The Empire Club/Session 1

What to do with our finances and our tax bill?
*Magda - Will include the option to round up purchases at her auction house by 2% and gift memberships to those who do?
*Herr Prof. Dr. J. Perrin Farrandole, PhD - We can list the building with the Aeldrum Historical Society
**Regular inspections by the Historical Society (a quasi-governmental organization), limitations on what we can do to renovate or the activities that we could do, but we would become tax exempt?
**This would put us under the supervision, and jurisdiction, of the Ministry of Culture
***Way of promoting and maintaining Aledrum's cultural identity as defined by the ruling government. It is a propaganda arm and a way of giving space for the religions to air their grievances.
**Ten percent of our operations need to be oriented towards the public good
**Let's put a pin in this to see what our cash flow looks like in a few months
*We will get reappraised and have our tax bill adjusted as a result, which makes it difficult to predict our future tax bill.
*Our building: 50 yards at street level, 30 yards deep, two stories above ground, 1 story below ground.
*Property value in tens of millions of ducats. Property tax would be valued proportionately 
*Cassandra Sorothin enters the club and inspects the premise. Wearing a nice dress with acoustically optimized high-heels and a very fancy church-lady hat. Magda offers to "do her (portrait)" immediately.
Party discusses identity of the club: 
*Club should cater to the rich and powerful
Pre-opening gala, drumming up excitement event
* (Magda) Host a pre-opening event for the VIP members showing them what we are doing with their money and what we will do with more of their money 
**Magda will hold an invite-only auction at the event. You get an invite for paying an extra 1% on top of your purchase.
*(Professor J. Perrin Farrandole) will give tours of the event
*We should each pull on our connections to drum up attendees for the event.
*Decide to make it an opening week, like a Greek Rush Week
Who are our VIPs?
*Talent on retainer and using talent as a reason to recruitment
** Historically we have not done talent based acquisition
**It is important to Mlle. Gauthier and the Cultural Coalition that the club creates culture and not on old men
*People were recommended by a standing member to join and seconded by an additional member. It was then subject to approval by the board (shareholders, senior members).
**There was not an application fees, but membership fees if you were accepted
*What about patrons of the art auctions?
** Perhaps they would only be given a pre-opening tour? Magda proposes an invite-only gala where the purpose of the gala is revealed during the gala. Auction would be held during the gala.
* Opening week of events - Different target crowd each night. Assess attendees for membership afterwards
When to do appraisal?
*Now? Potentially lower value -> lower property taxes, however lower values may anger neighboring properties
*Will there be a large change in appraisal value after our renovations? If yes, change in appraisal value could raise suspicion of government.
*Need to see basement before appraisal
Party goes into the basement:
*Three ways down: Staircase, dumbwaiter, staff elevator
* Magda and J. Perrin take staff elevator down, jittery ride down (Dawes supervises elevator operation)
*Lights are flickering, no outside windows. No health and safety repairs required, but plumbing requires repairs.
*Large portion of basement is a kitchen. Basement about half the footprint of upper levels. Contains a small generator. Club was used to witness etheric storms up close. Generator needs repair. Kitchen also needs maintenance. Vermin currently inhabit kitchen.
*Kitchen was abandoned quickly, no plans existed for winding down operations. Diagram on wall of proper meal presentation style. Cutlery included special fork for eating insects as a nod to the traditions of Aeldrum.
*Magda says we should leave the basement untouched as much as possible and make it our public good museum. 
*Plumbing needs to be redone to restore water. Infrastructure for gas in place, but should check for leaks. Appliances need work, corroded.
* Is the other half of the basement footprint unoccupied? Dawes brings in scanning equipment and team. Equipment is not calibrated for Aeldrum rock. Would need to hire someone on Aeldrum to scan/excavate basalt.
* Magda begins to organize auction and produces a piece of art (it is not a masterpiece). Auction is very successful, generates a significant buzz in the Aeldrum art circles. Seven bidders interested in purchasing painting. Magda values painting at 150k ducats (Aeldrum art market is not tax deductible). Painting sells for 5m ducats. Buyer is infamous Baron Hathel of Aeldman aristocracy. Hathel was a bitter rival with Elsevar. Assaulted several members of parliament when dueling was outlawed.
*Kingsley sees old woman at the auction. Woman approaches Kingsley and identifies as Margaret. Margaret asks why Kingsley hasn't called. Demands to be allowed to dine at the club. Margaret storms out of club. Kingsley hands her son, Lucian Walls, a lollipop. Walls says 'If my mother ever sees you again, this will be a violation of our agreement', threatens to ruin Kingsley.
* Prof. Perrin starts to do tours of the basement on a pro bono basis to build relationships with key figures in historical society
*Heidegger gets his appraiser friend involved to start the appraisal process. This involves Heidegger loudly, but charmingly, yelling at the appraiser about things over several days. Heidegger's guy says (1) value of land alone is 10M ducats, (2) value of material salvage is 500K ducats, for the right buyer and when restored to working order will be worth 20M. Because we can claim restoration, we get some protections for NIMBY neighbors. Crystal terrace will cost 3M ducats at cost to restore.
*Heidegger finds a contractor to map out other half of basement footprint, and other parts of basalt structure. Contractor finds evidence of other unused pipework. Interior of basement is sealed, however cut was made 150 years ago and discreetly sealed. 6 inches of basalt behind wall followed by concrete. Chamber is in the footprint of the remainder of basement. Filled with concrete. Empire club likely gutted what was in the space before and left pipework in place.
*J. Perrin investigates history of Baron Hathel - Hathel opposed to desegregation of club.
*Kingsley accesses office computer. Contains tax documents, survey of building, and log of all meetings from past 20 years. Survey results do not mention concrete block.
*Perrin investigates history of club site. Area used to contain houses of noble families before unification. Great houses controlled neighborhoods in the Aeldrum spire. This area belonged to family now extinct, descendants from this family are Elsevar and Baron Hathel. Most likely explanation of other half is basement is not that exciting. Empire club built during first 100 years of Aeldrum golden era of trade. Likely a period of occupation between cave lords and Empire club as evidenced by sophisticated piping.
*Heidegger agrees to start working on the main lobby so that we can host the soft opening galas
*Dalton starts to recruit staff for the events (and for long term)
#Gala Week
##Bohemian Night (10 guests)
##Revival Night (30 guests, sommelier with classic wines)
##Salon Night (50 guest, Baroness Salvek guest of honor)
##Fashion Night (20 guests, social influencers, media types, paparazzi) aka "Mean Girls Night"
## Live and Let Liveth (cigars and bourbon)
#Running Expenses:
## Renovations: 200,000 (lobby, backrooms, gallery)
## Personnel (6 custodians) = 13,750/mo
##Revival Night = 102,000 + 20,000 wine
##Art Gala = 128,000 + 12k
##Salon Night = 110,000 Bugs & Drugs
##Fashion Night = 75,000
##Music = 125,000 (every night but "Revival Night"") + 5k for Revival Night
## Live and Let Liveth = 50,000
Dalton invites Lady Margaret Seleth to Bohemian night… and will absent himself
Sommelier Whiskins may join the staff if sufficiently pleased with Revival Night
Category:Session Summaries