What would you most like to see new in an HH bar?

[lomuamart]

I agree with you Burger, but the whole situation is dependent on the lease. With 3 years to run, I certainly hope I'd be able to spend 10k here and 10k there from business profits. With a year to run and no prospect of renewing at sensible terms, I might just reconsider that.
As long as the initial investment has been recovered, I've got nothing to lose. I'll just take the money I can get for the remaining term and leave. I certainly won't invest.
In many instances it's not the bar owners fault. Blame the real owners who consistently mess about with leases/options. At the end of the day, many owners don't know whether they're coming or going.
Also remember the old adage that if you want to make money out of a bar, you've got to sell it on. Certainly, investment is a big element of any "sell-on", but most important are the prices people seem willing to pay these days.
There was nothing I hated more than regular customers coming to my place and commenting on how run down it looked at the end. When the future lease was explained to them, they understood

[tuktukmike]

Really cant agree lomu.

Most of the toilets just need a lick of paint and maybe overhaul the cistern.

I cant understand how if toilets were new at the start of a 3 year lease they could be so bad after only 3 years, or as in most cases maybe when the new owner took over he never renewed the toilets in the first place.

The simple truth is that there are just too many bars in Hua Hin trying to get the same customers, walk around at weeknights and so many bars have no customers.

In the end just maybe market forces will come into play and the bad bars will close and the good ones survive, one thing for sure is that in less than 5 years the bars in the Bintabat will be replaced with guest houses and hotels.

Mike

[caller]

Really cant agree lomu.

In the end just maybe market forces will come into play and the bad bars will close and the good ones survive, one thing for sure is that in less than 5 years the bars in the Bintabat will be replaced with guest houses and hotels.

Mike

Which prompts me to ask, what is the big development half way down going to be?

[tuktukmike]

As i understand Caller it is going to be a hotel with shops at ground level.

Simular maybe to what they have done to the car park at the surin hotel.

I understand that Tobys old bars have been sold to an indian business so i think we can assume that will become another tailors shop, at present though the ajoining bar still has some lease left so they are trying to rent Tobys old one until they can take control of the whole building.

With land prices at the levels they are in the town i cant see there being much of a future for the bars there.

Makes you wonder what will be left in 5 years time?, perhaps all the bars will be located outside of the centre as the relivant authorities always wanted.

Mike.

[uncle tom]

I doubt the bar count will drop much, but I have a hunch that the centre of the bar zone will gradually track northward a bit, toward the coastal side of the temple, with some of the jewellers and tailors in that area relocating into new developments near the Hilton.

Gradually, is, I think, the operative word however.

I'm not worrying too much!

Tom

[lomuamart]

Really cant agree lomu.

Most of the toilets just need a lick of paint and maybe overhaul the cistern.

I cant understand how if toilets were new at the start of a 3 year lease they could be so bad after only 3 years, or as in most cases maybe when the new owner took over he never renewed the toilets in the first place.

The simple truth is that there are just too many bars in Hua Hin trying to get the same customers, walk around at weeknights and so many bars have no customers.

In the end just maybe market forces will come into play and the bad bars will close and the good ones survive, one thing for sure is that in less than 5 years the bars in the Bintabat will be replaced with guest houses and hotels.

Mike

I'd agree with you there, TTM. There's no excuse for not giving a bar an overhaul as a new lessee moves in and trying to maintain the place during the lease. My only point was that if you know that you can't negotiate a new lease on reasonable terms, investment of any sort will not be high on your list of priorities.
Certainly there are too many bars now and that was also a major factor in our selling 5.5 years ago. When I first arrived, there were nine large bars on Soi Bintabart. All did well. Within a couple of years, a number the the 3 shop front places had been turned into three seperate bars - the owners would not grant new leases on the original places unless rents were doubled and in some instances major renovation work carried out. Even in the good old days, this simply made the business unworkable, so people moved on.
I wonder what our old place would have been worth if we'd bought the freehold for 7 mill? It's academic really and I'm pretty sure that if I had jumped in, I wouldn't have had the place now - the ex would have made sure of that!!

[Burger]

I notice Road Hole and a restaurant or two!? next door have closed, heard the land owner wants it all back to put a small 'boutique style' shopping complex on the land. There does seem a bit of a trend towards some of the bars closing down for richer pickings for the landlords.

By the way Lomuamart, whcih bar to you have previously, just curious ?

Burger

[Bamboo Grove]

It started slowly but is accelerating now. The land owners see that they can make much more money by turning the bars into hotels, shopping centres etc. where they can get multiple rents instead just one. That's why they quoting 80K per month which is the dead sentence for bars in that area. Where will they all move? Around the town I suppose.

[STEVE G]

One thing I always notice in Hua Hin at night is large numbers of couples on holiday wandering around trying to find somewhere respectable to drink. Many of them are staying in five star resort hotels, and have large disposable incomes. If its profitable to fit out expensive hotels, shops and restaurants to cater for these customers maybe a bar or two could be provided as well, even if it is more expensive.
This is just an observation, all my knowledge of the bar industry comes from the customer end!

[lomuamart]

One thing I always notice in Hua Hin at night is large numbers of couples on holiday wandering around trying to find somewhere respectable to drink. Many of them are staying in five star resort hotels, and have large disposable incomes. If its profitable to fit out expensive hotels, shops and restaurants to cater for these customers maybe a bar or two could be provided as well, even if it is more expensive.
This is just an observation, all my knowledge of the bar industry comes from the customer end!

The thing is that even 8 years ago the "little businesses" around town were having to compete with totally unfair competition from the big hotels who were moving in.
The number of times I heard customers say that they were positively put off visiting the bar scene because of druggings, theft etc etc by their hotels. This has been the theme of HH development for years.
Total B*******. Those who got rained in for one night years ago and had to order another drink in the hope that it would get dry before they were mugged, actually found out that they had missed something for the best part of their holiday.
Ie, friendship, good times, always an offer to get transport back to their hotel at any time (despite the girl getting drenched ordering it).
These people came back again and again for as long as thay stayed on holiday.
The disposable income was definitely ringing in those days as cocktails were served all round.
The hotels have had their say on this matter, in as much as the very nature of HH has changed. Good luck to them. I'm just not sure it makes town a btter place.
Rant over.

[uncle tom]

I've often noted how perfectly the majority of guests at the Hilton fit the saying: "More money than good sense"

So many spend their entire holiday closetted in the hotel - or being ferried by oversized coaches to well-managed 'attractions'.

They might just be brave enough to buy some souvenirs in the street outside, or have a foot massage across the road - but I'll wager that many never handle a single Thai banknote from start to finish.

- Sad!

Tom

[caller]

Just thought I'd mention that in the soi where I'm staying south of town, that there are three hotel developments on the go (so I am told).

But I wonder?

I found the new(?) shopping/dining area by the silom hotel a few hours ago (well, it wasn't there last August). Another modern could be anywhere type of place. Okay it was early and off season, but it was completely empty!

Good, its horrid. If thats the future of HH, its not for me. I doubt that matters one iota.

[getreal]

If you build it they will come.

I liked the film also, good old Kevin.

[olmate]

And only time will tell. (time is somthing i have plenty of!!!)

[Jaime]

Given the recent pool league problems, I feel that Hua Hin needs a skittle alley in every bar. This is a game which explicitly encourages getting pissed up during the match and in which luck and alcohol consumption have as much of an influence on the game as skill.

What is more, the game is accompanied not only by beer but by sandwiches, sausage rolls, scotch eggs and similar traditional fayre to be laid on by the bar owner. Both teams drink together and stood up, rather than sitting in little cliques; there is some vague semblance of competitive event for those who need that in their lives; there is much guffawing and ribald banter throughout; the bar owner sells loads of beer; the punters think they are getting something for free (the sarnies - or equivalent Thai finger food) and everyone's a winner!

It just needs some brave bar owner to get a few planks of wood nailed down and persuade the flower seller kids to throw away their flowers and work as putter-uppers for the fallen skittles.

Of course, some may see this as yet more imperialistic cultural expansion by the white man in Hua Hin. I say - let them eat pigs uterus!