New Paradise Park aims to attract high-end shoppers

New Paradise Park aims to attract high-end shoppers

The Paradise Park Co, the joint venture between Siam Piwat and MBK, plans to use Paradise Park as a business model to expand its high-end shopping mall on the outskirts of Bangkok after receiving a warm response from the project’s opening on Srinakarin Road earlier this month.

The company is looking for new locations for its Paradise Park brand that targets high- to middle-class suburban dwellers.

Chadatip Chutrakul, vice-president of Paradise Park, said the plan for a new shopping mall will be finalised in November.

With a 3.2-billion-baht renovation budget, Paradise Park, previously known as the Seri Centre, has a new interior and space for more than 700 shops. The shopping mall will have a 70-million-baht grand celebration on Aug 24 and 28-29.

“We want Paradise Park to be a high-quality shopping destination in eastern Bangkok. We hope our new look will boost the sales of our tenants,” she said.

Paradise Park took over Seri Centre for over 975 million baht through the purchase of shares in Seri Centre Management Co. The shopping mall has five levels with a gross project area of 290,000 square metres and a rental area of 90,000 sq m.

After the launch, Paradise Park has a marketing budget of 300 million baht for July 2010 to June 2011 dedicated to 400 marketing events and activities, including continuous sales and promotional campaigns.

“We expect Paradise Park will break even within seven years after its opening, compared to an average of five years at other malls, due to the higher investment cost,” said Ms Chadatip.

The project developer is confident of the market potential for this mall. Paradise Park fits the top-end segment in this area, she said. Central Bangna and Seacon Square have their own target groups, said Ms Chadatip.

Since the gradual opening of Paradise Park in March, regular customers have continued to visit the centre despite on-going renovations. When the mall opens for full service at the end of August, she expects it will register average traffic of 150,000 visitors per day from eastern Bangkok. It defines this area as eastern Sukhumvit Road, eastern Outer Ring Road, the motorway, Bang Na, Theparak, and the provinces of Samut Prakan and Chon Buri.

Source: http://www.bangkokpost.com

Having spent hundreds of hours in the kid-friendly but very run-down Seri Centre, I recently visited the new Paradise Park, and while parts of it were closed off for the on-going construction renovation works, I was very impressed. Think ‘small Emporium out in the sticks’ and you will visualise Paradise Park. Well worth a trip to if you live in the area, and if you don’t, consider a joint daytrip visit to Paradise Park and Rama IX Park, which is a few hundred metres behind the shopping centre  – ED