Despite complete destruction of tourism, new businesses keep investing

In Da Nang, Vietnam the past year and a half has been absolutely devastating to the economy. This area usually thrives with tourism both domestic and international but now it has a ghost town feel to it with around 50% of the overall businesses closing, many of them to never re-open.

Something kind of strange is happening in the meantime though, and that is that new businesses are being built at the same time.

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While the above appears to be a promotional picture done digitally, I have seen this establishment in person during their "soft opening" and it is not only brand new, but it appears to be extremely well-crafted and almost certainly cost a fortune to make.

This new bar, called After 5 is the first fully equipped sports bar in this part of town complete with pool table, fooseball, electronic darts, and even a digital gold driving range simulator. There are 3 floors in total as well as a roof and several bars contained inside.

It looks as though it is going to be a very exciting place to visit but this kind of makes me wonder what would compel someone to open a business now, when there are a really small amount of potential customers to be had.

They haven't even officially opened yet and they also do not appear on any of the major maps websites, which is something they should probably get working on if they want people to be able to find them.

This street was turned into a "walking street" at great expense to the city about a year ago only to see the tourism sector of the city's economy absolutely ravaged by the effects of Covid lockdowns in Vietnam and abroad. If you walk the streets in this area now about half of the buildings are for rent and I really can't understand what would compel someone to drop a bunch of money on a new business during these times.

I can only presume that they got some sort of fantastic long-term deal on the rent and this is why they decided to move forward with the build. I can't say how much was put into this bar, but it is seriously impressive and I hope they are able to survive once they do open because a full sports bar like this is going to be a lot of fun!

To me, it seems like a really stupid business idea considering what is going on in this city right now. There are no tourists and very little of the expat community actually remains right now. Maybe it's a money laundering scheme? That is also a possibility I guess. I can't imagine them making very much money with this but you never know!

They are not alone in this either. There are a bunch of new builds going up in other locations as well and I would love to know what is driving this, it can't be the current economy because going out now to basically anywhere results in you sitting somewhere with very few people around.

To me it seems crazy to do this now, but maybe the owners know something I don't know. I don't know very much about this area or its future, so there is a really good chance that this is the case.