parentshiftbook Chapter 207 The Explosive Popularity of Spark Internet Cafes in Silicon Valley
Chapter 207 The Explosive Popularity of Spark Internet Cafes in Silicon Valley
It was seven o'clock in the morning, and the sky was not yet fully light.
Manager James stood at the entrance of the internet cafe, watching the workers carry out three computers and place them in the display window. The computers were already powered on, and the screens displayed the StarCraft startup screen—a space marine holding a gun against a starry background.
A sign next to it reads: "Free trial of StarCraft: Stellar Edition".
At 7:30, the first customer arrived. He looked like a middle school student, carrying a backpack, and stopped when he saw the screen.
"Can we play?" he asked.
"Sure." James handed over the mouse. "Half an hour is free."
The high school student sat down, his hands on the keyboard. He selected the first mission of the Terran campaign. The screen lit up, and the commander's voice came through his headset: "Welcome to the Mar Sara colony..."
At 7:45, there were five people in line.
At 8:00 AM sharp, the internet cafe officially opened for business. Twenty customers who had booked a StarCraft game session for the day rushed in and headed straight for their reserved machines. The sounds of keyboard typing, mouse clicks, and game sound effects filled the air almost simultaneously.
James walked to the cashier, where the clerk, Maria, was already preparing the physical game discs for today's sale. The boxes were dark blue, with the StarCraft logo on the cover and the words "StarCraft System Special Edition" printed in small print in the lower right corner. Stacks of them were piled up behind the counter, like a blue brick wall.
"How much stock did you prepare yesterday?" James asked.
"Three hundred sets," Maria said. "Manager, how many do you think we can sell today?"
"I don't know." James looked at the demo area, where seven or eight people had already gathered around the three free demo machines. "Judging by this, three hundred sets might not be enough."
At nine o'clock, the first sale was completed. A college student wearing glasses bought a game set and a Spark optical mouse. "This mouse is more responsive for gaming," he said, "better than my old one."
At 9:30, all fifty computers in the internet cafe were full. Forty-two were playing StarCraft, and eight were browsing the internet or playing other games. The air was filled with the aroma of pizza and coffee, and the excited shouts of young people.
"Set up the tanks!"
"Airdrop! Airdrop!"
"Medics, follow!"
James surveyed the store. He noticed that at least fifteen customers were picking up the mice in the display area to test their feel and examining the keycaps of the keyboards between games. Labels on the display stand read: Spark Optical Mouse $69, Spark Mechanical Keyboard $89, Gaming Combo (Mice + Keyboard) $149.
At ten o'clock, Maria called out to him: "Manager, we've sold a hundred copies of the game."
"So fast?"
"Many people buy one set for themselves and then buy another set as a gift for a friend," Maria said, pointing to a customer at the counter. "That person just bought five sets, saying they were for his roommates."
James walked to the warehouse and glanced at the inventory. There were two hundred game discs left, and fifty sets each of mouse and keyboard.
He picked up the phone and called the purchasing manager of Xinghuo Internet Cafe.
"Games are selling very quickly at the main store, as are mice and keyboards. We might need to restock this afternoon."
"How much should we pay?"
"I need another two hundred sets of games, one hundred mice, and eighty keyboards."
"So many? My other stores also need them..."
"Give it to me first," James said. "I have the most people on my side."
"Okay, deliver it at 2 PM."
At noon, the internet cafe's pizza delivery orders were three times higher than usual. James temporarily reassigned two people to deliver the food, working like an assembly line from the kitchen to the tables.
A customer was eating pizza while playing a game, holding the pizza in his left hand and controlling the mouse with his right, his eyes fixed on the screen. He was playing Zerg and was using a Zergling rush.
"We won!" he shouted, put down the pizza, wiped his hands, and walked to the counter.
"Another game," he said, "for my brother."
"And this keyboard," he said, pointing to the mechanical keyboard on the display stand, "I'll take one too. The keyboard in my dorm is too soft; I can't feel anything when I press it."
At 1 p.m., the game inventory was running low. Maria counted, and there were only forty-seven sets left.
"Manager, the game is almost over."
James glanced at the time; the restocking truck should be arriving soon. He walked to the door and looked at the other internet cafes across the street—those cafes were deserted, while his place had a dozen or so people queuing in front of the three free trial machines.
People in the team are chatting:
What race do you play?
"Humans, it's safe."
"I play Zerg, I can mass units quickly."
The delivery truck arrived at 1:30 PM. The driver unloaded two cardboard boxes, one for games and the other for peripherals.
"That's all?" James asked, looking at the size of the cardboard box.
"The purchasing manager said that other stores are also ordering goods, so this is all we can give you," the driver said. "One hundred sets of games, fifty for mice, and thirty for keyboards."
"Not enough," James said. "I have another group of high school students leaving school at three o'clock."
"Then there's nothing I can do," the driver said, shrugging. "The warehouse is out of stock too."
James had the clerk bring in the new stock. Twenty games and ten mice were sold as soon as they hit the shelves.
At 2 PM, Ms. Lin called from Starlight Entertainment Company.
"Manager James, this is Lin from Starlight Entertainment's operations department. How are today's sales figures?"
James walked into his office and opened the day's sales records.
"As of 2 PM, 187 copies of the game, 92 mice, and 78 keyboards have been sold. The demo area has received a total of 123 visitors, of whom 41 have already purchased the game."
"A conversion rate of 33% is not bad," Ms. Lin said on the other end of the phone. "The data from other stores is coming in one after another, and the head office is currently number one in sales."
"We're running out of stock," James said. "We only have about thirty sets of games left, and not many mice and keyboards either."
"I'll contact the purchasing department to see if we can get the goods from other stores."
"As soon as possible."
After hanging up the phone, James returned to the store. He saw the college student who had bought two sets of games and a keyboard teaching a new player how to use keyboard shortcuts.
"Select a farmer, B, G, and build a gas field," the college student said. "Don't use the mouse to click; it's too slow."
A new player tried it and their eyes lit up: "It's really fast!"
"This game requires skill; you'll need to practice a lot."
At 3 PM, the middle school students arrived as expected. Seven or eight boys in school uniforms rushed in and headed straight for the demo area. Seeing the queue, one boy asked, "Can we play the games right away after buying them?"
"Yes," James said. "Buy the game and get an hour of free computer time."
"I'll buy it!"
"I'll buy it too!"
The stock of game discs was dwindling at a visible rate. Thirty sets, twenty sets, ten sets, five sets…
The game sold out at 4 PM.
"Out of stock?" a late customer asked disappointedly.
"It will be available tomorrow," James said. "You can buy the mouse and keyboard first, and come pick up the game tomorrow."
"Okay then." The customer bought a mouse, "Then please save me a set for tomorrow."
"it is good."
By 5 p.m., the mouse and keyboard were sold out. Even the display samples were bought—one customer insisted on having that set, saying he wanted the one with the best feel.
James looked at the empty display stand and made a second call to the purchasing manager.
"Everything's sold out. Games, mice, keyboards—all gone. We have to restock before we open tomorrow."
"We can't restock." The purchasing manager's voice was urgent. "The situation is similar in the other six stores. We prepared a total of 7,000 sets of games, and we've already sold over 5,000 by 4 PM today. The mice and keyboards are even more outrageous; we prepared 3,000 sets, and they're all sold out. The factory is working overtime to produce more, but it will take at least three days to restock."
"Three days?" James frowned. "What are we selling during those three days?"
"We can only wait."
At 8 o'clock, Lingyun received the summary data from seven stores in the Xingchen Technology office.
Tom stood to the side, watching the fax machine spit out page after page of numbers.
"Total game sales: 3419 copies," Tom read out. "Mouses: 1027. Keyboards: 886. Bundles: 623. Revenue from play... a total of thirty-four thousand dollars?"
"What about game sales revenue?" Lingyun asked.
Tom turned to the next page: "Game sales revenue... $49.99 per set, 3419 sets... $170,981."
The office was silent for a few seconds.
"Seventeen hundred thousand a day?" Tom looked at the numbers. "And that doesn't even include the revenue from the mouse and keyboard."
How much do people earn from mice and keyboards?
Tom turned the page again: "A single mouse is $69, a keyboard is $89, and a set is $149. In total... more than $146,000."
"It adds up to over 300,000," Ling Yun said, "per day."
"And the game inventory is almost gone," Tom said. "All seven stores combined have less than five hundred sets left. The mice and keyboards are all sold out, not even the samples are left."
Lingyun picked up the phone and called Jinan.
Li Mo answered the phone.
What is the current production capacity of the mouse and keyboard production line in Jinan?
"We produce 50,000 sets a month," Li Mo said. "Next month we can raise that to 80,000."
"Starting tomorrow, all production will be shifted to game-specific sets. We'll change the packaging and print 'StarCraft Collaboration Edition' on it," Ling Yun said. "The first batch will be 20,000 sets, and they'll be shipped to the US within two weeks."
"Twenty thousand sets? That many?"
"We sold over a thousand sets in just one day," Ling Yun said. "Twenty thousand sets might only last for half a month."
"...Understood. I'll adjust the production line immediately."
"Also," Ling Yun added, "we've contacted the packaging factory to order packaging boxes for 100,000 game discs. We're having Blizzard expedite the pressing of the game discs."
"One hundred thousand sets?"
"That's right," Ling Yun said. "At this rate, selling 100,000 units a month isn't impossible."
After hanging up the phone, Lingyun looked at Tom.
Starting tomorrow, all internet cafes will put up a sign at their entrance: "StarCraft: Stellar Edition, exclusively launched at Xinghuo Internet Cafe. Buy the game and get a three-month Star Language membership for free."
"What about the cost?"
"It'll come from the promotion budget," Ling Yun said. "What we need now is momentum, reputation, and market share."
"Understood."
Meanwhile, Li Mo, far away in Jinan, had just hung up the phone when he rushed into the workshop and shouted to the night shift workers:
"Production line adjustment! Everything's being converted to game-themed outfits! No sleep tonight!"