How to set up a Small Business in The Sims 4 Businesses & Hobbies

Updated 1 week ago3 min read

Overview

Everything you need to know to set up a Small Business in The Sims 4 Businesses & Hobbies Expansion Pack, from using ticket kiosks to building Business Renown and designating spaces.

Table of Contents

How to set up a Small Business

In The Sims 4 Businesses & Hobbies, just about anything can become a business! Your Sims can charge entry fees with a ticket kiosk to run a park, gym, or art gallery, run a service-based business like a bar or tattoo parlor, or sell crafted objects using Retail Surfaces. How to open a Small Business:
  1. 1
    In Live Mode, open the Owned Businesses tab in the bottom right of the screen (the cash register icon).
  2. 2
    Select Register Small Business. 
You’ll pay some Simoleons to register your business, and a menu will pop up with customizable options for your Small Business. Here you can:
  • name your business
  • write a description of your business
  • select a logo 
  • choose business activities 
  • choose target customers 
  • set Entrance Fees (if there’s a ticket kiosk on the Lot) 
  • set Lot assignments to choose which Lot the business operates from 
  • use the Price Modifier to set the markup for products or services.
The business menu in The Sims 4 showing how to register a small business, setting target customers, and business activities.In the menu, you can choose to run the business from home or from a Small Business Lot somewhere else. You need to buy a Small Business Lot first for the option to become available under Business Lot Assignment.

How to target customers

Choose what type of Sim you want as your customer base. Select specific ages, Traits, interests, and even Sims with a specific relationship status. You can set the criteria to be required or preferred. Selecting Required means that all customers must meet at least one of the criteria you selected. If you choose this and have multiple customer criteria selected, it’ll limit the pool of customers available. For example, if the required criteria for your target customers are Teen Sims with the Bookworm Trait, it’ll reduce the pool of Sims who can visit your business. If the pool of Sims is too small, you’ll get a pop-up notification telling you your customer criteria is too strict. Here’s the full list of criteria options for customers.
  • Age
  • Career
  • Marital Status
  • Financial Status
  • Traits
  • Skill Level +2
  • Occult
  • Supervised Customer

What are Business Activities?

Business Activities encourage certain actions when Sims visit your Small Business. You can choose up to five Business Activities, and there’s lots of cross-Pack compatibility. To run a retail business, choose the Browse and Buy Items option from the list of Business Activities. If Items are placed on Retail Surfaces, they’ll automatically be up for sale. Sims can still buy them without the Browse and Buy Items option selected. To find Retail Surfaces: 
  1. 1
    Open Build/Buy Mode.
  2. 2
    Choose Objects by Function.
  3. 3
    Select the Small Business category.
    • In this category, you’ll find retail surfaces and display walls.

What are Business Presets?

Business Presets can help you get started with running a Small Business in The Sims 4. Choosing a preset skips the steps of selecting Business Activities and Target Customers. Each preset has these preselected to match certain business types. These can be customized and saved as a custom preset.You can choose from these presets.
  • Bar
  • Gym
  • Library
  • Lounge
  • Museum
  • Nightclub
  • Park
  • Pool
  • Pottery Studio
  • Shop
  • Tattoo Parlor
There are presets for each different Lot type across Packs. For example, if you own The Sims 4 Get Together Expansion Pack, a Cafe Lot type will have preset Business Activities.

How to use a ticket kiosk 

The ticket kiosk gives your Sim the freedom to run a wide variety of businesses without selling a product. Have your Sim or their employees tend service-based objects like the tattoo table or bar so that customers can buy these services. You’ll find the ticket kiosk in Build Mode under Appliances. There are three options for charging Sims:
  • Hourly
  • One-time
  • Disabled: there’s no entry fee or hourly fee for Sims, and they’ll only pay for services/Items sold by the business.
The Entrance Fee is pre-set by the game and will depend on how successful your business is. The more Renown your business has, the higher the Entrance Fee will be. You can change the markup on your Entrance Fee by selecting the ticket kiosk and choosing Price Modifier. You can increase the Entrance Fee by:
  • -50%
  • -25%
  • +0%
  • +50%
  • +100%.
Adjusting the Price Modifier will also raise or lower the price of goods or services your Sim sells.

Where to set up a Small Business

In The Sims 4 Businesses & Hobbies, you can run your Small Business from a few different Lots.
  • A Small Business Residential Lot, where you run a business from your Sim’s home Lot.
  • A Business Venue Lot. Households can buy multiple Small Business Venue Lots.
  • An existing Community Lot, where you add a ticket kiosk to a bar, spa, gym, etc.
Buy a Business Venue Lot using the phone or computer. To buy a Business Venue Lot using the Owned Businesses tab, you must have registered a Small Business first. You can buy a Business Venue Lot furnished or unfurnished, and these Lots are fully customizable in Build Mode. 
Anyone in a Household can open their business on a Lot, but only one business can be open at a time.
Areas on the Lot can be zoned for different uses. In Build Mode, rooms will appear with outlines around them. Select the area or room you want to zone and choose between these three categories.
  • Residential: customers and employees can’t enter this area.
  • Public: all customers and employees can enter this area freely.
  • Employees Only: customers can’t enter, but employees can.
Note: the Residential option is only available on Small Business Residential Lots.An image from The Sims 4 showing how to designate a room on a Lot. The options are Public, Residential, and Employees Only.

Employees

Your Small Business can have a maximum of 3 employees, not including the owner. You can hire:
  • friends and family
  • Sims you’ve met and have some relationship with
  • a Sim that’s a Teen or older.
Members of your Household who don’t own the business and aren’t employees can still be directed to complete business tasks.  

How to hire or fire employees

To hire a Sim:
  1. 1
    Open the Owned Businesses tab in the bottom right of Live Mode. 
  2. 2
    Select Manage Employees.
  3. 3
    Select Select a Sim to Hire. 
Or, you can ask them directly by selecting the Hire for [business name] interaction.To fire an employee:
  1. 1
    Open the Owned Businesses tab in the bottom right of Live Mode.
  2. 2
    Select Manage Employees.
  3. 3
    Select Fire Employee underneath the employee you want to fire.
You can also fire a Sim directly by selecting the Fire from [business name] interaction. Be warned, when you fire an employee, your Sim’s relationship with them will take a hit. 

How does employee satisfaction and pay work?

Employees get paid by the hour, and you can set their pay rate to low, medium, or high. Employees can have different pay rates, and their pay rate impacts their satisfaction level. 
  • Low pay increases the chance of the employee having a Bitter Sentiment, and their relationship with the business owner decreases with each shift.
  • High pay increases the chance of the employee having a Motivating Sentiment, and their relationship with the business owner increases with each shift.
  • Medium pay has a chance of the employee having either Sentiment each shift.
To manage employee pay:
  1. 1
    Open the Owned Businesses tab in the bottom right of Live Mode.
  2. 2
    Select Manage Employees.
  3. 3
    Select Manage Pay underneath an employee.
  4. 4
    Choose between Low, Medium, or High.
The Manage Employees menu in The Sims 4, where you can hire and fire employees, and adjust their pay.If an employee’s relationship with a business owner is low for too long, they’ll quit. 

How to set Employee Tasks 

You can set up to five tasks for each employee, which they’ll autonomously work on when they arrive for their shift. To set tasks for employees:
  1. 1
    Open the Owned Businesses tab in the bottom right of Live Mode.
  2. 2
    Select Manage Employee Tasks.
Select the + icon underneath an employee to choose a task for them.

How Renown and Perks work

Building business Renown earns Perk Points for your Sim. You can build business Renown through customer satisfaction, which impacts the success and growth of your business.Spend these Perk Points on Small Business Perks, which are divided into three categories: Neutral, Dreamer, or Schemer. You can choose Perks from any category, or focus on one to align your business future with. This Alignment affects interactions with customers and even some of your Sim’s personal relationships. When you close your business, you’ll get an end-of-day summary outlining areas of excellence and areas of improvement.
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