Tesco Lotus

Hua Hin general discussion, observations and chat. Hua Hin topics that don't really fit anywhere else.
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buksida
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Post by buksida »

tuktukmike wrote:Just thought i would warn others about the little Hitlers that pass as security guards/parking attendants at the new tesco.
These Fuhrers are everywhere, ever encountered the little prick and his teenage mate in the plod that stands outside the Hilton? Must be some correlation with having a crappy underpaid job and treating people like dirt.

I agree with Mart, looked forward to the opening of the complex, went once, now avoid it like the plague unless I have a spare half a day that I wouldn't mind either spending in the car, wedged between 400 packets of bbq crisps and step ladder, or stuck behind an overweight tribe of Bangkokians discussing the discounts in the produce section.
Who is the happier man, he who has braved the storm of life and lived or he who has stayed securely on shore and merely existed? - Hunter S Thompson
shakin' boxcar joe
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Post by shakin' boxcar joe »

I've been there a couple of times now and find the place very hard work , its poorly designed , especially the traffic flow into and out of the car parks , to say nothing of the suicide u-turn from the main road and actually parking at busy times is a nightmare , i will avoid going at weekends and busy times in future.

The tesco store is just as expected , a reasonable range of products , grinning and helpful , but clueless staff , decent prices etc etc etc., but its hard to get out of there without spending b2000 , whereas if we shop at the markets and local shops our bill is much less , plus we dont end up with frayed tempers or food that never gets eaten.

I dont know if we will use it regularly or not , the biggish supermarket on the mountainside of the railway tracks stocks most stuff and its always easy to park right outside , and for fruit and veg we always buy organic at golden place and there is a good bakery almost next door to there.

I cant say whether this mall is a good thing for hua hin or not , it will certainly concentrate the minds of the hundreds of local shopowners who have had it their own way for too long.

I would rather continue shopping at small local businesses , you soon build up a relationship with the owners , and soon get to know which shops sell at fair prices and give good customer service , that's how communities are built up and flourish , at tescos its all so anonymous and cold , products may be a bit cheaper (although you end up buying more than you need and spending more) , but in the long run i dont think large soulless supermarkets do the town or the community any favours.

They are ultimately destructive to the communities they purport to serve.
Hopefully the renovated old market will provide a decent alternative when it opens.



But the japanese restaurant and the bowling alley are another story altogether.
shakin' boxcar joe.
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Post by Burger »

to say nothing of the suicide u-turn from the main road
People, there is another U-turn about 200 metres down past the main one everyone uses. It saves a lot of time if the main one is busy. Plus if you turn right immediately after coming down the car park ramp, you can find spaces right next to the exit ramp and there's an escalator right there.

I find the whole place generally good, it's nice to have a decent selection of quality (by Hua Hin standards) clothes stores. Plus some of the restaurants are very good, particularly the Japanese one.
Ofcourse there's plenty about the layout/location etc that could have been improved on but people I've spoken to think it's a good thing overall for Hua Hin.
And whether we like it or not, it is the most popular place in town with franags and Thais.

Another plus is when we visit the solicitor in the Hua Hin Shopping Mall, parking etc is easier as that place seems a bit of a ghost town now.

Burger[/quote]
Last edited by Burger on Fri Mar 10, 2006 4:56 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Jaime
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Post by Jaime »

shakin' boxcar joe wrote:They are ultimately destructive to the communities they purport to serve.
Interesting point.

The justification for this here in the UK is that consumers benefit from the low prices that the stores offer. In fact at least two government competition inquiries have supported this.

But could the same really be said for Thailand or Hua Hin?
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Post by Norseman »

May I dare to say that I like Tesco Lotus?
We are in a small town named Hua Hin.
NOT Bangkok or London or any international metropolis.

Why all the complaints and ranting for a shop?
It's 1 million times better than the Shopping Mall and good enough for me and most of you.
If you don't like it, buy your furniture in Tha Yang and the rest you need in Phet Buri.
I intend to live forever - so far so good.
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Post by david83 »

I have not been to the Tesco in Hua Hin, a few others in LOS though, and I must say that I pray that there will never be a huge mall there. I live in the U.S and all towns have malls, there is no town centre at all because the huge affairs can get better prices. Yes, it is always nice to get a good deal on a piece of furniture but in the long run I would gladly pay a bit more for a living town centre...
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Post by lomuamart »

Jaime wrote:
shakin' boxcar joe wrote:They are ultimately destructive to the communities they purport to serve.
Interesting point.

The justification for this here in the UK is that consumers benefit from the low prices that the stores offer. In fact at least two government competition inquiries have supported this.

But could the same really be said for Thailand or Hua Hin?
Um, just a slight correction here. The Big 4 in the UK have been referred to the Monopolies and Mergers Commission - or whatever it's called these days. That's today's news.
The original inquiry did not find that consumers were necessarily benefiting from lower prices. Range was smaller - mostly own label - and large tracts of land have been bought up by the supermarkets, but not developed, to stop competition from encroaching. The rise of the Tesco convenience store is also under very close scrutiny.
All this over the past two days.
I worked in the grocery trade publishing market for years in the the UK and the referral is long overdue IMHO.
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Post by lomuamart »

shakin' boxcar joe
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Post by shakin' boxcar joe »

norseman said
May I dare to say that I like Tesco Lotus?
We are in a small town named Hua Hin.
Exactly , and a shopping complex like market village will just push hua hin another step away from being the small town of hua hin.

The town centre , that until only a few years ago was a traditional thai town centre , is gradually losing most of its character , character that makes hua hin so appealing.

Most of the shops that once served local needs have been taken over by neon lit optical outlets , tailor shops with annoying touts outside harranguing passers by, shops selling all manner of useless tourist tat and no end of real estate businesses with premises designed more for new york than hua hin. The beautiful wooden shopfronts are being hidden by ugly plastic signage. The powers that be in this town really should try and preserve some of the things that make hua hin so attractive , new businesses should alter their premises in a sympathetic way , the uglification of the old streets has gone far enough in my opinion.
But it's progress i suppose and as such is unstoppable.

As for tescos and the market village , well it was inevitable , and in the short term probably a good thing for a lot of people , but in the long term i think its just another nail in the coffin for the attractiveness and lure of hua hin.

i dont want to get too misty eyed about the old streets and the past , but does the future have to be so unfriendly , ugly and overpowering?
shakin' boxcar joe.
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Post by Jaime »

lomuamart wrote:For the full story see http://www.guardian.co.uk/supermarkets/ ... 11,00.html
Lomu,

The news you are quoting is what prompted my post, except I listened to a BBC Radio 5 discussion on the subject earlier in the week. It has been news here for a few days now. When I heard the radio discussion the latest referral had not been confirmed and, as you say, this time it seems to have been prompted by concerns over the Tesco Express type convenience stores. The conclusion of the (impartial) radio discussion I heard definitely seemed to be that the big supermarkets were found 'not guilty' by the previous inquiries. I have no interest in supermarkets other than as a consumer and in my experience it is definitely possible to find a wider range at lower prices in them - and all in one place. For example - the small provincial town in which I live could never sustain a specialist delicatessen but my local Tesco can stock most of the stuff a delicatessen would normally sell.
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I like it

Post by Chas »

I may be in the minority here but I DO like the new mall and I like it quite a bit. I have been there perhaps six times now and it feels very nice to walk around, look at the people, have an icecream cone, pull out a shopping cart and see just about everything you want to buy on the shelves, have a choice of restaurants.. ..etc.

I have lived in poor countries ( in Belize for 15 years) and in small towns all my life and maybe that is why I delight in having someplace like this . . clean, well-lit, convenient and well-designed ( I LIKE the design. I thought it might be very big city-Bangkok in feel, but it isnt! I still feel like I am in Hua Hin except perhaps in the movie theatre.)

I agree that the car park ramps are badly designed ( am I supposed to drive up here?) and getting out of a theatre after the mall has closed needs a bit of clear rethinking ( we followed a group of 12 or 15 patrons down the back stairs for three stories going,"Now where does THIS door lead to. .oops! Ok how about here. Nope! How about going back UP one floor. OK No thats not it. It was like trying to evacuate the Titanic!

As for the rest of the town, I agree the old and quaint aspects have disappeared behind those ugly plastic storefronted Optician stores. .but this is the work of Thai businessmen who just dont care. And I wont add another word to my previous comments on the infamous "mall" which should die off in a month or two. Too bad they never took the courses in business school about being nice to your customers so that they want to come back, making your premises attractive to be in, not cheating the tourists, paying your staff a living wage, selling your goods at reasonable prices etc. They learned only to suck out every satang until the place falls apart. .there is a lot of that going on around town.
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Re: I like it

Post by Jaime »

Chas wrote:They learned only to suck out every satang until the place falls apart.
At the risk of being shouted down, that appears to me to be the whole Thai attitude to business in general. No planning, no forward thinking, no ability (or desire) to change strategy.

Mai bpen rai..... :roll:
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Post by Guess »

I have had a nother go at reading this topic but started to doze off again.

Anyway I have to add my bit.

I found the new Tesco Store to be absolutley top banana.

I rode past it and did the first U-Turn and made a left at the entrance, a few metres further on I made a right into the underground section labelled "Entrance" which I thought to be appropriate. I was met by an official that I can only assume was their Chief PR Officer. He was incapable of speech in any known language but could manage one note on his whistle. He directed me, by pointing and blowing his whistle, to the opposite side of the underground park. The only place to go from there was up a ramp where I was then forced to make a right turn which led me back onto Petchakasem road.

The official had obviously spotted straight away that I was a person of such discernment and would not be seen dead shopping at Tesco's but had just got a little disorientated.

I will, in future, send a motorcy taxi to collect my weekly supply of imported Ozzie baked beans.

As for the beetroot. If you get yourself a pickling jar and a bottle of the cheapest Ozzie red wine that Tesco's sell and then put some of that root vegatable, that Thais use in soup, into the jar with the red wine then after about two years stored in a warm place, the resulting concoction will taste remarkably like pickled beetroot.
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Re: I like it

Post by Norseman »

Jaime wrote: At the risk of being shouted down, that appears to me to be the whole Thai attitude to business in general. No planning, no forward thinking, no ability (or desire) to change strategy.
Can this be written better? I think not.
Well said Jaime and precisely observed and described.
I intend to live forever - so far so good.
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mall

Post by bill »

I love the new mall. I have not been in Thailand in 2 years( coming back in June). Soooooo i have not seen the new mall but any change into the modern world is is a good one for hh. There was little to do when i left and to much time to do it. Boring. Days lasted for months. This is great news and the more the better. Give me all the modern world stuff. Blast down the bar area and put up more hotels, shops,resturants, massage stores, noodle stands, kanome(?) shops, 7-11's, bakeries, video shops,tailors, dancing bears-chickens-dogs-stinkingfishheads-police parades-ladyboy submarine captains-flying farangs. Hell i don't care what it is but the sooner hh changes from a shitty, rotten, dirty, scumsucken, dump it was into the new hh it won't be to freaken soon. Oh just in case your crappen in your panties at the mere notion of the BARS going down , well you can take it to the bank. That land is to valuable and it won't be long before BYE-Bye. Don't cry you snivling rat bastards the bars will reappear somewhere else as will the gals. Ya never know it might be better. There are big changes in the future of hh. In 10 years it won't look the same but then nether will you. I'll still be tall, dark, and handsome. Ohhh by the way there are in Thailand about 1,964 sleepy, quiet fishing villages just like hh was 20 years ago. Don't let the door kick you in the ass on your way out of town.
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