good bad ugly & future for thailand/pattaya

[Henryford]

The earliest any tourists will be coming back to Pattaya is high season 2021.

[Laughing Gravy]

22 hours ago, Kwasaki said:

Well look on bright side whatever happens you will still have Pattaya's  corrupt police and immitation police force and the owners of property will still want to charge extortion type rents.

Sadly they will probably on the highest alert as they need to make up for the lost revenue.????

[Laughing Gravy]

20 hours ago, WhatsNext said:

In the beginning there will be an oversupply, prices will temporarily go down and attract more people, till we get back at what it was before.

I like your optimism. If you have lived in Thailand long enough then you will understand Thai logic and mindset. 

 

Loss of income, put the prices up. If it doesn't, then one positive has come of this virus but I wouldn't hold my breath.

[WillyPlatt]

If they implement a 14 day quarantine for tourists you won't have any anybody visiting.

 

[fhickson]

16 hours ago, BobinBKK said:

It absolutely disgusts me and fills me with rage the stupidity that comes out of the authorities mouth and their feelings towards westerners. Who are they to say anything about anyone of any race from any country that comes here to spend money. Thailand has absolutely nothing more to offer than any other country in SE Asia that has beautiful beaches. These people and their so-called authority are a disgrace to the country and the people of the country and their religion. A religion that teaches tolerance and acceptance for everyone is being completely ignored. My message and advice for you is to lose the deplorable attitude and be grateful that everyone comes here no matter what their race or religion is or the color of their skin. Live by the motto "the rest of the world doesn't need Thailand - Thailand needs the rest of the world".

good try, but no cigar or patatoe.

 

the country is catered to a certain drive much more then others. thus, the powers that be can get away with much more figuring people will always return.

 

if that catering shuts down like it has now, its goodnight for bozo.

 

...but its nothing a long vacation in a german hotel wont fix ????

Edited April 15, 2020 by fhickson

[nomad2019]

I imagine prices will shoot up, hotels, drinks, gyms etc double pricing even more for farangs, prices go up instead of down for lost revenue - thai logic ????????????????

Beach road beauties charging 2k ST ????????????

[digbeth]

After the 97 crash, many salaried workers and even business owners who closed factories had to set up garage sale, leading to the proliferation of open air markets that continues to this day and some has become new tourist destination

 

we might see 'headless' restaurants doing delivery only.... some pizza place in Pattaya is already doing that, being a grungy hole in deep sois

 

bargirls that ply their trade as a freelancer, contacting customers directly may never return to the bars, if there are any to return to even

 

shops in malls that had to close, yet see their competitor or their own locations outside on shophouses thrive during the lockdown could mean less reliance on mall builders, more on real estate, same with people holed up in apartments, house with land could see a boom, like when the Bangkokians flee to Pattaya during the big flood snapping up condos back then

[Rancid]

If we listen to the vaccine gurus, then the whole world will be closed for 18 months, economies everywhere will be shredded, and tourism will be very slow to recover, probably several years. Well except for pharma company execs getting billions from their vaccines. Politicians like to be re-elected, so consider how long before community anger sees them give up on this? I'm seeing already here people having had a gutful.

 

If we let the virus run its course but without overwhelming hospitals then it will die a natural death. We should then be able to get antibody certificates proving we can't catch it. Forget the reinfection BS, that is just stakeholders pushing the wait for a vaccine scenario. Thailand does not have a severe problem, nor several other countries, even the US as deaths per population is less than Switzerland. These are stats being massaged to evoke fear. Suspect Thailand will start to relax things before too many of the poor are starving.

[kingstonkid]

There are a couple of things in the recent history to look at.

 

1. is the flood

2. Phuket after the tsunami.

 

Both of these hurt businesses and in the case of Phuket they had to rebuild.

 

In the near future (12 months) tourism is dead.  People no matter where they are need to financially recover as well as build confidence that this is not gong to happen again or come back next winter spring. 

 

There are going to be a lot of bars and shops that re going to close.  Pattaya will not be the same.  It for the next few months to a couple of years is going to have to gear itself to either a non tourism income or to finding a way to entice Thais to come and stay as families.

 

Bangkok will see some changes also I am sure.  The ping pong shows in Patpong are going to struggle if not close as Thais and those of us that have been here long time no about the price gouging.

 

Soi cowboy will still be around as will NANA because of the lifers that are still here.

 

There is no doubt that the world as a whole is gong to be living a new normal.  What exactly that will be will be interesting.  

 

The only constant here that we can plan on is that there is not much outside of our daily lives that we can control and that we are all gong to have to either live with it and adapt or we are going to have to find a country that has not made changes and that will be impossible.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Jingthing]

On 4/14/2020 at 11:42 AM, 3421abc said:

Place was getting too arrogant and taking tourists for granted. Now sit and cry a bit and think about how to treat the hand that feeds you better. 

But you know if things ever get easy street again which is doubtful in the foreseeable future it'll be the same level of arrogance. 

[Lacessit]

IMO Prayut and his cronies are sitting on a powder keg, and they know it. Many people in the North have lost their jobs, have no savings to fall back on, or are deep in debt they can no longer service. Their sons and daughters serving in the armed forces will know the situation too.

I have yet to meet a Thai here that does not despise Prayut and the Junta, they had best be careful.

[Jip99]

2 minutes ago, Lacessit said:

IMO Prayut and his cronies are sitting on a powder keg, and they know it. Many people in the North have lost their jobs, have no savings to fall back on, or are deep in debt they can no longer service. Their sons and daughters serving in the armed forces will know the situation too.

I have yet to meet a Thai here that does not despise Prayut and the Junta, they had best be careful.

 

 

..... and yet 8,413,413 people voted for him........ you can probably exclude most of them from your uprising.

[BritManToo]

Just now, Jip99 said:

..... and yet 8,413,413 people voted for him........ you can probably exclude most of them from your uprising.

Depends on who was doing the counting.

[allanos]

Part of the problem is so-called "globalisation" - much vaunted by liberals and the left, the World Bank, the IMF, the UN and God knows how many other alphabet organisations- a "global village" where everyone must love his neighbour and each of the countries in the world become utterly reliant on all the others.  Now we have a situation where China has become the last man standing, despite its appalling political system and disdain for human rights.  Perhaps this is the time that a new, softer kind of Nationalism takes hold, where countries become self-reliant again, their citizens become proud of them without being sneered at, and which will perhaps go part way to reining in a despotic regime like China's. 

 

The British Foreign Secretary has promised China that Britain will not politicise the Covid-19 virus.  Why not, for heaven's sake?  The Dems in the US are affronted when the virus is called the Wuhan virus, or worse, the Chinese virus, for fear of upsetting the CCP and the Politburo.  Why?  Let's bring the world back to some state of normality, the way it used to be.  I look forward to it but I shan't hold my breath.

[murraynz]

On 4/14/2020 at 11:42 AM, 3421abc said:

Place was getting too arrogant and taking tourists for granted. Now sit and cry a bit and think about how to treat the hand that feeds you better. 

Somehow.....there needs to be more education for thai business people and immigration on the subject of 'how to attract tourists'.

 

[Tony125]

I see 18 months with slow recovery and that's if they find a vacine or medications to kill the vius so it's not fatal or debilitating . Thailand could also speed up their recovery by doing away with their complicated zenophobic Immigration policies. Let farangs come over on long time liberal visas that they would not limit renewing or even easy  under 50 long term stays to boost the county's overall income. More liberal relaxed rules in adult areas and better care of areas for families. 

[spermwhale]

On 4/14/2020 at 11:42 AM, 3421abc said:

Place was getting too arrogant and taking tourists for granted. Now sit and cry a bit and think about how to treat the hand that feeds you better. 

How can a "place" get arrogant. It's an inanimate object. You think the local municipality and the elected officials will suffer? no. What about all the honest shop owners who are just trying to make a living? You think grandma who owns a T-shirt shop was taking tourists for granted? 

Enough of this BS. Not everybody in Pattaya is a scammer. 

[Pilotman]

You never know, it may just be the re making of the place, into a City worth visiting and staying in. it sure needed a re making.

[phantomfiddler]

On 4/14/2020 at 2:16 AM, steven100 said:

They are closed for a reason ....  to stop the spread of a deadly virus.

You can't have it both ways ....  

A "deadly" virus that has, in the whole of Thailand, slain an average of around half a person per day over the last winter period. Am I missing something in the maths ?

[Jingthing]

My best guess is that it will become a far suburb of Bangkok. 

[DUNROAMIN]

Even when everything re-opens for normal trade you wont see a lot of tourist as the average income family will not have any money as many will have used up their savings to keep living and pay the bills, all countries have been affected with loss of income from the virus. I suspect it will be 2 to 3 years before any normality returns.

[Bagwain]

1 hour ago, Jip99 said:

 

 

..... and yet 8,413,413 people voted for him........ you can probably exclude most of them from your uprising.

NO 8m + didn't vote directly for Prayut!! Twisting the truth!!

[digbeth]

Bangkok Barbeers on upper Sukhumvit side of Nana is mostly gone, any large parcels of land available turned to condos or hotel

Soi Cowboy is a shadow of its former self, surrounding areas turning Japanese 

 

 

Pattaya beach road all the way to Walking street is rife for a change in ownership after taking a beating in this mess, before, the land is too valuable to redevelop with the rent still coming in

 

but the question is, even if the old owners wanted to sell to move on, who's got the cash to buy the land up, you can't be sure the tourist will return when their home countries are ravaged economically too.

[Traubert]

On 4/14/2020 at 9:17 PM, Kerryd said:

It will eventually recover but it will take time. 

A lot will depend on who Thailand prioritizes with it's tourism campaigns once things get back to normal. If it's the Chinese and Indians again, then a large part of Pattaya (and some other places) are going to suffer, as they were already suffering due to those demographics not spending a lot of money (outside of what they paid for the tour they arrived on). Business owners have been complaining for a couple of years now about how business was suffering (even while TAT was crowing about the numbers of arrivals to Thailand).

The idea that Indians and/or the Chinese are going to come here and spend at the same levels the "Western" tourists used to ? Not likely to happen, though the "girls" on Beach Road will probably be kept busy.

Over the last couple of decades, actually more like ever since the Vietnam war, Pattaya (and other similar places) have been fueled by "Western" tourists. Americans, UK'ers (UKites ? UKians ? UKenese ? UKistanis ?), Aussies, Scandinavians, French, Germans, Canadians and some other rabble, most of whom shared two similarities.
They were (mostly) "white" and they drank and spent money like "two week millionaires" (which is how many of them were labelled).

All that money is what fueled many of the construction projects in Pattaya. Malls, hotels, condos, "villages", rows of shop houses, and kept the sick buffalo industry in Isaan thriving for decades.
A lot of that construction was planned and built with the expectation that the money train was going to keep rolling in - every two weeks. Sheesh, 10-12 years ago it seemed like every second Thai guy I knew was riding a Harley. One club had about 30 members and they were all business owners and they all had Harleys. People were rolling in the dough back then.

And then the wheels started to fall off the train. The "authorities" decided to start targeting the Indian and Chinese tourism markets instead, thinking that larger numbers of "arrivals" would more than compensate for lower spending by them. (And yes, I think there was some racism involved in the decision. One just has to look at recent remarks by the Tourism and Health Ministers to see what they think of "western" tourists.) 

Sure there were some rich Chinese in Bangkok shopping in the high end stores, but most of the Chinese tourists were on packaged "zero dollar" tours where they paid (in China) for an all-inclusive trip and didn't have to spend a single yuan in Thailand if they didn't want to.
I spoke with some businessmen (a couple years ago and a couple months ago), one owns a resort hotel in Jomtien, another owns a popular seafood restaurant on Walking Street and another used to own half a dozen a-go-gos and beer bars on Walking street. 
The story was the same, few, if any, of those Chinese and Indian tourists were spending any money outside of what the tour company had pre-arranged. 

<deleted> loads of people on Walking Street, but in the bars and go-gos ? Mostly "Western" tourists (except for Baccara which was quite popular with the S Koreans and Japanese).

If Thailand decides to pin their hopes on on Chinese (and Indian) tourism once things return to normal, I'd guess that the economic recovery will take a lot longer to happen.

I don't think all those bars and go-gos on Walking Street are going to go anywhere, anytime soon. A lot of money and influence behind them (which is why they are still there despite attempts to get rid of them a couple of times in the past).

It would be difficult to get back to the heydays of Pattaya, especially with the current state of affairs in the world, anytime in the near future. It may never come back again.

Especially if the government continues with the attitude that they don't want "Western" tourists here.

It is fact of reality that the Chinese havent been coming in majority tour groups for ten years.

 

Now its small groups of four or six people extremely well heeled, and while you can deny the numbers, they'

re there. They don't drink in the bars but they spend plenty.

[Brickbat]

The world will have changed for sure. Hopefully, wanton Consumerism that’s killing the planet and creating Billionaires will slow down. 

[Traubert]

41 minutes ago, spermwhale said:

How can a "place" get arrogant. It's an inanimate object. You think the local municipality and the elected officials will suffer? no. What about all the honest shop owners who are just trying to make a living? You think grandma who owns a T-shirt shop was taking tourists for granted? 

Enough of this BS. Not everybody in Pattaya is a scammer. 

There is a lot of it about.

 

For arrogant read 'they priced me out.'

[Rimbuman]

On 4/14/2020 at 8:17 PM, Kerryd said:

It will eventually recover but it will take time. 

A lot will depend on who Thailand prioritizes with it's tourism campaigns once things get back to normal. If it's the Chinese and Indians again, then a large part of Pattaya (and some other places) are going to suffer, as they were already suffering due to those demographics not spending a lot of money (outside of what they paid for the tour they arrived on). Business owners have been complaining for a couple of years now about how business was suffering (even while TAT was crowing about the numbers of arrivals to Thailand).

The idea that Indians and/or the Chinese are going to come here and spend at the same levels the "Western" tourists used to ? Not likely to happen, though the "girls" on Beach Road will probably be kept busy.

Over the last couple of decades, actually more like ever since the Vietnam war, Pattaya (and other similar places) have been fueled by "Western" tourists. Americans, UK'ers (UKites ? UKians ? UKenese ? UKistanis ?), Aussies, Scandinavians, French, Germans, Canadians and some other rabble, most of whom shared two similarities.
They were (mostly) "white" and they drank and spent money like "two week millionaires" (which is how many of them were labelled).

All that money is what fueled many of the construction projects in Pattaya. Malls, hotels, condos, "villages", rows of shop houses, and kept the sick buffalo industry in Isaan thriving for decades.
A lot of that construction was planned and built with the expectation that the money train was going to keep rolling in - every two weeks. Sheesh, 10-12 years ago it seemed like every second Thai guy I knew was riding a Harley. One club had about 30 members and they were all business owners and they all had Harleys. People were rolling in the dough back then.

And then the wheels started to fall off the train. The "authorities" decided to start targeting the Indian and Chinese tourism markets instead, thinking that larger numbers of "arrivals" would more than compensate for lower spending by them. (And yes, I think there was some racism involved in the decision. One just has to look at recent remarks by the Tourism and Health Ministers to see what they think of "western" tourists.) 

Sure there were some rich Chinese in Bangkok shopping in the high end stores, but most of the Chinese tourists were on packaged "zero dollar" tours where they paid (in China) for an all-inclusive trip and didn't have to spend a single yuan in Thailand if they didn't want to.
I spoke with some businessmen (a couple years ago and a couple months ago), one owns a resort hotel in Jomtien, another owns a popular seafood restaurant on Walking Street and another used to own half a dozen a-go-gos and beer bars on Walking street. 
The story was the same, few, if any, of those Chinese and Indian tourists were spending any money outside of what the tour company had pre-arranged. 

<deleted> loads of people on Walking Street, but in the bars and go-gos ? Mostly "Western" tourists (except for Baccara which was quite popular with the S Koreans and Japanese).

If Thailand decides to pin their hopes on on Chinese (and Indian) tourism once things return to normal, I'd guess that the economic recovery will take a lot longer to happen.

I don't think all those bars and go-gos on Walking Street are going to go anywhere, anytime soon. A lot of money and influence behind them (which is why they are still there despite attempts to get rid of them a couple of times in the past).

It would be difficult to get back to the heydays of Pattaya, especially with the current state of affairs in the world, anytime in the near future. It may never come back again.

Especially if the government continues with the attitude that they don't want "Western" tourists here.

Quite right, I think.

[Rimbuman]

1 hour ago, Tony125 said:

I see 18 months with slow recovery and that's if they find a vacine or medications to kill the vius so it's not fatal or debilitating . Thailand could also speed up their recovery by doing away with their complicated zenophobic Immigration policies. Let farangs come over on long time liberal visas that they would not limit renewing or even easy  under 50 long term stays to boost the county's overall income. More liberal relaxed rules in adult areas and better care of areas for families. 

That would be rational old fashioned common sense, but that doesn't exist here and probably never will.

[gamesgplayemail]

MAybe with 10% unemployment at least Thai will understand that when we have a job we should care about it ad learn to do it properly ?

I have been waiting for this such a long time <3

 

 

[Zikomat]

1 hour ago, allanos said:

Part of the problem is so-called "globalisation" - much vaunted by liberals and the left, the World Bank, the IMF, the UN and God knows how many other alphabet organisations- a "global village" where everyone must love his neighbour and each of the countries in the world become utterly reliant on all the others.  Now we have a situation where China has become the last man standing, despite its appalling political system and disdain for human rights.  Perhaps this is the time that a new, softer kind of Nationalism takes hold, where countries become self-reliant again, their citizens become proud of them without being sneered at, and which will perhaps go part way to reining in a despotic regime like China's. 

 

The British Foreign Secretary has promised China that Britain will not politicise the Covid-19 virus.  Why not, for heaven's sake?  The Dems in the US are affronted when the virus is called the Wuhan virus, or worse, the Chinese virus, for fear of upsetting the CCP and the Politburo.  Why?  Let's bring the world back to some state of normality, the way it used to be.  I look forward to it but I shan't hold my breath.

State of normality? Like world war 2?