Jan 2010 looking ahead [RESPOND HERE]

I have been busy with life and stuff, and filling my shop is taking lower priority these days. Still, I'd rather be pulling these profits than not, so I'm fine with continuing the mall.

A few of you have indicated that you don't mind being part of a group of players who aren't aggressively ambitious and driven to grow: being laid back and just keeping up is fine. An absence of a couple days in a row isn't a big deal.

Others have said that they think they should bow out due to other commitments.

No one has actually come out and said, "This place is dead - I'm outta here!".

I'd like to get a feel (again) for how we're all doing. If you need to step aside, this is a good time to say so, so that we can all start thinking about either absorbing your categories or going back to the forums and board for another round of recruiting. I've really appreciated the relative stability of the past few months, I have to say!

Can I get a show of hands of who is in, and who wants to leave, and who wants a change? Post responses below ...

I'm still in Egg; things have been slow of late, but I think as a whole we have potential. We're up to 7 shops in the main market now (almost 8, Spunky seems to be knocking on that door now) so we certainly could be a "powerhouse" mall depending on how we capitalize our shop locations. Personally, I'm stuck between a rock and a hard place in my hut right now, but hopefully I'll be able to shift around and get into a better position.

Also, if Xaheras needs help with graphics at some point, I should have the time and ability to take care of them; I struggle with coding though so I may have some difficulty there.

Oh, I'm in! I'm investing everything into growing my shop. Growth has been steady. Backgrounds are OK income but not great by any means. If we shuffle categories, I would like to consider options for changing and or adding something else.

I haven't had a lot to say because I'm finishing up my doctorate and it is taking tooooo much of my time. I wouldn't be doing this if I didn't really need my job. I'll be done in April and I will have more Neo & social time then and a more secure job!

I've been in a lot of malls and I have come to appreciate stability. I especially appreciate the fact that no one in our mall is into drama.

I'm here too. The mall looks great. My shop needs to grow with a few million I have from my Portfolio. Hopefully my shop can hit late 500s by end of the year. Or even 600. The shop profit average about 5-10k a day. I had originally hope to catch up to everyone, but

The hard thing is playing neopets on my laptop. I think I need to reformat it cause Firefox takes 5 minutes to load.

RL has been tough, but at least I have a safe job. Also, need to for some Computer Certifications.

Anyways, future congrats on your doctorate, zoro! I'm in to drama, as long as it is in the big or small screen.

I believe this mall is a powerhouse mall. Just more powerful as time passes. When does sales peak again? May - August?

I am content to continue as things are. I think a lot of us have real life things to take care of at the moment, but a time will come when we all have more time. I still make enough for it to be worth it; I am not getting rich, but at least I can buy my 15k stocks everyday, upgrade the shop, and buy any simple things I want. The LEV will have to wait a while!

Ling Chi

Along with the vast majority, I'm perfectly happy to continue as we have been thus far. We could probably be more profitable with more dedicated time and effort spent I imagine, but personally I'm happy at present, spending time on my shop as time and mood allows. If thats good for y'all its good for me

Ditto to all the above. I'm happy being in this mall and not feeling pressured to get on neo every day and make sure everything is perfect, especially when real life is pressing on your available time.

lol, you can tell by how long it took me to respond that i've got some stuff going on at the moment...but I'm definitely happy to still be here, albeit less often than normal. I'm hoping that I'll have more time very soon, but still getting used to a new routine with two children.

I'm all for stability, and I know that even though we're mostly pretty quiet around here at the moment, there'll be times when we can focus much more on our shops and the mall.

Well! You guys have no idea how relieved I am to hear all your responses so far.

If you're happy, I'm happy.

There are still a few to hear from and I don't want anyone to think they have to follow suit. I'm afraid there will have to be some changes, just because we can't link to completely inactive accounts of course.

Sorry for the lateness with my reply, but I too am one of those people caught up in 'real' life and what not. In my opinion, I would be willing to continue on the same path we're on now. I am open to a shuffle of groups, perhaps some new inventory would add some neopian spice.

As much as I suppose a much more active/aggresive group would hold some appeal, I think that the fact that we are a 'older' set of neopeters is pretty evident. Middle school aged children can spend hours and hours on neopets like it's a job, adult aged neopets have real jobs and responsibilities.

I like the more relaxed feel we have around here, versus the malling as a job feel of some other malls.

I'm in too, now that I actually have time to stock my shop. For awhile I felt like I wasn't helping. And graphics are coming. Roby are you good with getting rid of the white backgrounds around objects? I am getting better at it, but it's the most painful part of the whole operation.

I'm pretty good at removing them usually. The only problem is when they're rotated and resized, that takes a little more work for me.