i’m not sure how to start since i haven’t written anything like this in almost 2 years, but its important that i chronicle what’s happening in the life of this business as it will affect our lives from here on. this whole thing started with my love for r/c models. i currently own 4 models including a Jato 3.3, HongNor X1-CRT, Mugen MB5XT and Kyosho dNano (Mazda 787B). Joom (my wife), is 100% supportive in everything i do so when it comes to enjoying time with R/C, she’s right there along side me & my son, Nalani (3.5 yrs old). my first son, Paris (8 yrs old), loves r/c as well, but at the moment he’s in my home country focused on a good education & i hope he’ll be joining us for a long visit soon. anyhow, about 2 weeks ago, the three of us went to visit the staff at our local r/c off-road track (Pattaya R/C Powerboat) & they had something new available. it was the dNano 1/43 scale r/c model. they recently setup the small Kyosho-made track close to the “big” off-road track. a few of the guys already bought their choice of dNano & were already practicing, racing with this speedy little mini car. the speed was amazing and the detail of the body on each model was very impressive. of course, i had to have one…. PJ‘s birthday is coming up next month, and these have yet to be released in the US so i figured this would be a great birthday gift. of course, i wanted to get my wife involved so i bought one for her. i’ve got the Mazda 787B, Joom‘s got the Porsche 911 GT3 and PJ‘s got the Lamborghini Murcielago LP640. all, beautfiul scale versions of the full size counterparts fully capable of flying across a mini-track at beyond scale speeds. i ran the car on the Kyosho track which was ok but it wasn’t smooth enough to give me a really good ride. i wanted a track of my own but after inquiring, i knew buying a Kyosho was out of the question (track cost was low but shipping cost is insane). what should we do?
with that, came the idea: build our own track. Joom & i looked at the material used on Kyosho’s track and it looked familiar. it shouldn’t be hard to find that so we set out to do so the next day. upon locating what we needed, we decided to build the track barriers using clear water hosing and cable ties. we picked up masking tape, paint, brushes, some colorful rocks and a fake mini-tree for trimmings and went to work. the completed work you can see in the photos section and we were both very proud of ourselves. i still am… the car ran excellent on this track, turning on a dime and flying across the straightaways. although this design is our favorite, we know its not perfect as we have discovered a few problems. eventually, we would like to give others the same satisfaction by building these tracks for sale but of course, that would also mean making them convenient to setup, breakdown and re-setup again for many years. the original material we chose was a seamless, smooth, sticky surface perfect for the hi-speed racers BUT if we fold the large sections, the material stretches. this caused the track to be warped when setting it up to run again and that is unacceptable. in future designs, we have to find a way to build the track in small sections so breaking it down & storing requires no folding and will remain as it was originally built.
following completion of the track, we took our idea to Charlie, the owner of exclusive rights to sell the dNano in Thailand. he liked the work but informed us that selling the tracks alone wouldn’t be a very good business idea because those with a little time could build a track just as we did. he then recommended we sell the cars as well. i never expected he’d give us that right & was excited about the opportunity considering the uniqueness of the product. we accepted his offer and moved into the planning stages of opening a shop to sell our handmade tracks and dNano models. the first step was to locate a suitable place for the shop. in Pattaya, there are many options but the ideal place would have both Thai and Farang customers, local and tourists. it would have to be a place where people actually went to BUY things, not just window shop and with these requirements, we narrowed our choices to Central (aka BigC), Tesco Lotus, Central Festival or Major Cineplex. TescoLotus Theprasit seems to be moving towards excluding small businesses requiring a full application & meeting with management before they’ll consider allowing one to rent space. Tesco Lotus North Pattaya was ready to allow us to open but the available locations were less than attractive and wouldn’t allow us the space required. our vision of the shop included a display cabinet AND a small track to allow for showing off the car performance as well as allowing customers to try out the product before making a purchase. Central/BigC South Pattaya was open to the concept as well but available space was also, less than desirable though very affordable.
then we walked into Central/BigC North Pattaya and knew this was the spot we needed. after speaking to Au, the small shop promotions manager, we felt confident that this was our location so we then moved to the next step on the road to opening our shop. i came up with the name NanoTrax after searching a few interesting domain names and had my on-staff designer create a nice logo for use on future store-related material. i dropped the logo on the index page of the site last night, and this morning, we took the logo to the “Signs” shop on South Pattaya Rd. now that’s in the works, i’ll have to get additional printed material including business cards & basic brochures for distribution at the shop. eventually, we’ll want to sell items online so an online processor is another important step but we’ll cross that bridge when we come to it. about 1pm we stopped by PRC for a quick meeting with Fah, our supply contact and reserved an acceptable amount of inventory to open the shop. we also agreed to use a few tables and the Kyosho track just to insure everything was as “pristine” looking as possible for the “grand opening”. so we’ve got inventory, signage on the way and will handle uniforms and biz cards tomorrow….and we have location – so we thought.
on the way to pick up Nalani from school, we decided to stop for a visit at Central/BigC North Pattaya to confirm our location and Au gave us bad news that we may not be able to get the spot as planned. she promised to do her best to work it out but sent us over to the new Centeral Festival Mall which is set to open this friday. the location is nice, BUT we’re not sure its going to be a great location for sales. i’m positive there will be lots of window shopping but we need people actually BUYING cuz these locations are running about 7-10k baht per day so that means sales are required to keep the shop open. Central/Big C already is proven but Central Festival? roll of the dice… we’re waiting to hear back from Au. for now, we’ll hustle to prepare for opening day at either location. damn i’m tired… future posts probably won’t be so long, but this is simply the calm before the storm… my experience in entrepreneurship tells me so.