About us

We got our start in 1996, when former advertising man and founder, and long term Bangkok resident, Aaron Frankel, decided to create a very different map of Bangkok: one showing Bangkok's notorious nightlife.  What could have been a seedy start to go-go bars and massage was really an orientation to the entire fun world of all night Thai noodles, riverside dining, wholesale market raiding, nightclubs and party spots.  

This fun venture to kill time, turned into a vaguely profitable enterprise, and soon, two dozen Asian city and island titles were turned out to enthusiastic travelers, who unlike the sophisticated travelers who graduated from Oxford with a First in history and plotted museums to cover, the Groovy Map'n'Guide™ helped a new generation of traveler to find Fun Mapped Out!™ 

Several years ago, not wanting to follow Kodak into oblivion, we developed the quality 'travel lifestyle' market of Groovy Gear®, with products that celebrate travel (and the material sacrifice we make to do it), as well as country-specific souvenirs like fridge magnets, stickers, postcards, notebooks, and an expanding line of apparel to make you look groovy! 

Currently, over 25 people create value for our customers and retail partners, and figure what to do with their days, other than take 2 hour lunches and make coffee in the Groovy Cafe.  

 

ABOUT GROOVY MAP CO LTD: As map makers since 1996 (yes, a few years before Groovy Map became its own company), we still love paper maps, even if it is essentially a dinosaur to the Snowflake generation.

Our map philosophy: a map is a tool to navigate space. A good map does that by simplifying the complexity of real space, with its thousands of objects, to only the objects of your interest. 

A good map is also a good way-finder.   And a Groovy Map finds the best and most fun places for you to visit, and helps you get there.  In our arsenal are icons, colors, font sizes, lines and shapes.  How we use them makes it Groovy... 

Will we continue?  Alas, with bookstores almost gone, a new generation largely traveling to post pictures of themselves, and the world's digital maps free, there isn't much point...  We still collect maps, so if you want to dispose or sell what you got, get in touch! 

We are here.