The Yard Hostel Amid the COVID-19 Outbreak
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Abstract
In the middle of the coronavirus pandemic, The Yard Hostel, a 600-square-meter area of land in the Ari neighborhood in Thailand, faces the challenge of an ongoing economic crisis because of a dramatic drop in the number of customers due to travel restrictions and border closures. The Yard was founded by two former female engineers, Ms. Amornrat Amornsirichairat (Som Yai) and Ms. Atiporn Sancharoen (Som Lek), based on the philosophy of the sufficiency economy. “Resilience” is one of the key principles essential to guiding the proprietors’ decision-making when The Yard is confronted with a complex problem, in this case economic uncertainty due to the coronavirus pandemic. Given the lack of foreign customers that have been a major source of income, The Yard has opened another business line—The Yard Grocery. With the spread of this infectious disease, causing economic hardship, the concepts of the sufficiency economy, in particular “resilience,” allow The Yard’s owners to make rational decisions in order to cope with many tough problems amid the COVID-19 pandemic.
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