Lady Pie - Case Study
From the Asialink Business Thailand Country Starter Pack
The 2004 tsunami took with it Harry and Susan Usher's home, and the tools of her fledgling pie-making trade.
When the 2004 tsunami that devastated South Asia hit Phuket, it took with it Harry and Susan Usher's home, and the tools of her fledgling pie-making trade. However, inspired by the Thais' resilience and a little help from home, their business, Lady Pie, was baking again within days.
Having sailed to Phuket in 1999, the pair liked what they saw and settled in. Susan, an Australian, started making pies as a hobby, building it into a small cottage industry. "She made them in a Breville pie maker at first, two pies at a time," says her Scottish-Australian husband Harry, now general manager of the company. "Then she got two pie makers, and just before the tsunami we upgraded to a pizza oven."
The oven was washed away with the Ushers' home, but they were determined to stay. "The thing about Thailand is it gets in the way of many natural disasters and unrest. The economy goes up and down like a yo-yo but it always seems to recover, it's got an elasticity to it," says Harry.
"People pulled together after the tsunami. Phuket pulled itself together. We picked up fairly quickly, Susan was making pies within a few days of the tsunami, she found one of the old Breville machines and got it rewired. We had customers and they were wanting pies."
When the owner of Sydney factory Lindsay Pie Making Equipment saw a newspaper photo of Susan in the remains of their washed-away house, they sent a pallet-load of equipment including an electric oven and dough mixers.
Today, Lady Pies are sold throughout Thailand via two supermarket chains and a network of distributors. They produce around 500 pies a day for a mainly expatriate market, though the sweet-toothed Thais are partial to their apple pies and lamingtons.
No one anticipated such growth from the once home-run business. Harry left his construction job to join the company in 2010, and today works with Susan and eight Thai workers. As a Thai Limited Partnership, a business structure chosen when it was initially set up, a strict four-to-one Thai-to-expat staff ratio is required for its registered company structure.
If setting up Lady Pie now, the Ushers highlight that they would seek approval to operate under the freer Thailand Board of Investment (BOI) rules designed to encourage investment in certain sectors or regional areas.
"There are several conditions and the location has to be approved and your accounts checked, but the new regulations permit expats to own 100% of their business' shares and own the land the business is on, which is one of the few ways for a foreigner to own land here," explains Harry.
Other benefits also exist for Australians wanting to set up a business in Thailand in areas where the government seeks to attract foreign investment, under recently introduced BOI regulations. "Business visas and work permits can be fast-tracked and there's no profits tax for the first few years. There is a lot of paperwork and you need a specialist to help, but that’s the way to go," highlights Harry.
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