Internet Business Venture - Naklua

[o9zooaza]

my wife (thai) and i would like to buy into an internet cafe business. We have funds to buy but we would like to know if it may be better to rent and pay for a curent ongoing set-up, or go for the buy out option? Can anyone offe us any advice.

m/t

[bkkblueeyes]

You can start your own business. Rent a shop font and buy bulk computers. Hire an Network IT tech Find all the latest games Thai teens are playing.

Most comic book shops supply them with a magazine.

If this is a tourist friendly spot I don’t think you need to worry about games much. But rent cost and power will be general higher.

Buying in to a existing set up is possible but if there in a poor location they might be selling it due to the fact they don’t have any customers and there going under.

Stake it out for a few days and see how many customers they get.

On the School holidays a lot kids go back home country side ect….

Good internet cafes have people 24-7

I only know about Bangkok I don’t know much about the other towns and provinces. Id guess not much difference.

Tourist Friendly areas 20-40 baht one hour

Non tourist areas 10-15 baht one hour

There’s a big difference in the rent.

But in answer to your question I would rather rent and be smart about it researching the areas 1^st.

I have the funds for such a project but I would not choose to do it. Its crap money!!!!

Good luck

[Cuban]

my wife (thai) and i would like to buy into an internet cafe business. We have funds to buy but we would like to know if it may be better to rent and pay for a curent ongoing set-up, or go for the buy out option? Can anyone offe us any advice.

m/t

This has been aired here before.

You charge 2 baht a minute for the computers when used, you need to be open 24 hours.

You make money from drinks and snacks (toasted sandwiches and ice cream).

You should have good internet phone options in place.

You should have online video, MSN, ICQ, Skype etc. in place.

You are open to 'raids" for computer misuse and dodgy Thai MP3 music violations. (monitor your users in real time)

You have to be able to rebuild PCs quickly. (having a remote ghost build process in place)

You need to enforce user level access rights, allowing admin access is a great way to allow your PCs to be used as zombies.

You could be different to the rest and employ staff that can clean keyboards when not busy, it's all the food you sell.

Who are your target customers? (Tourists spend more money than Thai kids, who will sit for hours playing a game and not buy a drink.)

Have your computers set up with English, German, Dutch, Russian and Scandi keyboards and font sets.

Having a wifi equiped seating area serving coffee, need to issue time limited access codes with your lattes, might attract some extra customers - Starbucks style. But there are a few open unrestricted wifi hotspots in that area already.

Have you run some figures through an Excel sheet yet?

[ I spoke with a guy late last year who was ready to invest in such an internet venture on 2nd Road near Mike's Shopping Mall - he had the money ready and was talking to me about USB sticks as he had not used them before. I showed him what you could do with moving files around quickly and we spoke further about this case. There was another on Pattaya Daily/City News web site from a Thai women as well, last I heard the guy was looking at an upcountry hotel. ]