Hi all if you could please advise me I will for ever been in your debt & will owe you a drink or two.....

Ok me & my friend are very serious thinking of buyinga bar in Soi Green or other parts of Ko Samui but prob Soi Green near Green Mango as there are some bars for sale & does seem busy etc....

I have read & heard a few horror stroies about buying a bar
"it never work your get ripped they all fail etc" you got to watch the thai mafia?????

So as you can imagine we are confused....

Also it is not for the love of a "thail girl who will rip as off" as that is another one I keep getting told.

It is for me & my friend just very bord of the uk love Samui & the life style & could do with a new start...But dont want to waste all our money etc...

I keep hearing bars dont work???But some must as there are loads & Soi Green always seems to be busy??? so all cant fail can they???

The bars we are looking to buy are £35k/£40k to buy what do you think of this any one????

Does any one know how much thease bars make per year???

The bars seem to be in good spots wright near Green Mango....

I/we do have good experince we & still do run some big "dance music"events in the UK up to 2000 people so we do know the indurstry well & only of the age 27 & 28 so we know what the "youth want" & many of are close friends are big Dj's who will come over time to time...but not the biggest of dance floors

If any one can give me any info on what they think will so be sooooooo much help & wiil shout you a drink when back over..

Cheers

This post has been edited by CCC: 2007-02-03 01:49:37

Can't really offer much but, good luck.... I think you'll need it.

Maybe PM Lampard10, he owns a successful place in Surin (and a sponsor of this site- The Farang Connection). He may be able to offer you some help.





redrus

Find a niche and you have a fighting chance. (need to set yourself apart from all the same ones)

Suggest having a word with DaveThailand - he owns a very popular club in Pattaya, Blues Factory.

Plus talk with other ex-pats in the area that own bars.

This post has been edited by britmaveric: 2007-02-03 02:05:37

Cheers man will do...just one thing why do say I will need the luck this is what i am on about lol..

bars do keep opening so I guess some got to work

AND alot of them close after short periods of time. Good advice is talking to other farangs that have done what you want to do, and get some of the + and - of opening a place on Samui-Good luck though, Im not trying to deflait your dream, just to be careful! Many loose there life saving here on these ideas, and only a few make it worthwhile.

This post has been edited by SamuiJens: 2007-02-03 04:10:47

Most bars that are bought are back on the market within one year when the owners realise they are never even going to get their investment back nevermind acually making a profit. The rents now are sky high and the only people making money are the landlords. Before you buy anything work out how many bottles of beer you have to sell at 70-80 Baht a pop to make money and you will soon realise this is not a good investment,

All of the people I know (farang) running small businesses in Samui do not need them to be successful, they do it for a hobby to keep boredom out. As long as thye make enough to cover overheads & staff, they are happy. Most are older than you though but they all have external income like accident pension property rental from home country or inheritance money etc

You have to seriously look at why a successful bar in soi green mango would be up for sale & ask to see the books for the previous 3 years. Ask around at other bars, are they expected to pay tea money to anyone & whos toes might you step on if you did become successful??

Have to agree with Soutwest19, the beer calculation has alway halted any ideas i had about a bar in that Soi.

The standard deal has been 5 million for 5 year for a while now (single unit).

1000,000 per year divided by 365 days = 2,740 baht per day .

2,740 / 90 baht per bottle = 30 bottles

you have to buy the beer first obviously so on a 100% mark up you got to sell 60 bottles a day Every day for 5 years just to pay the rent.

Plus refitting ,staff ,electric ,water ,accounting ect ect ect

Think long and hard and talk to as many ex bar owners before you commit

Good luck

be happy to chat and tell you what i know from a little bit of bar running experience.
drop in to my bar (dont worry i wont be busy and can talk!)
there are some things i have learnt that i never expected,
its not a normal business situation here,
message me or phone 0872746106
"let's be careful out there" (Hill Street Blues)

i own a bar in soi green mango and am making a living out of it. you won't make money out of owning a bar here but as long as you can live off the bar you're doing ok. feel free to pm me.

Hi guys thank you all soooo much for your advise I really do mean it I taken it all on & will pm some of all very soon.

If any more advise will be great.

I do know we will never be rich from doing this out in Samui & I will never will be in UK but UK sucks,

so that is why we want the move to Samui as well its more about the life style & making money so we are not skint & can enjoy our self's & live a better life than this urban one in uk

One other question do you know how much thease bars do make????

Also many people keep saying to me samui is ona down hill slide is this true...

cheers again guys

I GUESS time will tell, but I would'nt bank on it.

The ten rules about buying a bar...

1. Give up drinking now, otherwise the 60 bottles a day needed to cover the rent will be made up mostly of your own purchases.
2. Only invest what you can afford to lose.
3. If you go in with a friend as a partner, have your farewell party before hand as inevitably the pressures of not doing as well as expected or the influence of a lady or the hours of work will end up breaking the friendship.
4. Learn to speak and read Thai.
5. Learn to put up with lazy staff, late staff, stupid staff, disrespectful staff, thieving staff, and the odd decent one - but don't think that they ever want to be your friend as they only see you as a farang owner who pays them money.
6. Don't expect to breakeven before the end of year 3 - if you do it before then you have been lucky, but too many have expectations of making a profit from day one.
7. Build in the ability to have a day off a week for yourself and even a holiday sometime.
8. Don't build up the clientelle out of your mates because friendships move on and therefore so do the customers, and sometimes you want to get away from the place and have a beer with your mates ... hard to do if your mates are only the guys drinking at your place.
9. Go into the business on the basis that you want to get out of it sometime. i.e. make sure your lease is long and open ended for you. The longer it is the better as it means you have a longer lease to sell on to someone else (but remember no lease over three yeaars is legal unless it is registered). Perhaps even build in a kickback for the landlord so they are encouraged to have a favourable lease.
10. Treat it as a business and not something to bide your time in between sunbathing and boozing. No body really makes a go of it if they treat it as "somethinthiing on the side, just to cover my day to day living". A business like this needs you to invest money and energy and brain power, not taking it seriously is very unlikely to result in a successful business.

and remember, many a farang has left Thailand with a small fortune
... having come here with a large fortune.

Theres a lot more rules and lots more ways of looking at it, but I have owned 3 bars and restaurants here and If I had someone telling me these 10 things (and I listened to them, which on hindsight I probably wouldnt have listened anyway) before I started, it would have saved me some headaches.

Well put Beachedwhale, and just to answer the ops comment on not doing it in the UK, all I've got to say is if you can't make it "there", you certainly won't make it "here"
Be very careful, it always looks easy on the surface, but when you get down to it (this is Thailand) you'll find surprises you didn't even think off!-Good Luck, if you decide to make a go of it.

This post has been edited by SamuiJens: 2007-02-03 22:21:06

All the advice above is bullshit.
All people who buy bars get rich, at least here on Samui. The staff is cheap and the profits are great. Not only that, you get to shag all the girls who work in your bar as, er, hostesses for free anytime you want. You can drink all the beer you want for free too. You will be looked up to by all who come into the bar since you "own a business," which makes you a big swinging dick around here. Other bar owners will become your friends and will cooperate to help you with your business as you help them by organizing "pool nights" and "get drunk in each other's bar" nights. This way you will be spreading the love.
At the end of your stand in Samui, you can jack up the fee for "the bar is 'worth' such and such" on top of the key money and rent and all the rest. Never fear, if you wait long enough, there will be another rube, just as gullible as you were to buy the whole kit an kaboodle.

Don't follow this op.

LOL ....

So most if you are saying that it would be a very bad idea to buy a bar in Samui??

Cheers for the info guys really do mean it...

But if it is such a bad idea (i know alot of bars will & do fail every year)
Why are there sooo many bars in Samui & alot of new one's opening up & some very expensive one's to?

So your saying bars will fail even when in a prime spot of location...

some got to work in the good location??? what do the most people on holiday go out & get drunk???

cheers all

Didn't you You forget to sign it Frank Zappa?

superbly put mr wolfe...i think if he follows this wisdom he will be thaksinminted.....tee hee

LOL

Yep Spain has got cheap bars etc...but an alot of them not going well know alot of people with bars there & Ibiza but I ibiza serious money otherwise you got no chance+Thailand is more fun+ still growing?

This post has been edited by CCC: 2007-02-06 01:07:37

I wouldn't even considder it
if you have no problem with flushing 40 grand down the drain then go for it
theres only one way to make a SMALL fortune in thailand and thats start with as bloody great big one.
yes all you've heard is true
you will have to pay the police and thai mafia "protection" money.
if your bar gets too popular then you stand a good chance of being shot or done over by competing thai bar owners.
As posters state here only do it if its a hobby and you have other income
if this is your career plan then forget it.
if you want to have fun in thailand and not get into serious strife observe the following rules
never buy property
never get emotionally attached with a bar girl
and number one never do business there
keep all money and assets in the uk
buy property there and live out in LOs on the rent would be my advice

there are many bars as there are many idiots out there.
simple as that.
to quote a good guy
i wouldn't buy a fishbowl in Thailand
a million tourists a year and you have just admitted you usually go to spain as do most of the chavs who go to Samui
so out of a million people at 90 percent chav, thats an awful lot of idiots to con out of money
thats why thailand prefers the Chav over the backapcker, they are easier to con and far more gullible.

ive been in samui for 12 years and was told the same as you dont do it i now run one of the most successful bars in samui so if you think you can make it work go for it no matter what people say your going to do want you want to do most people who give negative advice 9 times out of 10 have already failed good luck in what ever you decide