End of an Era

It was always going to happen. Well ever since Santhiya was finished in 2006. That was the second hotel on Thong Nai Pan Noi. When it was discovered that Santhiya was filling its expensive rooms and pool villas the writing was on the wall for the budget backpacker places in Thong Nai Pan Noi.

It should be considered a good thing that the urge to ‘up-grade’ Tapan Noi bungalows was resisted until 2013. They haven’t been upgraded yet, but they have been shut down; meaning that there aren’t any bungalows for less than 1,000 Thai Baht a night left on the beachfront. That is a bit sad.

Tapan Noi or Baan Tapan Noi attracted lots of people, including many loyal customers who came back year after year. The bungalows on the rocks were simple wooden structures. The ones at the back didn’t have a bathroom. None had air-con. Instead they had a lot of character. The bungalow on the headline point was a gem – with lots of pointed plants outside and access to two beaches. Another bungalow had a bedroom and an entrance area big enough to install a basic kitchen. There were also a couple of bigger bungalows directly on the sand that were highly coveted and usually only let by the month.

The people running Tapan Noi are a friendly bunch. They got to know their long-stay customers and were always ready for a joke and a smile.

The northern end of the beach was ideal – it was free of the nasty early morning drone coming from the Jungle Bar and Hideaway Bar. Instead there was the relaxed I Sea Bar for a drink. Until 2011 there was the excellent Krua Tapan restaurant to enjoy authentic Thai food as well as the Tapan Noi restaurant.

Now that idyllic set up has gone. The Tapan Noi restaurant is still there as is the I Sea Bar but the cheap bungalows – the life blood of that part of the beach – have been taken out of the equation.

At the moment they are just standing there rotting. No doubt in the low season they will be pulled down and will be slowly replaced with air-con bungalows that will make their way onto the Thong Tapan website. It makes business sense I suppose but in terms of culture and pluralism the beach is a poorer place for their closure.

Thong Nai Pan Room Prices for 2013

Now that the peak season is over the hotels and resorts in Thong Nai Pan Noi and Thong Nai Pan Yai are revealing their prices for 2013 up to the rainy season. Naturally, the Christmas and New Year prices change as the year goes on and a number of factors are considered.

The thing to remember about prices in Thong Nai Pan as with many resort areas in Thailand is that they are not governed by inflation. The currency exchange rates don’t fluctuate very much. The resorts go on the principle of charging as much as the market will stand. They are apt to raise prices if they had high occupancy rates the previous year, and to lower rates if occupancy was down the previous year.

The notion of competition driving down prices often doesn’t apply in Thailand. Rather the resorts have an unspoken agreement to keep to their price niche. Thus, the cheapest place remains the same and the hotels don’t get into price wars.

The fact that most of the hotel rooms, bungalows and villas in both Thong Nai Pan Noi and Thong Nai Pan Yai have gone up in price this year reflects the growing popularity of TNP, and that business has never been better.

In Thong Nai Pan Noi Phuwadee Resort and Spa has raised its prices by 200 Thai Baht; Thong Tapan by about 300 Thai Baht; Sandee Bungalow and Tapan Noi by 100 Thai Baht and both Santhiya and Panviman by a massive 2,000 Thai Baht.

The exceptions are Buri Rasa which is offering discounts of 1,000 Thai Baht and Rasananda that has frozen its prices. Buri Rasa has been open for less than a year and is still trying to establish itself in the hotel market. Rasananda started out massively over-priced and has no need to further raise prices.

In Thong Nai Pan Yai Central Cottage has made small increases (about 50 Thai Baht); Nice Beach Resort is 100 Thai Baht more; Dreamland Resort costs 300 Thai Baht more; and Candlehut Resort 400 Thai Baht more.

The surprises are that Baan Panburi prices are unchanged. Also Starlight Resort prices are mostly unchanged. Havana Resort has also kept the same prices. Longtail Resort doesn’t use booking engines but it looks like it has increased prices by a modest 100 Thai Baht. Indeed I suspect the popularity of Longtail Beach Resort is forcing the neighboring resorts of Baan Panburi and Starlight Resort to refrain from big price hikes. Baan Panburi is part of a bigger chain of resorts and so there is less pressure to squeeze every last Baht out of the place. It still seeks to become the main budget option in Yai.

Private villas in Thong Nai Pan are outside the pricing rubric guiding prices in Thong Nai Pan. The prices remain unchanged in general. Sunrise Villa is offering a discounted week every month for 4,000 Thai Baht a day instead of 6,000 Thai Baht. Due to high running costs a couple of private villas have stopped opening their doors.

Current Promotions

At present Thong Tapan is offering a 5% discount for bookings more than 40 days in advance. Santhiya has hiked up its prices but is offering 4 nights for the price of 3 to soften the blow. Buri Rasa is also offering promotions.

Use the links below to check promotions:

Thong Tapan
Santhiya
Buri Rasa
Sunrise Villa

Buri Rasa

Buri Rasa opened for business early 2012 but it was not until late 2012 that they actually finished the resort or put up a website. Cheekily Phangan.info put up a website masquerading as the official website. It is a cheap looking site with minimal content and over-priced booking.

One look at www.burirasa.com is enough to clearly see it is the genuine article. Now that we have the website and a more completed resort we are in a position to offer a review of Buri Rasa in Thong Nai Pan Noi.

For all of those folks who haven’t heard the sad news, Star Huts was torn down in 2011. The owner of Baan Panburi and the Anantara brand bought the land. He moved Baan Panburi over to the southern end of Yai beach and used the space to create ‘Buri Rasa Village’.

From this background it is clear that we have a big player flexing his corporate muscles. He owns Buri Rasa and Baan Panburi and his management group runs Rasananda. How long before he buys Rasananda? His name is William E. Heinecke. He is an American with a Thai passport and one of the richest men in Thailand. 

Although Panviman and Santhiya have branched out, they were conceived as one-off unique resorts. In contrast Buri Rasa from the very outset was designed to belong to a corporate entity and to be heavily branded. There is a Buri Rasa in Koh Samui. It had its ‘soft opening’ in June 2012. It is very similar to the one in Thong Nai Pan Noi. It is beachfront, uses a similar interior design and is aimed at the same 4 star market. The branding is deliberate as the 2 Buri Rasa resorts share the same website!

The Buri Rasa in Thong Nai Pan Noi occupies the corner of the beach between the stream that separates off the Panviman bit of beach up to the public road leading down to the beach. There is a small infinity pool on the beach complete with decking. Next to this is the ‘Beach Club’. This reminds me very much of the Baan Panburi Beach Club but just a bit more up-market. It has the same layout with large open plan restaurant with lots of seating on the beach. The menu is similar too – Thai food and barbeque, only more expensive. They even have a small bar hut to the side, like the old Baan Panburi used to.

As you walk up the road away from the beach you encounter the ‘Village Square’. This is a slightly ambitious or pretentious venture. It depends on your point of view. There is cobbled road, seating under a large tree, cafes, shops and what feels like an English style pub. The architecture is deliberately European rather than Thai. Bright colours, upholstered seating, colonnades and wall murals have transformed this part of the village into a 4 star enclave. If you were kind you would say it is sophisticated; if not you would be inclined to see something that resembles Koh Samui in all its pomp and glory trying to pull in the tourist bucks.

The rooms at Buri Rasa have air-con, en-suite bathrooms and balconies with sea views. It is hotel style accommodation in the sense that it is all in a large multi story building rather than in bungalows or villas stretched out across the beachfront. Building upwards and making the rooms fairly small means that they can offer rooms for as little as $100 a night compared to the minimum of $250 a night it costs for a Rasananda villa.

It is interesting to note that the Buri Rasa is still using computer generated graphics for the rooms. Because of the expansion of Rasananda building of Buri Rasa fell behind schedule. They opened in 2012 with only a few rooms functional and obviously not looking good enough to feature in promotional material.

The original meaning of boutique was a shop that was small and sold unique items. No doubt Buri Rasa will be promoted as boutique. It is not that small and its style is derivative. The rooms offer comfort but not luxury and the restaurant is just a re-make of the previously successful Baan Panburi Beach Club. Buri Rasa is a safe corporate bet to increase revenue from a prime piece of real estate.