All of my new franchises fail?

[Nina]

Hi,
Is anyone else finding their franchises failing?...I just cant get mine to succeed lately...and I start with 1 habitat...1 keeper..1 vet..1 mechanic....I make sure I choose an animal that breeds fast and has a good life span...I use the power of the entrance and I have donation bins everywhere,level 1 food...minimal habitat decoration. My new one is the Japanese Macaques and its failing..I even had to fire my 1 vet >.<...My outgoing is to high and I cant raise tickets as people get upset and wont come in...I have education near donation bins and alternate advertising...but I cant bring in more then is outgoing...I have tried even to add an information shop to generate income. I don't know what to do anymore and am getting sick of having to start over and over...My first zoo that was raking it in is also bleeding funds now since the update and I am loosing it without having changed anything.

 

[JonasH8000]

Mixed habitats are always a good idea to start with..., Warthogs and ostriches, you can add a bunch of other animals to that as well... But to answer your question, no I haven't found my franchise zoos failing, I started one this week and it's booming. But it's not a clean start because I obviously have conservation credits from my other franchise zoos which makes it easier to have a good start...

 

[Moosegun]

This is my starter zoo which i make for all my Franchises, this is guaranteed to make minimum 50k per year but often a lot more. I run this zoo until I have a minimum of 1.5mil in the bank and then i start to build the proper zoo.

One full set of staff facilities
Two set of guest facilities
Two habitats - one walk in peacocks
One cheetahs or similar (good for early CC generation)
5 Exhibits for income

• both scorps (the best ROI)
• Gilas
• Snails
• Eastern Brown snakes

One thing I did add which isnt in this picture is walk through education boards and seating in the first plaza

 

[Nina]

@[B]JonasH8000[/B]...my main zoo, I started that way but this time I wanted to do a zoo focused around cold climate animals and I'm failing miserably...I also don't want to have to wait ages to beautify or build on...I have tones of conservation credits...making them is easy...it's generating income around animals I want to focus on thats hard. I just don't think a zoo should fail if you are running it on the bare bones with 1 habitat. I shouldn't have to do each new franchise the same way for it to succeed...what is the point in building a replica of my first zoo. I guess I am feeling frustrated as I like the franchise mode over sandbox.

 

[JonasH8000]

@[B]JonasH8000[/B]...my main zoo, I started that way but this time I wanted to do a zoo focused around cold climate animals and I'm failing miserably...I also don't want to have to wait ages to beautify or build on...I have tones of conservation credits...making them is easy...it's generating income around animals I want to focus on thats hard. I just don't think a zoo should fail if you are running it on the bare bones with 1 habitat. I shouldn't have to do each new franchise the same way for it to succeed...what is the point in building a replica of my first zoo. I guess I am feeling frustrated as I like the franchise mode over sandbox.

You make a valid point, but I guess you'll have to accept that you'll have to start off a bit conventional. You can go wild once your income is green with a good cushion to fall back on. The best advice I got was: "Start slow with your franchise zoo", but having just one habitat with one type of animal might be a bit too slow ;-) If you have a lot of conservation credits, just use it to buy the most appealing type of animal? That should help...

 

[Moosegun]

...my main zoo, I started that way but this time I wanted to do a zoo focused around cold climate animals and I'm failing miserably...I also don't want to have to wait ages to beautify or build on...I have tones of conservation credits...making them is easy...it's generating income around animals I want to focus on thats hard. I just don't think a zoo should fail if you are running it on the bare bones with 1 habitat. I shouldn't have to do each new franchise the same way for it to succeed...what is the point in building a replica of my first zoo. I guess I am feeling frustrated as I like the franchise mode over sandbox.

You can easily build something like I outlined above and make it look however you want, what i did was build this and then knocked it down but you dont have to. The concept is the same. You need enough food and drink stall to cater for your guests. You need two habitats, one with a basic animal (I use peacocks because I like the walk in element) but you could equally use reindeer and artic wolves. The key thing for me is the exhibits, they are the income generators early game. Even if you dont want them later, put them somewhere out and delete them when your economy is sorted.

Get a good breeding pair, breed them until they enclosure is full, leave breeding pair in exhibit, sell the rest. Exhibits are one off the only things in the game which generate income regardless of visitor numbers (another is selling animals for cash).

 

[Nina]

I'm going to take all your suggestions on board and try again tomorrow...Thanks for the tips everyone =).

 

[Moosegun]

I'm going to take all your suggestions on board and try again tomorrow...Thanks for the tips everyone =).

Should have added, exhibits only really work as a revenue generator at normal aging. At higher they will not breed enough. What i normally do is run a lot of breeding exhibits early doors on normal breeding, then as the zoo gets larger, the income they make becomes less important and I turn up breeding speed and turn my exhibits in show only (turn off breeding), as they are still good for guest happiness.

 

[KiriONE]

I've been going through the same issues. It's fun to do the whole trial and error, but there's still some oddities in the way the game works IMO.

I had a Macaque habitat for the community challenge and I remember it being kind of expensive to operate. In short, start small. The 3 things I've found that kill your zoo financially are: food/enclosure costs, refunds to unhappy guests, excessive wages. I mean really they are the only things that will kill your zoo.

1. I can't fully confirm, but I believe sending juveniles to the trading center reduces food costs. I did this when I basically had 3 adult Gharials and about 20 offspring. Predators always seem to cost more, to be mindful of what kind of animals you are putting in your zoo early on.
2. See below for happiness solutions
3. You don't need a ton of staff early on, additionally, you should hold off on upgrading their training until your zoo is a little more established. High level vets for instance become very expensive.

Guests leave the park if their happiness drops to a certain point (not sure if it's 0 or a mix of a threshold + time already spent + money already spent). Happy guests leave the park after a certain amount of time but don't ask for refunds, unhappy ones do. Their happiness drops (and it goes down over time regardless) because they aren't having their needs met. When it is met, it will increase. Food and Drink, Benches and Picnic Tables, and Bathrooms need to be placed in areas that aren't too far from habitats. Be wary though, guests only seem to want to stand in line if there are about 5 or less people on it. Also make a sure trash cans are in and around your park to prevent litter build up.

Moosegun has some pretty good tips for starting out, the "early game" of PZ seems to focus on easy-to-breed-and-sell and low risk exhibits. Let them breed all year and at the end of the year send all the excess off to the trading center and quick sell them. When I get a pair of exhibit animals I usually denote them with something to note who the parents are. So my two gila monsters would be named: Armando (Sire), Cassie (FM). FM = Female Mate. This way at the end of the year, I hit select all in an exhibit and de-select those two so they may continue to breed. Between 4-5 exhibits you should be able to net anywhere between 9K-15K in straight cash.

 

[Jileha]

My macaque group rakes up the highest food costs in my tundra zoo (and I also have a group of giant pandas!) because they are happy breeders and I have to constantly reduce the groups’ size.

Try red pandas as starting animals (in addition to exhibits, but I don’t think I even had exhibits initially). People love them and they bring in high amounts of donations. And they don’t cost much in food. Do everything you need to keep the guests happy and don’t add new animals until you have reached a solid financial basis.

 

[Klinn]

This is my starter zoo which i make for all my Franchises, this is guaranteed to make minimum 50k per year but often a lot more. I run this zoo until I have a minimum of 1.5mil in the bank and then i start to build the proper zoo.

That's almost identical to what I do to get a new zoo rolling, although I'm too impatient to wait for 1.5 million. In addition, once I've got a bit of money I like to double the lab research and workshop facilities and hire a extra vet and mechanic so the whole researching process goes by more quickly.

 

[Skylalaa]

You must start a franchise with at least 2 animals to begin with, 3 is ideal. Crowd them together near the entrance for free electricity. Animals with no water requirement so you don't need filter. Have all entrance gates to habitats close to keeper hut etc so one keeper can do all the work.
If you only use your starting money for only one animal you will fail.

 

[Nina]

@Skylalaa I always start as you have said and have failed multiple times. As I have credits my new zoo started with polar bears and it is still viable...will see how it goes today.

 

[Skylalaa]

Polar bears have the most expensive food cost in the game I believe. But maybe big enough attraction to cover costs.
I recently started an entire new franchise (back to no conservation credits) and started my zoo with flamingoes and lemurs on an island (I put in the water filter) using null fence and rocks, and a walk-through peafowl habitat using mostly null fence and rock, small amount of fencing. One drink, food and information Center with all my buildings using blueprints to look nice. Have not had any problem making profit. Never got a loan (which are very difficult to repay).

My zoo started off beautiful from the start, can't handle ugly zoo! I have grown it now with Wolves and bears, beautifying one habitat at a time before I move on. I have over 150k, making about 6+K profit, with all my animals getting grade 3 feeding and all my staff on highest level, including extra 'float' vendors to cover the shifts when someone needs a rest. All vendors but my floats are assigned to a specific shop and all in workzones. All my zookeepers in workzones. My vet and mechanic float.

 

[Moosegun]

You must start a franchise with at least 2 animals to begin with, 3 is ideal. Crowd them together near the entrance for free electricity. Animals with no water requirement so you don't need filter. Have all entrance gates to habitats close to keeper hut etc so one keeper can do all the work.
If you only use your starting money for only one animal you will fail.

For me exhibits are still the easiest way to get a profitable early zoo, 5 decent gold breeding pairs can get you 30k/40k of additional income per year, which is massive early game. Not found anything else that comes close.