Opening Bookstore

[ercorn]

I love books and visit book stores when I am on holiday I think I probably read more on holiday as I have more time.Anyway I noticed in Samui there were alot fo secondhand bookstores though they seemed expensive compared to BKK.One thing I noticed was the Bungalow where we stayed had a full bookshelf at reception where you can exchange the book your reading for other books people had left for free which I thought was a great idea.

[soundman]

From a potential customer's perspective, I always buy a book or two when on short vacation.

I don't know the first thing about supplier deals or running a bookshop, however, IMO, bookshops in tourist areas should do OK as long as the store overhead is not too high.

Cheers,

Soundman.

[simon43]

Here's my idea. I'm not sure on the legal/licensing aspects though.

Forget about renting a shop for your bookstore. Instead, buy a cheap, secondhand van and fit it out with a range of new/secondhard books in English, German etc, such as trashy novels, travel guides, language books/CDs, good maps, magazines, foreign newspapers etc. Then simply drive to a different popular beach/tourist location each day.

So don't wait for the customers to come to you, you go to the customers . . .

Although you save on a shop rental, I don't know how much you will have to pay the local mafia. But you are not competing in the product that you are supplying....

Simon

Edited October 13, 2007 by simon43

[blizzard]

i would never buy from a farang running his buznit out of a van! i would laugh out loud if i saw one trying.....lol.

[simon43]

Blizzard - don't know where you come from, but in the UK I often saw the library van going round the villages to allow people to visit the library without having to come into the town.

Perhaps you might not buy a book or newspaper from a guy in a van. But if I were down on the beach and miles from a bookshop and there's a guy selling interesting books/maps/newspapers etc from a decent van - then why on earth would you not buy from him?

Do you refuse to buy fish and chips from a guy in a van? Or refuse to buy coffee and coke from a van? What about the mobile bars in BKK?

Simon

[blizzard]

roving vans to introduce the less priiledge to reeding is one thing. the guys sounds like he want to make munney.

for some reason i dont know what will work but i m good at knowing what wont.

for example, i knew a sseparate subsection for sme in thailand would be a tuff go. people dont want everything broken down to the miniscule. if its buznit stick it in with the main section on buznit.

Edited October 19, 2007 by blizzard

[cmsally]

If you had somewhere with tourist areas combined with resident farang areas, it could well work. That might not be the case in Koh Samui and it really depends on the concentration of readers and what kind of competition you have.