Pizza Drop! (RAR!)

[Zor]

In this scenario ROB gives you ownership of a one of a kind Restaurant operation which takes this basic formula...

...to a truly global level: PIZZA DROP!

Pizza Drop has a series of a dozen space stations orbiting the earth. Each of which are toroids 8.5km in diameter and 850meters wide spinning to provide artificial gravity with a wheel like hub. Raw material is collected mostly from comets and asteroids collected by collector ships. The ring section on each is divided into five levels, with big windows and mirrors to provide sunlight in most situations and growlights to supplement when needed powered by batteries and a solar collector array. Inside most of these are (mostly) hydroponic farms growing a wide variety of plants including (but not limited too) basil, tea, cola nuts, sugar cane, peach, garlic, various other spice plants, peppers (hot and mild), spinach, onions, scallions, leeks, olives, potatoes, mushrooms (grown in special suspended mushroom racks) and most notably tomatoes and wheat. These are harvested by harvesting drones overseen by a small number of engineers and agronomists. Some of the plant matter is used to feed chickens, pigs, holstein cattle and water buffalo on pasture raised for their meat and their milk. The milk is fermented into cheese, the chicken is cured in various ways and the beef and pork mostly goes into making sausages. Each of the stations is somewhat specialized in it's secondary aspects of production (besides cattle, wheat and tomatoes) and they send unmanned supply ships between them docking delivering food. But one thing they all have in common is a facility were all the ingredients come together and are made into delicious pizzas.

Available online is an smart-phone app which allows people to order a Pizza from Pizza Drop. Once the Pizza is made, it is loaded into a drop pod (made in a factory on the dark side of the moon) and launched to land either at their address or their location. They'll reenter the atmosphere, areobrake, use parachutes and eventually springed landing gear allowing for a good safe touch down and opening. Each pod costs $50 and can contain up to ten pizzas in Pizza Boxes (which sell for $16 canadian dollars for a 20cm Pizza, $24 CAD for a 30cm pizza and $32 for a 40cm pizza, which comes with up to two toppings not including cheese for free with extra toppings costing $2 dollars extra per pizza) and up to four two liter bottles of Pizza Drop Cola or Peach Iced Tea. Each Pizza Drop drop pod has a radio tracker allowing you to track its course. There is a "arrived in 45 minutes or it's free" policy. Pizza Drop Pizzas are high quality stuff. Pizza Drop boxes have the Pizza Drop logo on them, which has a Space Trooper in Power Armor delivering pizza. Pizza Drop comercials either show this female space trooper fighting through hordes of Not-Klingons and Not-Borg in alien environments to deliver hot fresh Pizzas and more demonstrative commercials showing how Pizza Drop actually works. Pizza Drop has a staff of 2,500 employees, all of which are hard working men and women who want to make the best darn Pizzas they can and twelve surface to orbit shuttles to deliver.

The US, Canada, UK, Australia, Japan, Germany, France and China have agreed to let you operate your operations in return for a special deal allowing their heads of state (and heads of government in the case of the monarchies) one free drop pod of Pizza every day. The current US president has some desire to make extensive use of your services. Your facilities have breezed past the Health Inspections.

You currently live in a 200 square meter apartment in one of Pizza Drop's stations overseeing the cattle ranches in a dormatory complex which has a gym, rec rooms, swimming pool, video arcade, a grocery store and a sit down Pizza Drop place and Saul's Kosher Chinese Noodle House for your nutritional needs.

What do you do?

Zor

[FaxModem1]

Watch as nations try and take my new satellite robotics technology and conquer it for their own purposes? Is there any reason the various nations of Earth won't simply do what they can to disable a drone, reverse engineer it, and do what they can to take it themselves?

[Zor]

Watch as nations try and take my new satellite robotics technology and conquer it for their own purposes? Is there any reason the various nations of Earth won't simply do what they can to disable a drone, reverse engineer it, and do what they can to take it themselves?

They're drop pods, they're one shot things that are launched from a Pizza Drop station and land. They are incapable of getting back into space on their own and you can only fit ten Pizza boxes in them in any case.

Zor

[Eternal_Freedom]

I suddenly have that kind of massive space infrastructure and global reach...and it's used for delivering pizzas. You have got to be fucking kidding me.

I maintain the pizza business as a sideline and start offering space infrastrucutre and so on (like whatever else can be made on that lunar factory, and whatever is used to get the drop pods back to Earth orbit) to the UN and to private companies. Consider offering those power armoured space troopers to the UN as globally-reaching peacekeeping forces.

Basically, use this for just about anything apart from delivering pizzas, as that is such a massive waste of the potential it's not even funny.

Hell, if I really wanted to, between the Moon-Earth supply ships, Drop Pods and Power Armoured troopers, I could probably go full supervillain without much effort.

EDIT: Missed the bit about the power armoured troopers being a marketing gimmick...but still, there is a lot of potential to this beyond putting Pizza Hut out of business.

[The Romulan Republic]

In this scenario ROB gives you ownership of a one of a kind Restaurant operation which takes this basic formula...

...to a truly global level: PIZZA DROP!

Damn, I've got to agree with Eternal_Freedom on this one- that is one hell of a waste of this tech.

I mean, I guess its a way to keeping the money coming in, but there is SO MUCH MORE that I could do with this tech- though I'd have to hire on people with more business skills, political skills, and scientific knowledge than I (if I don't already have some on staff).

Pizza Drop has a series of a dozen space stations orbiting the earth. Each of which are toroids 8.5km in diameter and 850meters wide spinning to provide artificial gravity with a wheel like hub. Raw material is collected mostly from comets and asteroids collected by collector ships. The ring section on each is divided into five levels, with big windows and mirrors to provide sunlight in most situations and growlights to supplement when needed powered by batteries and a solar collector array. Inside most of these are (mostly) hydroponic farms growing a wide variety of plants including (but not limited too) basil, tea, cola nuts, sugar cane, peach, garlic, various other spice plants, peppers (hot and mild), spinach, onions, scallions, leeks, olives, potatoes, mushrooms (grown in special suspended mushroom racks) and most notably tomatoes and wheat. These are harvested by harvesting drones overseen by a small number of engineers and agronomists. Some of the plant matter is used to feed chickens, pigs, holstein cattle and water buffalo on pasture raised for their meat and their milk. The milk is fermented into cheese, the chicken is cured in various ways and the beef and pork mostly goes into making sausages. Each of the stations is somewhat specialized in it's secondary aspects of production (besides cattle, wheat and tomatoes) and they send unmanned supply ships between them docking delivering food. But one thing they all have in common is a facility were all the ingredients come together and are made into delicious pizzas.

So I have both the most awesome restaurant change, and the most advanced space program, on Earth? Groovy.

How automated/self-sufficient are the stations?

Available online is an smart-phone app which allows people to order a Pizza from Pizza Drop. Once the Pizza is made, it is loaded into a drop pod (made in a factory on the dark side of the moon) and launched to land either at their address or their location. They'll reenter the atmosphere, areobrake, use parachutes and eventually springed landing gear allowing for a good safe touch down and opening. Each pod costs $50 and can contain up to ten pizzas in Pizza Boxes (which sell for $16 canadian dollars for a 20cm Pizza, $24 CAD for a 30cm pizza and $32 for a 40cm pizza, which comes with up to two toppings not including cheese for free with extra toppings costing $2 dollars extra per pizza) and up to four two liter bottles of Pizza Drop Cola or Peach Iced Tea. Each Pizza Drop drop pod has a radio tracker allowing you to track its course. There is a "arrived in 45 minutes or it's free" policy. Pizza Drop Pizzas are high quality stuff. Pizza Drop boxes have the Pizza Drop logo on them, which has a Space Trooper in Power Armor delivering pizza. Pizza Drop comercials either show this female space trooper fighting through hordes of Not-Klingons and Not-Borg in alien environments to deliver hot fresh Pizzas and more demonstrative commercials showing how Pizza Drop actually works. Pizza Drop has a staff of 2,500 employees, all of which are hard working men and women who want to make the best darn Pizzas they can and twelve surface to orbit shuttles to deliver.

Hmm, if my logo is a female action hero, then I'll probably try to build on that image (and hopefully live up to it), by instituting highly progressive hiring policies, etc. It fits my own political inclinations. Equal pay for equal work, naturally. Market myself as the wave of the future in all senses of the word- space tech., progressive policies, healthy/environmentally friendly food production. My brand/slogan will basically be "A Brighter Tomorrow".

Naturally, I'll branch out into other industries besides pizza. Oh, and sign a promotional deal of some sort with both the Star Trek and Star Wars franchises, naturally. "Pizza Drop- the Official Pizza of the Star Wars/Star Trek universe" has a nice ring to it, don't you think?"

Or just buy them out, with the resources I'll enjoy as the owner of a monopoly on the most advanced technology in existence.

The US, Canada, UK, Australia, Japan, Germany, France and China have agreed to let you operate your operations in return for a special deal allowing their heads of state (and heads of government in the case of the monarchies) one free drop pod of Pizza every day. The current US president has some desire to make extensive use of your services. Your facilities have breezed past the Health Inspections.

That's convenient.

Glad to know my workplace health conditions are up to snuff, but I expect there'd be a lot of regulatory hassle around so much new tech. Not to mention regs. regarding airspace. Not to mention the political issues involving the fact that I am essentially running both a business and a major global power, which is largely outside of the effective control of any national government.

And man, every government's going to want a piece of this pie (no pun intended). Though considering who the current President of the United States is, I think that my response will be something along the lines of "Kindly go shit off into that gold-plated toilet of your's."

Hmm... maybe put some anti-missile defenses on my stations before I say that.

You currently live in a 200 square meter apartment in one of Pizza Drop's stations overseeing the cattle ranches in a dormatory complex which has a gym, rec rooms, swimming pool, video arcade, a grocery store and a sit down Pizza Drop place and Saul's Kosher Chinese Noodle House for your nutritional needs.

What do you do?

Zor

Enjoy life, try not to abuse the awesome power that I've been handed, and try to find a worthy successor for it. Oh, and maybe do a Mars landing (business partnership with Elon Musk?) as a promotional stunt.

Oh, and since my facilities operate outside of any national borders- I instruct my human resources department to prioritize hiring illegal immigrants and refuges where possible. Its not as though ICE is going to show up on a shuttle to deport them (or would have any jurisdiction to do so).

[Elheru Aran]

Someone's been reading Questionable Content, haven't they?

[The Romulan Republic]

No, actually. I've never heard of that title.

Edit: Or were you addressing the OP?

[Elheru Aran]

No, actually. I've never heard of that title.

Edit: Or were you addressing the OP?

The OP. It's a webcomic set 'ten minutes in the future' with AI's, space stations, and coffee shops with impossibly snarky baristas and swords behind the counter. I asked because one of the occasional jokes involves pizza being delivered by orbital drop from a space station.

http://www.questionablecontent.net/view.php?comic=3046

[U.P. Cinnabar]

What do I do?

Considering most restaurants ultimately go belly up, especially in a bad economy, and the cost of maintaining the infrastructure and delivering pizzas from orbit is going to eat into what little profit is made from this venture, the answer would be lose my fucking shirt.

[bilateralrope]

One thing I note in the description is that we are sending mass down to Earth, but there is no mention of anything being done to replace that lost mass. So three possibilities:
- The tech is much more impressive, and wasted on pizzas, than other posters think it is.
- The stations are going to run out of mass at some point.
- The mass is being replaced in an unmentioned manner. Which is unusual for such a detailed scenario.

As for what I'd do, it's the same as everyone else is suggesting. Find a better way to use the infrastructure.

[Zor]

- The mass is being replaced in an unmentioned manner. Which is unusual for such a detailed scenario.

More mass is collected by collector drones from comets and asteroids.

Zor

[U.P. Cinnabar]

There 's also the issue of personnel turnover, something to which the food service industry is especially prone. It costs money shipping people up and down the well.

Unless you clone workers, or use automation exclusively, and I'm not sure I want Chef Robby the Robot cooking my food.

Then, there are the Yelp reviews...

[Shroom Man 777]

I'd make a side-business mining Helium 3 or whatever and anyway, I'd use whatever GORILLIONS OF DOLLARS I've got to use Pizza Drop tech and food cultivation methods to alleviate hunger in the worst parts of the world. Pizza will be renowned as mana from heaven, raining down from heaven to feed the survivors of major calamities. Heck, I'd have the pizzas be infused with vaccines or something, super vitamin fortification. I will make the world that the Boss envisioned come true... mankind will be whole again.

[Solauren]

Begin having my tech staff modify the drop launches into rail guns, and declare myself Emperor of the Solar System.

Prove my power by crushing rebellious governments under rock I hurl down instead of Pizza.

[bilateralrope]

- The mass is being replaced in an unmentioned manner. Which is unusual for such a detailed scenario.

More mass is collected by collector drones from comets and asteroids.

Zor

That sounds like the most valuable part of the entire operation.

[Shroom Man 777]

My philanthropic uses of the Pizza Drop will stay loyal to the hippotheticel senareo RAR in that for example if I orbital drop non-food supplies, like a generator or shelter, to those in need, nonetheless those items will still be pizza-shaped or pizza-themed, even eatable like pizza if possible. So hypothetical shelter for disaster victims or impoverished people would be resilient, but made out of pizza that's SUPER PETRIFIED, so it'll be in keeping with the scenario.

[LaCroix]

Some number crunching....

Each level is 22km² surface area - 2200 hectares or 5500 acres... With (only) 5 decks, that's 11000 hectars of hydroponic gardens. (Assuming you have the animals not grown free range, but in stables, thus also being very space efficient.)

Given how efficient hydroponics can be in terms of area yield, you can easily quadruple the harvest, making this an about 50000 hectar equivalent operation.

Still it is wasteful in terms of effective usage. Given the radius of the station, you could easily create dozens of layers (extending out and in from the optimum 1g diameter) without significantly changing simulated gravity and move toward a more cylindric instead of toroid station with the yield of a small nation.

East Germany, for example, fed their population ( 3 meals for 365 days per person) with 21million hectares - about 1.3 hectar per person. So the station in it's current layout could easily produce 365*3*50000/1.3 = about 42 million pizza per year.

Since the US alone is eating 3 billion pizza per year, this venue (12 stations), can only satisfy about 16.67% of the US consumation. Even though the US is excessive in their pizza consumtion, considering that there are 25 other people for each US american on this planet, it's just a small niche company on the global scale.

[Simon_Jester]

Honestly, pizza from orbital drop pods is never going to be anything but a niche. Even given all the technomagic that goes into making these pizzas vaguely cost competitive.

I'd probably never order it myself except for novelty value, because the pizza I really like enough to pay a premium cost for it is a type that Pizza Drop can't make, on account of it wouldn't be able to survive the accelerations of re-entry.

There 's also the issue of personnel turnover, something to which the food service industry is especially prone. It costs money shipping people up and down the well.

To be fair, you can select from the pool of people who are willing to be pizza workers if it means they get to work in outer space. This is a higher grade talent pool than the common run of pizza workers, and turnover will probably be lower.

[U.P. Cinnabar]

Anchovies, Simon?

How about people willing to be pizza workers in outer space, because they're desperate for any work they can snag?

Or, since food service generally scrapes the bottom of the barrel, how will these workers be more qualified than any other food service worker? The ability to deliver a ballistic drop pod bang on anywhere on the planet? The ability to mine the system for raw materiel?

Since the latter is largely automated, and the former appears to be idiot proof?

There's also that whole living on a spinny tin can in orbit, virtually isolated from home, with anything they might want to bring up the well costing more than they probably make in a week, coupled with stress, drama and general bullshittery of working in a restaurant, dealing with customers on a daily basis.

[Simon_Jester]

Anchovies, Simon?

No, just a style of pizza that can barely withstand a 0.3g lateral acceleration without the cheese delaminating from the rest of the pizza. I doubt it'd weather reentry.

How about people willing to be pizza workers in outer space, because they're desperate for any work they can snag?

Put this way, if you had to do exactly the same job as you do now, but on a space station, would you consider it punishment duty, or reward duty?

I bet, by searching the globe, you could find 2500 people for whom "you get to live on a space station" is a major perk. Furthermore, this operation is almost certainly expensive enough that you can afford to pay higher salaries and retain more competent employees. You don't HAVE to scrape the bottom of the barrel for workers just because Domino's or Papa John's does.

There's also that whole living on a spinny tin can in orbit, virtually isolated from home, with anything they might want to bring up the well costing more than they probably make in a week, coupled with stress, drama and general bullshittery of working in a restaurant, dealing with customers on a daily basis.

I thought the customers were down on the ground. They order space pizza from an app. I'm not sure there's any direct contact with customers at all, at least not for the majority of the staff.

[LaCroix]

Also, you don't need pizza cooks or any kind of pizza place worker type up there. The orders are via app, and all tasks making and packaging the pizza are the ones that are the easiest to automate, and sending it down means it needs such high precision targeting that it also must be done automatically to prevent errors. The business will be 100% automatic. The only people that have a legitimate reason to be up there in the station are engineers, biologists, and veterinarians.

[Elheru Aran]

Pizza is honestly pretty darn easy to automate. It starts with the crust; easy-peasy, just manufacture a variety of doughs and mould it in various ways, then freeze. Sauces-- offer a few basic types, a machine spreads it on whatever crust is selected. Toppings, same deal, a machine spits them out on top of the pizza. Move it on along and bake it on the belt as it goes, or even just design the drop-pod to bake it as it falls through the atmosphere. Honestly dealing with the massive inertia of a falling drop-pod is the biggest problem here, and if Zor's scenario means that there's a working inertial compensator involved here... that's probably the biggest ramification of all.

[KraytKing]

I'll point out that it really isn't that expensive, all things considered. If you include the cost of the pod and buy ten large pizzas, it's about thirty USD each. This isn't for Dominoes; this is a handmade, farm-fresh, never-frozen pizza. I've been to plenty of hipster joints that charge more for a pizza that is smaller, not made from ingredients straight from built-in farms, and not delivered. When you factor in that you can get one any time you have cell service, it's a steal. Once you add that your one location will be dealing with pizza orders all over the globe, you can easily see making enough money to sustain operations and live comfortably.

[Simon_Jester]

Well, we were explicitly told the company has 2500 employees, so it's reasonable to assume that all those employees are doing something productive and necessary to the function of the company.

[FaxModem1]

Well, we were explicitly told the company has 2500 employees, so it's reasonable to assume that all those employees are doing something productive and necessary to the function of the company.

Customer service for the phone lines for when the drop pods ruin their yard?