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Samui Must Be Packed

Changian

By Changian
in Koh Samui, Koh Phangan, Koh Tao

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Changian Silver Member

Changian

Posted
Posted

So how come all your Samui folks are whinging about how quiet it is down there?

Samui Airport, the only regional airport sees over 6 million passengers and more than 15,000 flights per year

That's 40 747's per day landing throughout the year. No wonder resorts have 100% occupancy year round.

For news you can trust visit Pattaya Daily News

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goldfinger Silver Member

goldfinger

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This is from "Samui Airport Guide", maybe 1 year before...

The bulk of Bangkok Airways' flights originate from Suvarnabhumi and a substantial number of its passenger traffic is between Bangkok and Samui. Bangkok Airways carries about 600,000 passengers a year through Samui Airport.

With a limited number of international flights, Samui Airport is largely classified as a domestic airport, flying mostly foreign tourists from Bangkok to Samui.Aside from Bangkok Airways' own international-bound services, Samui serves a handful of international flights from Malaysia by the low cost carrier Firefly and Selangor-based Berjaya Air.

Part of the problem is environmental restrictions on the number of flights and operating hours, with a total of 36 flights per day currently allowed.

But Bangkok Airways is eager to make Samui Airport its second traffic base to support the airport's new 500-million-baht passenger terminal that was completed early last year.

The new terminal is four times larger than the old one and can handle 16,000 passengers a day. It is intended to cope with surging foreign tourist traffic to the island over the next 10-years.

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Gulfsailor Gold Member

Gulfsailor

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Airports talk about flight movements. I have no doubt that there are 15,000 flight movements per year on Samui airport. A flight movement is a departure or arrival. Just checked the stats for today; 22 planes landed and 23 departed from Samui. So that's 45 'flights' just today. Multiply that by 365 and you get well over 16,000 flights anually.

Now for the passenger numbers; I agree that these must be wrong, as it would mean that each flight holds 400 people... They must have confused the number of all Bangkok AIrways passengers anually (not just to/from Samui)...

But please note, that Samui would need a lot of visitors to give the hotels the idea that the island is "busy". A conservative estimate is that there are 15,000 rooms available on the island in hotels / guesthouses / private villas. With two people sharing a room that would add up to 11 Million bednights of availibility annually. Let's assume the average tourist stays 5 nights (I think its less) and you would need over 2 million tourists to truly fill the place. I think the peak year for Samui was 2005, just after the tsunami in Phuket. That year Samui got something around 1 Million tourists. At the same time, the amount of beds available was around 9,000. Whilst now there are mostly families and couples visiting, until around 5 years ago these were mostly singles. In such cases you are looking at 90% occupancy rates and filled girlybars.

The problem now is not that there are not enough visitors, the problem is that there are too many hotels, too many bars and too many restaurants.

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joe84330 Gold Member

joe84330

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and here i was just about to retire on the expectation of future earnings based on 6 million tourists per year. i had already picked out my beach front villa and found a location for my girlfriends restaurant/beauty shop/massage parlor/t shirt/dvd and perfume empire.

i wonder if i still have time to cancel the building contract on the 24 shop houses i was planning to sell to these tourists in laem set?

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BigC Ruby Member

BigC

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no wonder bangkok airways is still open. shame we cannot boy cott it.

to be honest if you compare the population from now to 10 years ago. there is definatly allot more people here. problem is there is also allot of businesses. lot o businesses means allot of compitition. some savive some don't.

just the way it is. example. i go to fugi resturant in tesco and it is jame pack mean while the posh new italian resturant down the road look like it is full....with staff and not customers

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Boater Diamond Member

Boater

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no wonder bangkok airways is still open. shame we cannot boy cott it.

to be honest if you compare the population from now to 10 years ago. there is definatly allot more people here. problem is there is also allot of businesses. lot o businesses means allot of compitition. some savive some don't.

just the way it is. example. i go to fugi resturant in tesco and it is jame pack mean while the posh new italian resturant down the road look like it is full....with staff and not customers

they have a Fugi restaurant in Tesco ?

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Xonax Gold Member

Xonax

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no wonder bangkok airways is still open. shame we cannot boy cott it.

to be honest if you compare the population from now to 10 years ago. there is definatly allot more people here. problem is there is also allot of businesses. lot o businesses means allot of compitition. some savive some don't.

just the way it is. example. i go to fugi resturant in tesco and it is jame pack mean while the posh new italian resturant down the road look like it is full....with staff and not customers

That is because italian food is so expensive here in Thailand.

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joe84330 Gold Member

joe84330

Posted
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those are run by her mother and aunts.

i had already picked out my beach front villa and found a location for my girlfriends restaurant/beauty shop/massage parlor/t shirt/dvd and perfume empire.

How could you forget laundry, bike rental and internet cafe!

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robsamui Platinum Member

robsamui

Posted
Posted

Airports talk about flight movements. I have no doubt that there are 15,000 flight movements per year on Samui airport. A flight movement is a departure or arrival. Just checked the stats for today; 22 planes landed and 23 departed from Samui. So that's 45 'flights' just today. Multiply that by 365 and you get well over 16,000 flights anually.

Now for the passenger numbers; I agree that these must be wrong, as it would mean that each flight holds 400 people... They must have confused the number of all Bangkok AIrways passengers anually (not just to/from Samui)...

But please note, that Samui would need a lot of visitors to give the hotels the idea that the island is "busy". A conservative estimate is that there are 15,000 rooms available on the island in hotels / guesthouses / private villas. With two people sharing a room that would add up to 11 Million bednights of availibility annually. Let's assume the average tourist stays 5 nights (I think its less) and you would need over 2 million tourists to truly fill the place. I think the peak year for Samui was 2005, just after the tsunami in Phuket. That year Samui got something around 1 Million tourists. At the same time, the amount of beds available was around 9,000. Whilst now there are mostly families and couples visiting, until around 5 years ago these were mostly singles. In such cases you are looking at 90% occupancy rates and filled girlybars.

The problem now is not that there are not enough visitors, the problem is that there are too many hotels, too many bars and too many restaurants.

That's the nitty gritty. I did some research on this last year and it goes like this - (not that I trust stats and numbers but it indicates the general trend well enough!)

TAT figures for 2008 indicate a 9% increase in visitors to Samui over the previous year.

One of the Govt. depts (can't remember which one)shows a 24% increase in new construction projects on Samui in 2008.

Will eyes never open and thoughtless opportunism never cease?

R

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Rooo Star Member

Rooo

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Posted

There is a very good article about it in the latest issue of samui gazette ( Today's). It's not on line yet. Will absolutely amaze you regarding the #'s to Samui.

whats this word #'s

There is a very good article about it in the latest issue of samui gazette ( Today's). It's not on line yet. Will absolutely amaze you regarding the #'s to Samui.

Is latest issue #4 edition?

#'s abbreviation for numbers. It's today's the 17th edition , # 5.

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Tropicalevo Diamond Member

Tropicalevo

Posted
Posted (edited)

There is a very good article about it in the latest issue of samui gazette ( Today's). It's not on line yet. Will absolutely amaze you regarding the #'s to Samui.

Interesting article, thank you Rooo.

The biggest problem can be answered in two words. Bangkok Airways.

You can fly to Phuket for a pittance compared to PG. So when the tourists land in Bangkok and compare prices - where are they going to go?

robsamui has also got it spot on. There is a limit to the number of bums on seats on PG. There is no limit to the number of beds for those bums. The numbers have doubled over the last few years and still growing.

Not forgetting the policy of "get rid of the backpackers and go upmarket!" This one has really helped Samui (not). People who stay in 5 star resorts, stay in the resort or go to 5 star clubs/restaurants etc. This does not help the average guy on Koh Samui. Less people coming in and not necessarily spending more outside of the resort where they stay.

"When will they ever learn, when will they ever learn...?"

Edited by Tropicalevo
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Rooo Star Member

Rooo

Posted
Posted

The problem compounded after the Tsunami. If you search the forum, there is many discussions on it as far back as 2006 -2007. Many people back then, have seen this coming, quite a few posts with good advise were written.

As for Bangkok Air , let's be fair here. I do not agree with their pricing policies, but the fact remains that they had the same flight movements back then as it is now. The only difference is they have larger Jets now.

They are not allowed to have more flights, restrictions on Samui Airport.I understand that if they drop prices, they will have more bums on seats.

But (the magic word ) it will not solve the oversupply, the Bangkok Air movements is still the same,more ferries, but still not enough.Makes you wonder, what did they expect?

So what thoughts go through people's minds, when they come here after a natural disaster has hit another region? Time to cash in, right? Have they had any foresight?Any business plans?

Mostly fly by the seat of the pants operations, less people wow, let's put our prices up, they are no different, they also are a great contributor to Samui being overpriced in all facets.

In my view, the people that had the ounce to move with the times & read the market, are the ones that succeed.

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Boater Diamond Member

Boater

Posted
Posted

i remember the month after the Tsunami, Samui was packed, take lamai for example, everybar full, all hotels full , restaurants packed ..... so samui being thailand, people started to raise prices , they wanted to cash in on these extra tourists, the problem is when they started to dwiddle, they never return there prices to what they where.....

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