My fiance and I are planning on moving to Asia in about a year or so. I say Asia in the broad term because we haven't exactly settled on a destination yet, but ideally Taipei, Hong Kong, or Shanghai though we are also considering other parts of China, Vietnam and Thailand. My fiance is the sensible one and a lot of these decisions will come down to what jobs he is offered. I, on the other hand am impractical, creative and a little bit fearful of cubicle based jobs. In thinking of what I would like to do when we make the big move, my initial idea would be to start up a sort of literary/creative magazine for ex-pats and see where that goes/how it evolves. For those who have lived or worked in the areas mentioned, what would the possibility of that be? Would there be a market for it? How many similar publications already exist? Obviously there's plenty of time between now and the move to smooth out the kinks, gather up more information, etc. but I'm just curious and overly excited. Thanks for any and all advice.
There are plenty of reasons to say why it wouldn't work - but if you listen to the naysayers you won't even bother to move overseas.
So - get it going! I don't know how you would make any money with it - but that is the trick with ANY website: how to monetize it.
Only my opinion - and I just said DON'T listen to anyone . . . but the literary angle might not be very monetizable (is that a word?). BUT! It can be the base for other things. Many of us who have lived overseas for long periods of time really do literally HUNGER for things of an intellectual slant (Expat life often revolves around drinking and BSing). A literary group/publication/blog/website might also help connect people to reading and discussion groups? I'd love to find a book club in my area - I found one when I lived in Bangkok and LOVED it. Not even for the books - just for the good people I met. Books were the vehicle for many of us to meet and make friends.
It you connected people to local book clubs AND were able to sell them books (the books the club will read next month perhaps - or books recommended by the clubs (if you could find someone to summarize what each club read and recommends?) . . . or subscriptions of some sort?
I would suggest just getting started (there are LOTS of reasons not to) and just allow the path to unfold. It WILL be there - though it may not be immediately apparent. If you provide a good service - people will come.
The problem (or wonder!) of these things is all that you don't know - that will eventually reveal itself to you. But, you'll never find it if you don't head down that path.
Go get 'em!
There are already a number of "free" magazines aimed at Ex-pats, also websites - have you checked out Asia-expat.com, expat9.com etc?
Obviously how successful you are will depend on your language skills. How good is your Chinese now? If fluent you probably will be able to pick up a job easily. If not visas may be a problem.
Posts about 'moving' to another country always make me wonder if they are being posted by someone who doesn't know you can't just move to any country you feel like. So let me ask, how do you plan to get legal residency in whichever country you decide you want to move to?
As for the ex-pat magazine, I'm a naysayer.
Ah well, if I was easily discouraged by the naysayers, I would have left Lonely Planet a long time ago. I appreciate the concern Wayworn, but this has been my plan for about 6 months now and I still have another year to get everything into order, so I'm not one of those posters who thinks they can move to "any country you feel like". Thanks to TedKarma for the encouragement. If/when I achieve the seemingly impossible, I will be sure to post again ;).
Ted has a very good point. After a while most intelligent ex pats have a real hunger for good reading material in their own language - and its often expensive or difficult to get depending on your location. One of the most successful ventures a friend of mine managed in Spain in an ex pat community was a "buy sell exchange type stall" for books. She canvassed backpapers accommodation, small hotels etc - got them on her side, paid a small commission and retailed the collection through the stall - good books for about a pound UK. Someone else actually ran the stall - (permit issues), but she stood around a bit, made friends, discussed books etc.
I'm not necessarily a naysayer. Let's say I am practical.
I live in "Asia" so let me comment about the English mags here. Tokyo seems to be overwhelmed by English language free rags. This happened in the last few years and I can't possibly believe that many or even most of them make money. I'd say there are at least six of them. The ballpark figure I've read for Westerners in Tokyo is between 20,000 and 30,000. That's a free rag for every 5000 or so Westerners. Those numbers look pretty skimpy if your goal is a profitable business. Given that most of these magazines are now free, I doubt you will be able to charge people for it.
Your post also doesn't make very clear how important this work is as an income source. If your hubby's income can carry you through in a pinch then you have the option of doing this since you aren't depending on the money from it. If you do need a paying job quickly, I am afraid that this magazine idea is very ill advised. Feel free to do so but you'd be wise to have a Plan B AND a sizeable pool of capital.
I agree that ex-pats often find it difficult to get books to read. A used book business of some sort might be a way to make some money. I would have bought from one in places I have lived.
What I found was that book 'exchanges' were not uncommon. That is, you bring a book in and take a book out, no charge. I had one in the bar I owned in Greece. Brought a few people in who then became customers of the bar.
Whether any real amount of money could be made would depend on demand obviously. A few dozen customers buying books isn't going to provide a living. I know it wouldn't have provided a living anywhere I have lived. The prices necessary to earn a living would have discouraged most potential buyers. A pound a book would require selling a lot of books ohwell.
Then there are the practicalities of getting the books, a license to sell and a place to sell from. I can't see it as being a highly practical idea. A hobby or sideline, OK.
Since the subject of book dealing came up, let me look at it from a practicality point of view.
Tokyo has two English language used bookstores, one high brow and the other low brow. There used to be three but the third one closed. I heard through the grapevine that the owner closed it and sold the remaining stock online. I know the scene here pretty well becasue I visit the stores regularly and I have chatted with most of the employees about the business in detail. An added vantage point is that I am an active seller to the bookstores and I can follow the progress of the books once they are sold through ongoing visits. I see how long items take to sell and I can see how they price them compared to what I was paid for them.
As I have said before, Tokyo has a roughly 20,000 to 30,000 population of Westerners. Some of them will not be English speakers. Let's assume that there are 20,000 English speaking Westerners which will be the market for the bookshops. This is 10,000 per shop. Perhaps this is on the low end and the city can support more. But keep in mind that an expat community does a lot of geenral sharing and that the high income expats perhaps will simply buy new and not bother with used bookshops.
Based on my conversations and observations bookstores here will usually pay between 25% and 33% of resale price for a book from customers. This may sound very profitable to some since it means you are selling at three to four times your cost. But don't forget that books are bulky and it is also capital intensive, inventory business.
First about the bulkiness. A retail shop will contain a certain amount of cubic feet of shelf space per square foot. Too little profits for a book and it isn't making enough money given the rent you are paying. An example. I have a book here, a hard cover on Byzantime history, purchased from one of the stores here. It was on half price sale for Y500. Assume he paid 25% of resale which means that the profits were Y250, $2.20. Assume that it was a slow seller, thus the sale price. Having a book weighing a pound sit on the shelf for more than a year, only to make a profit of $2.20, I am not sure if this was profitable merchandise.
Now about the capital intensiveness. Most inventory based businessed will be capital intensive. All used, vintage resale businesses are. I am very familiar with these businesses since my business is also that type. Simply put, in such a business the more you carry the more money you make. Carrying 5000 titles is more than 10 times better than carrying 500 titles. You end up plowing most of your profits back into the business. It not only requires capital but also commitment since that inventory will rather have little liquidity and resale value if you were to decide to get out of the business.
Books are expensive in Tokyo. At the low brow shop, books are usually priced at Y600 and up; at the high brow, Y1000 and up. I once figured that they are charging something around 75% of US retail price, which to me sounds very expensive. But then I would imagine that they are also paying more for books given the general dearth of English language books in Japan. New books here can cost between 150% and 200% of US retail.
What is the conclusion? Given that it ties up a lot of capital, is labor intensive as you must attend the shop 9-5, and the local expat einvironment and competition makes for more uncertainty, I thin this will be a tough business to make money in. It certainly won't give you too much free time to travel for example as any downtime is by definition earning no income and costing you rent.
I will also quote the foreign partner in the low brow bookshop. He said that it was making less money than he projected. The shop needed more working capital and since he wasn't able to put up more, he lost control of the store as his local partner put up the cash. He also said that he gets a lot of unsellable merchandise which shouldn't be bought but they usually end up buying from customers anyway. These are usally best sellers in either paperback or hard cover.
As for the comment by ohwell, I am rather sekptical. I note that he/she did not expicitly say that it was profitable, only that it was "successful". Maybe this means that the person had a good time. Let me analyze the case. Since he says "stall", I will assume it is one stall. I have next to me two tall bookcases. Each has five shelves which can fit around 30 books per shelf; 300 books in all. Assume that a stall has the equivalent of 4 bookshelves, 600 books. Assume again that the cost per book was 25% of sales which makes GBP 0.75 profits per book. The sales staff at the stall also needs to be paid since the owner wasn't able to do it.
Here are the numbers. If the sales is 50 books per day, which I think is an extremely generous assumption, the profits will be GBP 37.50/day. Assume you take no vacation and work 5 days every week. That's only GBP 9750 gross margin in a year. There will be other expenses to pay and on top of that you need to pay the guy minding the store. There is absolutely NO way that such a business scenario will be profitable given the prices you quote. Maybe the average prices were much higher than a pound. Maybe it was "successful" because he had fun for a year chatting up customers. But that's a very different criteria and it doesn't help someone needing a job and income.
<<For those who have lived or worked in the areas mentioned, what would the possibility of that be? Would there be a market for it? How many similar publications already exist?>>
I live in Bangkok and cover Vietnam for regional travel.
The Bangkok Post, one of two Bangkok based newspapers, has two weekly sections that are magazines - one is a glossy and the other is not. Both carry a variety of types of articles. Plus there are dozens of freebie and local subscription magazines, lots of English language bookstores and quite a few used bookstores, book clubs, book exchanges, etc. I seriously doubt that a new magazine would make money here without years of work, lots of up front capital and a really special niche. Remember that the vast majority of the expat population here in Bangkok is transient. In my experience, they are here for 3-8 years or so generally with a big corporation or international organization or embassy and then get transferred. Some stay longer but getting a job that provides a work permit to remain longer is not that easy.
While the situation is not quite the same in Vietnam, it is increasingly similar in Ho Chi Minh City which is the larger and more cosmopolitan/international of the two main cities in Vietnam. Things have been changing rapidly in this part of the world in the past several years and I would expect that they will continue to do so. I would be surprised it some of the things in Bangkok were not already in the process of being developed in Vietnam.
Any product of this nature is going to require a significant investment financially. Do you have those resources?
Ruth
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