Its An Interesting Subject...

[monkfish]

Lol hope you are not implying that I hacked your wife's site.

Seems to be working fine to me.

[Geekfreaklover]

Fourth, many of these businesses started by older farangs are, as has been commented here, "vanity businesses" started to give themselves, or the mia noi, or the mia boy something to do. They are a pasttime, a hobby, and it is not surprising most of them go belly up.

It is easy to forget that many, many of these hobby businesses are kept afloat only by pensions from overseas. If the owners had to live off of business "profits", they would be living alone in a cardboard box, over a heating vent, back in the old country.

This is so true. I recall coming to Thailand for the first time a few years ago and wondering how so many of these small farang run buisinesses make it. After a while it became apparent that they are bank rolled by overeas pensions.

Business in Thailand is tough, especially when you don't have that pension coming in every month. That said it is doable. I've found it's been a matter of haiving 'fingers in many pies'. Find a market hit it hard and fast and then move on, because once locals realize you are making money they will copy the idea and sell it for half the cost.

[sassienie]

Lol hope you are not implying that I hacked your wife's site.

Seems to be working fine to me.

No, was not implying you. Working fine now, but she will take steps to protect herself so as it does not happen in the future.

Your personal pm to me:

Your personal profile has you down as intelligent member, well, after your last post, I beg to differ. To imply something like you did, on a public forum, is one sure way to find trouble. Are you looking for trouble?

Is that a threat?

It seems you’re the one looking for trouble.

My post is about the pitfalls of someone being a behind the scenes business owner, I did not directly imply that this applies to you.

You have completely misunderstood my post.

This thread is about Farangs doing business in Thailand and you mentioned about your fiancées company that deals in mattresses. I responded by saying that mattresses fall under the prohibited professions Acts and those who are behind the scenes business owners, meaning that this is not good advice for Farangs wishing to go into that sort of business in Thailand.

Take it anyway you like, it`s up to you.

Edited September 13, 2009 by sassienie

[wolf5370]

Whooah, Jai Yen guys! Consider it a misunderstanding, eh?

I think the problem is many fold - here are some in no particular order:

- Being in a foreign land we pay more attention to our fellow farang and his/her failures than In the west. In the UK I once owned a restaurant, it did OK - at bthe time new restaurants were closing at a rate of 90% in their first year - it hardly made front page news (I only picked up on it because it was of interest to me at the time).

- Wise farangs that are success stories keep their mouth's shout where possible - or at least are humble in their admissions.

- A certain kind of people pack up and move to pastures as new as Thailand - adventurers - these same types of people include entrepreneurs, but also risk takers, gamblers and experimenters and the easily bored - at all points in he scale, some more conducive to running a successful company than others!

- A severe lack of ingenuity - too many people come and open up another bar/guest house/restaurant and expect to sit back and watch the bahts roll in. Without some draw, some quirk or whatever, you are competing in a crowded pond - and are the newest, littlest fish surrounded by pike and sharks with the home advantage!

- It is very hard to compete on a a level playing field, 'cos there ain't one!

- We simply lack the contacts, surnames and familial appeal of a local competition. When you put your sign up in the wrong place, the cops want to know and provide you with a personal visit; when you put it up the right correct, paid for, place and your Thai competitor steal, vandalises or covers it with his own one, then its shrugs all round!

- Too many farangs with money fronting their GF/Wifes dream when neither has any experience or idea outside of the 'ideal' that was the dream.

- Limitation of scope. We try to sell to tourists and expats and not Thais in the whole and that limits our scope for growth.

- Importing parts/components/raw produce/etc is expensive due to the import taxes and special Farang price at customs.

- Often we are forced to work, at least in part, unofficially or even illegally just to try and make the whole thing legit (which is not merely a contradiction its a Sword of Damocles).

- God, I think I could go on forever!!! ... stopping now, honest!

[monkfish]

Good luck to all those thinking if starting business in Thailand as you can read it is a real rat race!!

Edited September 13, 2009 by monkfish

[Thakkar]

<snip> The farang will, also, not have recourse to certain extra-judicial privileges that many Thai business owners will have (I'm being deliberately vague here).

Not very successfully

[Mapguy]

With the exception of a couple of regrettable posts above toward the end of this thread, I have read a lot of wisdom here.

My contribution is nominal. Simply, if you are a salesman or a business man, you have to know the territory to be successful. That's not so strange, is it ?