René Pisters

While Ren้ Pisters may have been the general manager at the Thai Garden Resort for only nine months, he is a man who has had a connection with Pattaya for twenty-one years. A career hotelier he says he is now here to stay.

Ren้ is Dutch having been born in Heerlen in the Netherlands. The youngest child in a family of six, his father was a purchasing officer in a state enterprise and his mother, with a brood of six, stayed at home to look after them, so there was no family connection to the hospitality industry.

However, by aged 18 young Ren้ knew that the delight he always felt visiting restaurants and hotels on family outings was the direction he wanted to head and so enrolled in the Hotel and Catering College in his native Heerlen. The training there was in two groups - either practical (for chefs) or management trainees. “I didn’t want to work in hot kitchens. I’d rather be a planner.” So the young trainee soon found himself receiving training in the food and beverage (F&B) departments and front offices in different hotels in Holland and Belgium. He remembered one hotel at Lelystad with amusement. “It was a new city and the hotel was built 20 years too early as there were no people there yet!”

But young Ren้ was not to escape the kitchens - 18 months of National Service came his way where they trained him to be a cook and a truck driver. He towed his mobile field kitchen to the troops, set up and started cooking. He has nothing but praise for the National Service concept, despite cooking. “You might hate it while you’re there, but you learn how to be a team player and how to accept discipline. Every kid should go through National Service,” he said with conviction.

Following discharge Ren้ began his ascendancy through the ranks. Believing that it was important to get as much and as varied experience as he could he took on several F&B appointments, culminating in being the manager in charge of all F&B in a convention centre that would house 5000 people.

The next direction for Ren้’s life was by accident. “I made the mistake of going on a holiday to Thailand. I returned very impressed with the standard of the hotels and the friendliness of the people, so I sent out a few letters and got a contract to be the assistant general manager at the Siam Bayshore Hotel here.”

His next career move was to the Montien Pattaya when his next milestone in life occurred. He met a Thai girl, Suthat, who worked there, and who became his wife. However, restless Ren้ felt he needed more experience in city hotels and the newlyweds went to Guam for the opening of the Pacific Star Hotel, the first of the All Nippon Airways hotels. However, after 2 1/2 years he began to feel hemmed in by the confines of island life and they were both ready to return to Thailand, so he took an executive assistant manager post with the Holiday Inn group in Bangkok.

The return did not last long as tourism was going through a depression and the Holiday Inn people sent him to Johor Baru in Malaysia to be resident manager in a hotel that was undergoing a complete refit and upgrade. The only catch was that he had to also keep the hotel open during this period. The renovations took 3 years and he kept occupancy at 90%, an achievement he remembers with pride.

A completely new venture then came his way. He had been hiring bands to perform in the hotel and was approached to form a company to be the booking agents for musical talent. Whilst it was successful, it was not a long term commitment. “At our peak we had 150 bands playing in SE Asia. This was great other than the fact I was never home. We had two kids by that stage and they were asking who was the guy cutting the meat on Sundays. Family comes first, so we came back to Thailand.”

Four years in Bangkok was also not the ideal for a young family. “My kids were getting up at 4 in the morning to go to school and never got the chance to play in a park. We needed a place where kids could enjoy what kids are supposed to do.” That place was Pattaya and when the opportunity came to take over the reins as GM at the Thai Garden Resort, Ren้ jumped at it.

Ren้ does not believe that the hospitality industry is for the dilettantes. “You must be prepared to work 15 hours a day. You work when everyone else is free, and even if you work your butt off the people may not come. This business can be very rewarding, but sometimes it is not.”

Success for this hard working man he describes as, “Being able to have a happy life without too much worries while moving towards being successful in business and life.” I asked him if he considered himself to be a success and he said confidently, “Yes, I do.”

And while that may be true, first of all, Ren้ Pisters is a family man. “Family comes first” ran through much of his reasons and in his present post he says, “My kids keep me alert on what ‘families’ need.”

For the resort which calls itself “The place where families never get bored”, they certainly have the “family” man at the helm. A man whose ambition is “To take my family and show them snow.” The Pisters family will never be bored either.