there's something else that you're doing wrong as your unit prices seem to be OK. If the car is at least halfway decent it should sell for the 900$ you're asking.
Here's a couple of points that you should follow:
1. Make sure your first car is a Sedan or Compact (preferably a Sedan).
2. Make sure your factories are very close to your main market (preferably in the same city!). Don't think that you can outsource your production to Mexico in the early game years.
3. Make sure you have decent branches (not too big though).
4. I'll assume that you have the auto-wage function on. You can turn that off and decrease wages for factory workers and branch employees - that will increase your profit, though you might suffer from strikes later on and its a bit of a micro-management hassle right now.
5. Advertise your vehicles and/or your brand in the target markets.
6. Check your expenses report for any "oddities", such as high transportation costs (factory too far away), high wage costs (see item 4) or other anomalies.
7. Again, make sure to start on the US East Coast or England. Other starts are viable too, of course, but since you are still learning the game, this is by far the most business-conscious way. You can also start selling your car in both European and US markets using the new "shipping distance" slider (I don't know if you're familiar with that function yet) once you start turning consistent profits on one continent. There's no need to develop separate vehicles for both markets! (Although you can, of course).
8. Check your demand report to quickly see whether you need to increase or decrease production in a region. Apply basic principles of economics and try not to overproduce (kind of obvious, right?).
Thanks for the help, and well, I had some more progress after my last post. Made a car with like 500kg weight, 10 horsepower and a small engine which has lots of fuel mileage(inspired by the screenshot above). The result was at least 25km/L fuel, and 70km/h max speed due to the weight being so low. So I'd say that was a great attempt
Sure, there still isn't as much fuel economy as on the car on the screenshot above, but it is better in terms of speed, without being too expensive. I have no clue how he made a 200kg car, heh.
I'll post a screenshot with sales once I get to selling it. Taking a short break right now.
@Edit: Also, I'd like to see your branch network screenshot, to have an idea on what's a "decent branch", and on the amount you add.
My low sales were with the starter branch, and no additional branches. So that could be the issue with the low sales, on my older car. I also think the fact it was bad at absolutely everything was not good for the sales.