I have never understood the pleasures of shopping, being the type that doesn’t go out to buy anything without a list. Maybe I’m too utilitarian a person, but wandering through aisles and arcades looking for something serendipitous -- which by definition must be a rare find -- seems an awful waste of time.

People are incredulous that even Bangkok has no allure for me. "You mean you go to Bangkok, yet do no shopping?"

Hardly any. And on the rare occasions when out of obligation or whatever irrational impulse, I accompany a friend or two on their shopping rounds, I am bored stiff within minutes. If at Jatujak, the weekend market that is often jampacked and sweltering, I am cursing without end.

Still, if not for those friends, I might never have had the opportunity to observe the differences between the retail scene of Bangkok -- well, at least the part of the retail scene frequented by Singaporean tourists -- and that of Singapore.

Ask any Singaporean to name their favourite shopping locales in Bangkok, and most will reply Ma Boon Krong and Jatujak. The gay men may add Gaysorn and Emporium, but gay men are far outnumbered by straight women and anyway the actual places are not important to this article.

Ma Boon Krong (MBK) is a large airconditioned mall, not particularly upmarket, but very centrally located. It is crowded virtually every day. It has one departmental store as an anchor tenant, but in my estimation, the store takes up no more than 10% of the floor space. Small shops predominate, each rarely more than 50 square metres in area. There's a popular cinema on the upper floors.

Jatujak is a vast collection of cowsheds, under which are squeezed an almost infinite number of stalls, all hot, airless and overfilled with merchandise. Jatujak only operates on Saturdays and Sundays when a quarter of Bangkokians seem to head there. It’s always so packed that the only air you breathe is what the other person has just exhaled. With flesh pressing upon you from all directions, to sneeze is a terrorist attack. 

I cannot understand how anyone can call such an experience fun.

Yet, there they are -- thousands of Singaporeans enjoying the highlight of their Bangkok holiday, browsing and bargaining in Jatujak, MBK and other shopping areas. What is it about shopping in Bangkok that people find so irresistible? And why do Singaporeans think it worth the trouble to make their way here? What can they get here that they can’t get at home, the supposed shopping capital of the region, according to our Tourism Board?

From my observations, the killer factors are originality and price. A closer examination of how Bangkok enjoys these two advantages tells us much about the Singapore model -- our economics and career preferences.

MBK and Jatujak -- and many other shopping venues in Bangkok -- are characterised by numerous small shops without famous names. Most of them stock a narrow range of products that look either home-made or manufactured in a small family-run factory. They range from clothes to lampshades, from cookies to jewelry, from sling-bags to unusual blends of essential oils. At MBK, you can get your portrait painted in oil, or purchase a passable copy of an old master. At Jatujak, you’ll have a vast range of traditional handicraft and antiques to choose from (if you believe they’re really antique, that is).

Frankly, most of the products are uninspired, and I would think their quality pretty suspect too (but what do I know, since I never buy anything), but some of them really do catch your eye. In the highly competitive environment they spring from, there is considerable pressure to differentiate and excel, at least to the extent that limited resources permit. Even if the majority of the shops and merchandise aren’t interesting, enough of them stand out to make the shopping trip worthwhile. The Singaporean shopper is wowed by designs he has not seen anywhere else, and often at a price that knocks him over as "cheap, cheap, cheap!"

It is a function of how Thailand’s economy is. It has a huge informal sector, with relatively high rates of unemployment or underemployment. Thai society is features strong family bonds, so networks of relatives can be roped in to weave, sew, carve or polish. Or else, you can set up a small workshop (no zoning laws to stop you) in your home and employ a few workers cheaply from the thousands hungry for work. With the much lower cost of living, and low-cost domestic inputs (e.g. fruits that can be made into preserves, cotton woven into fabrics, leather made into bags), the resulting selling prices are attractive to visitors from Singapore, Hong Kong, Australia and Japan.

Compared to MBK and Jatujak, our retailing scene is vastly different. We tend to have the same brands and even the same shops in just about every shopping mall. Even the food courts are rapidly becoming all too similar, selling virtually the same shortlist of dishes. Start-ups are few and far between; originality virtually forgotten.

It seems to reflect the fact that in Singapore, we tend not to work for ourselves, but to work for others. We don’t sell things that we have invented or made, but things that others made and have proven to be successful. We’re a risk-averse kind of place.

We have much lower rates of unemployment than Thailand. If it’s so easy to be a Clinique or Marks and Spencer shop assistant, why bother to open your own shop? In any case, how much free time does your mother, aunties or cousins have, that they can sew the clothes you have designed? Without them, what options are there in terms of small sweatshops that can do contract manufacturing in small batches for you?

Daunting as these hurdles appear to be, the killer, in my view, is the rent asked for. The fixed cost is a severe deterrent to experimentation. It makes for a strong bias in favour of proven brands and franchises. And the reason why rents are so high in Singapore is the Development Charge. When a developer wants to redevelop a piece of land to a higher density, the government assesses a charge that has to be paid. This is rationalised as the price for the state giving permission for a high-density development, and having to put in the infrastructure (e.g. roads) to support it. (The infrastructure might have been put in beforehand, e.g. a metro station) Quite typically, in a shopping mall development of, say, $600 million, as much of $400 million of the total cost could be the Development Charge. You can then imagine the effect this has on the rents later charged to recover the cost of the project.

With such rents, who can afford to sign a lease for a shop unless you can forecast with confidence that you will have enough sales? Hence, known brands have a huge advantage. Known restaurants with already-popular dishes. Known music on known CD labels.

Yet, what makes sense at a micro level becomes collective suicide on a macro level, when everybody is taking the same approach, selling the same things. Invention and experimentation are squeezed out, and it's no wonder people say shopping here is boring.

© Yawning Bread