Gringos.com New Ownership & Future Plans

***Gringos*** · #1 (**permalink**) 06-21-2010, 02:38 PM

Dear Members,
The Gringos.com site has been sold and made live again. My company has bought the site and we have some great plans to help increase the traffic, get the community active and hopefully bring the site back to the great resource it has always been for Expats and Travellers South of the Border!

My name is Bob Sheth and I run a small company called MoveForward.com Ltd. We are based in London and our focus is managing and growing communities like this one. We own sites like www.ExpatForum.com, www.PropertyCommunity.com, www.AustraliaForum.com and a few others.

I want to let you all know about some of the changes we have planned for the site. Firstly we will be updating the design a little. The new design will help us to publish news and helpful articles on a daily basis. A lot of the site software is also being changed and upgraded. This will mean some downtime but we will try to minimize this as much as possible. Finally we will be re-structuring the forums a little. Our aim is to become an invaluable to resource for people moving to Central and South America and a great network for people currently living there. We want the site to be evenly spread across all Countries and popular Expat destinations South for the Border. From a design point of view this will mean each Country will be displayed in an equally proportioned manner and some of the more specialist and niche topics may be moved into their own sections. So right now, Colombia takes up around half of the site – this will be reduced and made more equal to the other Countries. Topics on agencies and dating may be moved to their own section and this new section may be made private to members only. It would be great to hear any feedback community members have about these changes. Please leave any comments you have in this thread.

Finally I want to say thank you to all the members that have made Gringos.com such a valuable information resource and it is a pleasure to be part of a community with such a long and interesting history.
Regards
Bob Sheth

James · #2 (**permalink**) 06-22-2010, 01:54 AM

Hey Bob,
It was very nice meeting you I wish you the best of luck and you should do a much better job doing Gringos this time around!Onces again good luck to you!

***Gringos*** · #3 (**permalink**) 06-22-2010, 02:16 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by James

Hey Bob,
It was very nice meeting you I wish you the best of luck and you should do a much better job doing Gringos this time around!Onces again good luck to you!

Thanks you for your kind words James. Its nice to meet you too.

Benjio · #4 (**permalink**) 06-22-2010, 10:42 PM

Sounds like a winner to me. Thanks for bringing Gringos back. I'm looking forward to the future of the board.

Kalel21 · #5 (**permalink**) 06-23-2010, 12:13 AM

Hi Bob,
A warm welcome to the site and a pleasure to meet you. We all look forward to continue bringing our various experiences and share our experience with each other.

thank you...

***Gringos*** · #6 (**permalink**) 06-23-2010, 01:31 AM

Hey Benjio and Kalel21,
Thanks for the warm welcome.

Reagrds
Bob

rivardco · #7 (**permalink**) 06-23-2010, 11:40 PM

I'll add my congrats too. I hope this acquisition is good for the SOTB community and you too. A couple points if I may ....

1, I too have noticed the imbalance with Colombia. Indeed there is little about other places. I have had to look hard to get info on other places. But, that is because there is an uneven interest.

2, I hope that we can balance several audiences without insults and exclusion. There is an audience - let's just call them playboys. Then there is a separate audience - let's call them "wife hunters" (sometimes they overlap; sometimes they don't) Then there are expats / international livers. It has been interesting for me to notice that good discussion boards rarely cater to these groups collectively. I hope it is possible here, this time.

Again, best of luck. I think you are filling a vacuum, and the political and economic environment ought to make SOTB a growing area of interest.

***Gringos*** · #8 (**permalink**) 06-24-2010, 02:20 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by rivardco

I'll add my congrats too. I hope this acquisition is good for the SOTB community and you too. A couple points if I may ....

1, I too have noticed the imbalance with Colombia. Indeed there is little about other places. I have had to look hard to get info on other places. But, that is because there is an uneven interest.

2, I hope that we can balance several audiences without insults and exclusion. There is an audience - let's just call them playboys. Then there is a separate audience - let's call them "wife hunters" (sometimes they overlap; sometimes they don't) Then there are expats / international livers. It has been interesting for me to notice that good discussion boards rarely cater to these groups collectively. I hope it is possible here, this time.

Again, best of luck. I think you are filling a vacuum, and the political and economic environment ought to make SOTB a growing area of interest.

Hi rivardco,
Many thanks for the warm welcome. I understand your points on these types of audiences and it is my initial dilemma with this site. My experience is with the Expat community and that will become the primary focus of the site moving forward.

I totally agree with you about the changing economic and political landscape SOTB. That's why I'm so excited about some of the changes and growth plans we have for the site.
Regards
Bob

LastLion · #9 (**permalink**) 06-24-2010, 10:38 PM

Bob, great to see the site open, it really was a wealth of info in its day. I truly hope you didnt pay 30,000 dollars for it...

I would love to hear what the plans for the site are, as I really discovered I didnt miss it that much while it was down.. I learned a ton in the beginning and realized that after years of travelling to Lam and with 1/2 way decent spanish the site doesnt have much to offer me these days. I have met some great people on this site, I hope it has something to offer again, like it did for me when I was searching for more than a good wave to surf SOTB!

Although, I am starting a tourism business in colombia that will cross over into south america, and am wondering what the site will be like and what type of advertising you will have available.

Please shoot me an email when you get a chance.

Congrats on the site, I think the gringos.com is a great web address..

Look forward to seeing what you bring to the table..

***Gringos*** · #10 (**permalink**) 06-25-2010, 02:24 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by LastLion

Bob, great to see the site open, it really was a wealth of info in its day. I truly hope you didnt pay 30,000 dollars for it...

I would love to hear what the plans for the site are, as I really discovered I didnt miss it that much while it was down.. I learned a ton in the beginning and realized that after years of travelling to Lam and with 1/2 way decent spanish the site doesnt have much to offer me these days. I have met some great people on this site, I hope it has something to offer again, like it did for me when I was searching for more than a good wave to surf SOTB!

Although, I am starting a tourism business in colombia that will cross over into south america, and am wondering what the site will be like and what type of advertising you will have available.

Please shoot me an email when you get a chance.

Congrats on the site, I think the gringos.com is a great web address..

Look forward to seeing what you bring to the table..

Thanks for the welcome LastLion. Once we have completed the initial changes including the redesign I will post more details about the future plans and get in touch with you on advertising options.

Regards
Bob