Seacon Home boss forgoes price war

Seacon Home Co, one of the country’s oldest and largest homebuilders, will shy away from price competition and focus instead on improving housing designs.

The company has set a sales growth target of 9% this year to 1.3 billion baht, according to newly appointed managing director Manu Trakulwattanakit.

“Avoiding high competition from a price war and the launch of new home designs that meet the target customer’s requirements will be two key policies for the company this year,” Mr Manu said. “A price race does not help improve the homebuilding business. Seacon Home should escape from this scenario, which we expect to be out of in two years.”

The company will use its strong and long-established brand to continue marketing among consumers.

“Our new home designs should win target customers with prices that rely on actual costs,” said Mr Manu, a former executive of SET-listed developers Pruksa Real Estate and Sansiri.

He said the experience he gained from working with top developers will help in dealing with construction materials suppliers so that the company can control cost, price and product quality.

“We aim to improve Seacon Home’s profit to reach the same level as that of property developers, or around 30% growth, without using any campaigns and promotions,” Mr Manu said.

Seacon Home will no longer push price discounts as it did earlier, but rather focus on the reliability of the seasoned brand and the quality of Seacon’s construction system, which employs the prefabricated construction method and is able to support structure weight of 1.5-3 times, Mr Manu said.

“The homebuilding business should listen to the customer’s voice and give professional advice,” he said.

The company’s strategies this year will focus on after-sale services, digital marketing and target customers in units priced between 5 million and 20 million baht, as they constitute the middleto upper-end segment with strong purchasing power.

Seacon is also improving a homebuilding centre in the Srinakarin area that will be completed in September 2018. The centre is one of five in Greater Bangkok where the company showcases home designs.

Company director Supitcha Chaipipat said that while consumers overall remain cautious in their spending, demand in the homebuilding market in the first half stayed resilient.

Seacon Home posted higher-thanexpected sales of 660 million baht in the first half and aims to have 640 million baht in the second half, said Ms Supitcha, formerly managing director.

The homebuilding business should listen to the customer’s voice and give professional advice. MANU TRAKULWATTANAKIT Managing director, Seacon Home Co