Professions ain't so Profitable as it once was!

[wynterlyn]

I have been noting lately that Professions lately have not been very profitable as it once was. Obviously there are different contributing factors but the one that has stood out is that nearly everyone I know have around 3-4 alts. They may not all be level 85s but they are the minimum level to have the profession at max.

I remember how profitable Jewelcrafting was during WTLK and only a few had actually levelled it and it was really hard to find one on my realm. However, there seem to be so many Jewelcrafters and the competition is ridiculous where you have people undercutting gems that are already listed for 7-8G. Similarly Enchanting was once a profitable profession as well but the only decent profits you make from are the high level ones or probably the heirloom ones. I've seen numerous Enchantments for less than 4G on the AH.

Similarly with Inscription. People list glyphs for 4-5G. There were a few glyphs that were listed for 110G - Glyph of Frost Nova. Someone came and listed 3 for 11G. I mean seriously?

I do believe the only way to make money is probably selling BoEs. I've made more gold selling BoEs this entire expansion than I've probably made from all my professions combined. Especially with guilds having 200+ members it is so much easier finding someone in your guild willing to make what ever you need. I play on a medium population realm. During WTLK we were a medium-high populated realm with 100s of small guilds with 25-30 people and even fare less.

People blame the botters for mass farming, etc but honestly I don't really think that has contributed as much as having Alts with every single profession available.

[themortalgod]

Professions are only low profit if you don't understand economics. I make a killing off my professions. Yes everyone has most professions now so the obvious stuff isn't as profitable and daily cooldowns are a lot less scarce but if you know how to leverage professions to play the market you will do well.

[wynterlyn]

Well the thing is you can't compete with someone undercutting you by 100G like my example on Inscription. I know someone will say to buy him out but it only encourages them to re-list more items. According to them it is selling. I doubt they know that only 1 person is buying it all. I don't even look at the names of people that have bough my stuff when I take the gold from the Mailbox.

Similarly with JC. How do you compete with people selling gems for 8G and enchanting mats for 50 silver.

[vesseblah]

Profitability of crafting always goes down with age of the current raid tier and current expansion. Since we're already three months into last tier of the expansion, nothing is worth much anymore except red gems and the highest end enchants while people are slowly winding down towards MoP.

[Marxman]

Well the thing is you can't compete with someone undercutting you by 100G like my example on Inscription. I know someone will say to buy him out but it only encourages them to re-list more items.

And then you buy those. When he relists again, buy those too. Eventually he runs out of stock and you post his auctions at 200% profit. No one has infinite materials. NO ONE. I was a Gem baron at one point, and even I had limits on the amount of stuff I could craft in a period of time.

Don't try to compete with idiots posting things below value. Either buy them out if their price is cheap enough or wait on them to run out of stock. If their price really is that low, then they can't sustain their business by losing gold/breaking even on every auction.

[Tinykong]

Anyone who undercuts to 10% of market value is just trying to unload them quick. Do them a favor and buy them up, they get their money, and you get to make profit off their inability to deal with the AH.

I love seeing people undercut that big, I always buy them out and then wait a few days, repost it, and make 50-60g for clicking a button twice and walking to a mail box.

[Palisis]

And then you buy those. When he relists again, buy those too. Eventually he runs out of stock and you post his auctions at 200% profit. No one has infinite materials. NO ONE. I was a Gem baron at one point, and even I had limits on the amount of stuff I could craft in a period of time.

Don't try to compete with idiots posting things below value. Either buy them out if their price is cheap enough or wait on them to run out of stock. If their price really is that low, then they can't sustain their business by losing gold/breaking even on every auction.

Pretty much what I was going to post. I wasn't as active during 4.1-4.2 as I was dealing with RL and couldn't log on as much, but during the first few weeks of 4.3 I went from around 10k to 150k in a matter of weeks from just working the A.H. Didn't really take much time, but I just wanted to have some lump sum of gold moving forward as I was planning on 10 85s (pre-4.3 I was at 2 85s). The money came a long way with those alts, and now those alts have their own professions and starting to turn profitable.

[Hoddie]

And then you buy those. When he relists again, buy those too. Eventually he runs out of stock and you post his auctions at 200% profit. No one has infinite materials. NO ONE. I was a Gem baron at one point, and even I had limits on the amount of stuff I could craft in a period of time.

Try telling that to the person who is trying to do just that with the Lil Smokey's that I keep posting at 41g. He buys and re-lists at 250g. I have a guild bank tab full of them and enough mats to re-fill that guild bank 20 times over. And the mats are still available on the AH. I get about 25g profit from each one and so far he's bought a couple of hundred or so. At times - if he's online - I can't list them fast enough.

As for glyphs, I agree that eventually herb prices will go up if you're forever buying more to replenish the stock that your competitor keeps buying from you, but in my experience most people give up buying and re-listing long before that becomes an issue. Only once have I had to give in to a competitor doing this and he later told me that he burnt over 200k gold buying 1000s of stacks of herbs so as to make the prices go up to a point where I could not list at the same price. We actually became quite good friends in the end, and he bought out my entire glyph stock giving me a 30g profit on each one, on condition that I didn't list any more for at least 12 months. That's when I switched to enchants, best move I ever made.

[Shamanic]

I'm making a ton of money on my server; this has to be massively server dependant. Gems are still selling like hotcakes, enchants are selling like hotcakes, I'm still selling gyphs very frequently at 200g+

[Celtix]

So wrong, i have over 7 diffrent 85's all with diffrent proffs and all maxed out, with all these combined.. i make alot. and all it takes is playing 45 mins aday on each. ive hit goldcap twice.

[Stuffs]

I'm making a ton of money on my server; this has to be massively server dependant. Gems are still selling like hotcakes, enchants are selling like hotcakes, I'm still selling gyphs very frequently at 200g+

It definitely seems to be. The guild as a whole recently moved to Tich(back to high pop from low pop, wooo), and my old mainstay of JC/Ench doesn't seem to be making much of a profit, nowhere near the old margins anyways from KJ. All that really sells for a decent lump are Ember Topaz/Inferno cuts rare gem wise it seems.

[Moneypenny]

Just install TSM, scan your professions and the AH (at least during a week) and it will tell you what you should craft to make gold. Not easy to setup, but rewarding when done correctly.

[Pipebomb]

I have 3 transmute alts. Inferno Rubies and Truegold procs make thousands of gold. Tailoring bags sell pretty good. Other than that you're probably right.

[Kaibhan]

Those people who post things up that cheaply more often the not don't want to play the ah game and don't care about professions they are just tossing stuff up to get rid of it and to give someone a break. Just buy em out and resell it if you want to make money.

[Izin]

Well the thing is you can't compete with someone undercutting you by 100G like my example on Inscription. I know someone will say to buy him out but it only encourages them to re-list more items. According to them it is selling. I doubt they know that only 1 person is buying it all. I don't even look at the names of people that have bough my stuff when I take the gold from the Mailbox.

Similarly with JC. How do you compete with people selling gems for 8G and enchanting mats for 50 silver.

That's what an open market is for if the demand is high an enchant that got under cutted with 100g will disappear fast, how ever if the demand isnt great enough the new price will indeed be this 100 g lower price but this means that the old price was to high. The market didn't accept the old price hence the new price will sell more enchants (or what ever item).

[Rec]

And then you buy those. When he relists again, buy those too. Eventually he runs out of stock and you post his auctions at 200% profit. No one has infinite materials. NO ONE. I was a Gem baron at one point, and even I had limits on the amount of stuff I could craft in a period of time.

Don't try to compete with idiots posting things below value. Either buy them out if their price is cheap enough or wait on them to run out of stock. If their price really is that low, then they can't sustain their business by losing gold/breaking even on every auction.

Reselling in small amounts is great, but you never know how much stock they have. Just as they don't have infinite stock, you don't have infinite gold.

[Aryl]

I think with professional the income of gold will take longer & you must be patient and be willing to take risks, but by doing so will have the easiest income of gold (practically clicking buttons).
I'm glad WoW is at a stage where gold is easy to come by and i'm sitting very comfortably without having to do mass amounts of work. I hope it remains the same in MOP

[ablib]

I work the economy on 3 realms (both Alliance and Horde), and two others (both Alliance and Horde) semi-regularly for a total of 10 different economies.

They all have different quirks about them. The OP may very well have a shit economy that makes it difficult to make gold. I know a guy that farms ALL day (no botting) solely to make crusader enchants. He sells them for 49 gold a piece (he's an idiot). He has hundreds of them on the AH. That market is saturated. He owns it. There is no way I'm going to buy hundreds of crusader enchants on that realm, when every day he farms enough to put a ton more up. I refuse to sell them for less than 500g a piece.

[Psilo]

So wrong, i have over 7 diffrent 85's all with diffrent proffs and all maxed out, with all these combined.. i make alot. and all it takes is playing 45 mins aday on each. ive hit goldcap twice.

Correct me if I'm wrong but that's over 5 hours a day? No thanks. I already have a job.

[knockboots]

Leatherworking leg armors and Tailoring leg enchants made me tons of money. The mats are easy to farm for and there's usually little competition on the AH.