This document discusses two approaches to branding yoga taken by Bikram Choudhury and Tara Stiles. Bikram aggressively patented and trademarked his specific style of hot yoga, establishing the Bikram brand, while Tara mixed styles and promoted yoga on social media. The rise of commercial yoga raises debates around spiritual practices becoming branded products. Professor Rohit Deshpandé uses this case to explore how brands create value and differentiate themselves.

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HBS Cases: Branding Yoga
Published: September 10, 2012
Author: Kim Girard
As yoga's popularity has grown into a $6 "There are two elements of brand what the difference was. His story was all about
billion business, a cast of successful authenticity, and they appeal to two different understanding that you needed legal protection
entrepreneurs has emerged with their own sorts of people," Deshpandé says. for your branding."
styles of the ancient practice. Yet yoga's rise The enterprising Bikram, born in 1946 in
underscores a larger question for Professor Calcutta and known worldwide by his first
Rohit Deshpandé: Is everything brandable? name, began studying yoga as a four-year-old
The Stiles approach
under his guru Bishnu Ghosh. He arrived in Tara Stiles, meanwhile, found success in
America in 1971, opening his first studio in Los yoga her own way. She had studied ballet
Harvard Business School Professor Rohit Angeles and teaching traditional Hatha yoga to before launching a brief modeling career with
Deshpandé often asks his marketing students a students including Shirley MacLaine. the Ford Agency. Her early experiences of yoga
show-stopping question: Is everything Bikram built his business slowly. In 1979, were personal and drew from several different
brandable—and should everything be he wrote Bikram's Beginning Yoga Class. He traditions. "It felt right and natural, not rigid
brandable? also trademarked his company's name, Bikram's with a certain style," she said. Yoga "gurus" she
So when he read a November 2010 New Yoga College of India. In 1994, he began had encountered in New York put her off.
York Times piece on the tensions between offering intensive courses, training 200 teachers Stiles used Facebook to promote yoga
traditional practitioners who wanted to "take per year, according to the case. classes taught out of her apartment and offered
back yoga" from celebrity teachers with Worried that competitors were copying his private sessions. She also blogged about yoga
newfangled twists on the ancient practice, the teachings and techniques, Bikram decided in for Women's Health and the Huffington Post. In
word "brand" jumped out at him. 2002 to patent a typical 90-minute class, which 2008, after opening her own studio, Strala
"What had me intrigued was that there was consists of 26 postures and two breathing Yoga, the popular doctor and self-help author
this controversy," says Deshpandé, the exercises in a room heated to 105°F. Hundreds Deepak Chopra hired Stiles as his personal yoga
Sebastian S. Kresge Professor of Marketing. of cease-and-desist letters were slapped on instructor, a huge endorsement.
"There were strong positions taken by a number competing studio owners. Stiles created controversy because she was
of people. It wasn't just a descriptive story." The Indian government, meanwhile, took "making yoga cool," Chopra said in the case.
umbrage with Bikram's legal claims, arguing "We are basically breaking the rules,
"There are two elements of that yoga was part of the country's traditional improvising, adding music; in our minds,
knowledge. The government put together a connecting the younger generation. In society,
brand authenticity, and they panel of 100 historians and scientists that began brands that succeed stay relevant."
Stiles hasn't patented her classes, but in
appeal to two different sorts cataloging 1,500 yoga poses found in ancient
2010 she did publish a book called Slim Calm
texts written in Sanskrit, Urdu, and Persian. The
of people" goal was not to challenge Bikram in court, the Sexy Yoga and launched a yoga DVD under
case explains, but rather to keep others from Jane Fonda's "Team Fonda" fitness brand. In
Deshpandé decided that the business of following his proprietary example. addition, she and Chopra collaborated on the
yoga would make a lively teaching case for his By 2011, iPad app Authentic Yoga. Those actions spurred
class of entrepreneurs in the School's there were some instructors to label her a sellout, but
Owner/President Management Program, with some 5,000 Deshpandé is more measured.
plenty of lessons about branding and Bikram Yoga "Tara Stiles appeals to a much younger
competitive strategy. studios demographic than Bikram," he says. "She's not
worldwide. as regimented in her form of yoga. There's no
Sanskrit in her yoga. Bikram is about Sanskrit.
Two paths Deshpandé
Bikram is about India. She's quintessentially
In Branding Yoga, cowritten with HBS notes that in
a world American."
Global Research Group associate director Kerry
Herman and research associate Annelena Lobb, where the
Deshpandé examines the different paths of two majority of Adding value
successful yoga teachers. yoga teachers were just scraping by Bikram Deshpandé taught the case for the first time
There's Bikram Choudhury, the founder of succeeded through strategic use of branding and this past spring, drawing a lively debate among
Bikram yoga in America, who has aggressively legal protections. Bikram also gained an edge participants who were divided on whether the
fought to patent his approach to traditional yoga by starting early in the United States and commercialization of yoga is appropriate.
style. Then there is the former model and ballet understanding yoga's commercial potential. "The discussion was very heated," he says.
dancer Tara Stiles, who isn't particularly "He's very good at marketing the business, "The argument against it is that religion is
interested in yoga's roots or rules, but rather in but especially on the branding side, he something that is very personal, and that it
mixing up different styles of yoga to create a understood the importance of the Bikram should not be commercialized."
beneficial exercise. brand," he says. "It wasn't about yoga, it was
about Bikram yoga, and he had to establish
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gurus, swamis, and others that offered up a "You get this stuff for free out of your
"It wasn't about yoga, it religion's spiritual wealth at the altar of crass faucet," he says. "With Evian or Dasani you pay
commercialism." $2, $4, and that's the reaction consumers have:
was about Bikram yoga" The other side of the argument focuses on 'You are just attaching a fancy name on it,
business rather than religion. "It's all about which costs me money.' "
(The Hindu American Foundation (HAF)
creating value for a large audience. By using It's up to the company to add value to that
has weighed in on the debate as well. The
marketing and branding you can be more brand to make it worth the price, stresses
organization launched an awareness campaign
effective and bring [your product] to a larger Deshpandé. Participants also tackle how to
called "Take Back Yoga—Bringing to Light
audience," Deshpandé says. leverage a brand globally, build a multibrand
Yoga's Hindu Roots." The goal was not to
portfolio, and defend a brand against
convert yoga devotees to Hinduism, according
competition.
to the organizers, but rather to have them Creating value
acknowledge the connection. "Branding Yoga" is one of five branding
HAF cofounder and board member Aseem cases Deshpandé uses in his classes to explore About the author
Shukla wrote a 2010 piece for the Washington how companies create brands that are Kim Girard is a freelance writer based in
Post's On Faith column called "The Theft of differentiated and worthy of a price premium. Brookline, Massachusetts.
Yoga." In it, Shukla blasted the "facile In addition to yoga, he cites the bottled water
complicity of generations of Hindu yogis, industry as an example.
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