1. District Yoga And Fitness
Feben Gebremichael, Morgan Iacolucci, Alan Kuo,
Linda Li, Risa Ochiai, Yile Peng
2. About
District Yoga and Fitness
Year Founded: 2013
Class Offerings: Bikram and Vinyasa
Owner: Whitney McCormick
Co-partners: Brooke Davies and Adam Pearlstein
Customers: clients passionate about maintaining overall health
and wellness through yoga and fitness.
3. Scope
1. Prepare SWOT analyses and analyze our client’s
finances
2. Research methods to reach new customers,
specifically UW students, and locate a feasible
partnership within the UW
3. Provide guidance on business sustainability and
business strategy
9. Recommendations
Another Website we felt illustrated
District Yoga’s value proposition better
Central Issues Recommendations
Impact of
Recommendations
Conclusion
1OnlinePresence
11. Survey Feedback (Clarify Difference)
▷Only 15% of customers are UW students
▷Satisfied with existing free UW facilities
▷While 27.3% UW students answered $0,
74.5% would spend $5-55 per a month
Problem and Research2
Few
UW
Clients
Central Issues Recommendations
Impact of
Recommendations
Conclusion
12. Lack of
UW
Students
2
Few
UW
Clients
Central Issues Recommendations
Impact of
Recommendations
Conclusion
“I don't live on campus
anymore, so I wish I can still
use the West Campus Gym
(in Elm Hall) because IMA is
kinda far from where I'm
living right now”
- UW Student
Opportunity
13. Recommendation:
Why Student Intern?
▷Understand the demographic well
▷Low Cost, High Return
▷Increase the awareness on campus
Many UW students (especially freshmen and
sophomores) seek out internship opportunities
around campus even if it’s non-paid
Lack of
UW
Students
2
Few
UW
Clients
UW Student Intern/
Brand Ambassador
Central Issues Recommendations
Impact of
Recommendations
Conclusion
14. ▷ HuskyJobs
▷ The official platform to recruit UW students
▷ $25 to post a 30-day posting
▷ Takes about 2-3 days for registration
▷ Jobs and Internships Facebook Group
▷ The unofficial platform but still has a lot of traffic
▷ Easy access and free
▷ Many UW students have an access to the group
Recruiting UW Student
Interns/Ambassadors
2
Few
UW
Clients
Recommendation:
Central Issues Recommendations
Impact of
Recommendations
Conclusion
15. Student Brand Ambassador Functions
Updating
Social
Media
Marketing/
Promotion
on campus
Work on
partnership
with RSOs
Lack of
UW
Students
Lack of
UW
Students
2
Few
UW
Clients
Recommendation:
Central Issues Recommendations
Impact of
Recommendations
Conclusion
20. ▷Need to be certified by RYS
Alliance
▷ 200 hours training
▷Extra source of income
▷Successfully implemented at
many other yoga studios
3
Insuffi
-cient
Reven-
ue
Teacher Training
Central Issues Recommendations
Impact of
Recommendations
Conclusion
21. Current Trends
2014 Jan-
Jun
2014 Jul-
Dec
2015 Jan-
Jun
2015 Jul-
Dec
Total
Revenue $7,240.18 $5,445.74 $8,314.67 $8,309.56
Total
Expense $13,294.80 $11,634.00 $11,634.00 $11,634.00
Net Profit
-$6,054.62 -$6,188.26 -$3,319.33 -$3,324.44
Profit
Margin -83.63% -113.63% -39.92% -40.01%
Research
Central Issues Recommendations
Impact of
Recommendations
Conclusion
23. Impact
Central Issues Recommendations
Impact of
Recommendations
Conclusion
Attendance
+%10-15 percent
each quarter
Instructor Training +$1,000 each quarter
Workshops
$900 /month
(two workshops each month)
25. 2X in Revenue
Breakeven by the beginning of 2017, 2X by the end of 2018
Increase Awareness
Have more presence in community around U-District
Establish Value
Make experiences unique to District Yoga
Central Issues Recommendations
Impact of
Recommendations
Conclusion
When Whitney came to us, he brought up the problem of inconsistent customer flow. We went in and assessed the attendance across different months on Mind Body, which is the internal membership enrollment tracking system. The inconsistency has been improved since 2014, especially in the months with low attendees like Jan and Aug. We took last month as a sample month, and came up with average attendance for each class. 6pm Bikram 60/90 has been the most attended, and class offered at 12pm has the lowest.
We conducted two surveys to look at the preference of our two demographics: current customers, and UW students.
In order to study District Yoga’s online marketing campaign, we conducted a hashtag analysis on Facebook. The results show that #getbent campaign doesn’t receive as much popularity and recognition as #yogaseattle. Above pictures are the examples we found on Facebook that uses #yogaseattle, as we can see there are a lot more publications and yoga studios are using this hashtag. So we recommend District Yoga to adopt this hashtag to enhance its online presence recognition.
Another way to enhance online presence is to improve District Yoga’s website. We see the current slogan in the center of the web page is “Be Well, Have Fun, Get Bent”. This slogan is a bit more tense and inaccessible for people who have never tried hot yoga before to take in and feel relate to. For UW students who are stressed with heavy loads of schoolwork,
In terms of value proposition, we believe that District Yoga has so much more to offer than what is shown through its social media. To start, “Be Well, Have Fun, Get Bent” isn’t a very motivating or captivating slogan. This does not accurately demonstrate the core values of District Yoga and it is extremely vital for it to be properly displayed and explained. We recommend using “community, balance, rejuvenate” and the three core values that can be expanded upon. Furthermore, the “learn more” section on the website should be titled “core values” or “about us”. If I were to come across this website I would much rather read something about the studio and what it stands for rather than click on “learn more”, which could mean a certain number of things. Furthermore, pictures or a virtual studio tour is also a missing piece that is vital to the value proposition. Many users have more of an attachment if they can visualize themselves in the studio, which can only be done through viewing pictures or a virtual tour of the studio itself. Also, District Yoga is proud of its location and the perk of having a deck that oversees the ave. This should be mentioned and shown on the website as well!
When we were seeking ways of improving DY’s website, we studied other yoga studios’ website as references and we found a good illustration, Expand Yoga. In comparison, we conclude several ways of improvements. First, DY has a relatively dim overall color tune compared to Expand Yoga and we suggest to lighten up the webpage to create a more welcoming feeling for online visitors. Second, when we took a class at DY, we saw many diversified groups in the studio so we recommend to capture this diversity in the photo and put them on the front page to create a sense of community like how Expand Yoga did in the screenshot. Third, we recommend adding a visual tour of the studio and a class schedule instead of links to make the front page more interesting for browsers to stay on.
In terms of value proposition, we believe that District Yoga has so much more to offer than what is shown through its social media. To start, “Be Well, Have Fun, Get Bent” isn’t a very motivating or captivating slogan. This does not accurately demonstrate the core values of District Yoga and it is extremely vital for it to be properly displayed and explained. We recommend using “community, balance, rejuvenate” and the three core values that can be expanded upon. Furthermore, the “learn more” section on the website should be titled “core values” or “about us”. If I were to come across this website I would much rather read something about the studio and what it stands for rather than click on “learn more”, which could mean a certain number of things. Furthermore, pictures or a virtual studio tour is also a missing piece that is vital to the value proposition. Many users have more of an attachment if they can visualize themselves in the studio, which can only be done through viewing pictures or a virtual tour of the studio itself. Also, District Yoga is proud of its location and the perk of having a deck that oversees the ave. This should be mentioned and shown on the website as well!
we believe that a new slogan that emphasizes on “rejuvenation, community, and balance” is much more appealing.
The second issue we found was lack of UW students. While District Yoga is located on the Ave, only 15% of the customer base are UW students. Also while many students are not willing to spend a lot on additional workout opportunities as IMA already offers many services for free, 74.5% of students answered that they are willing to spend $5-55 per month.
we also found an opportunity for the studio as 20% of students answered in the survey that current UW fitness facilities are not easily accessible. Since District Yoga is located on the ave and is closer to students who live in West Campus area, we believe that there is an opportunity to expand the customer base.
In order to target those UW students who live far away from IMA but closer to the studio, District Yoga needs to raise its awareness on campus. To do so, we came up with a recommendation to hire Student Ambassador as an intern. We believe that Students Ambassador will be beneficial to the studio for three reasons. First, students interns are also UW students so they will understand the demographic and students needs better. Second it’s very easy to implement but will bring back high return to the studio. Third, having a student ambassador will help the studio raise its awareness on campus.
Many UW students are looking for internships or work experiences, and we believe that having students intern is “win-win” to both the studio and students. Now Feben will talk about how to look for student interns as well as what they could bring to the studio.
Ways to Recruit UW Students
HuskyJobs
The official platform to recruit UW students
$25 to post a 30-day posting
Takes about 2-3 days for registration
Jobs and Internships Facebook Group
The unofficial platform but still has a lot of traffic
Easy access and free
Only UW students have an access to the group
Foster Career Center
Some Ideas For the Student Brand Ambassadors position:
Marketing/Promotion on Campus
tabling in Red Square and during special tabling events such as the Student Activities’ fair, distributing flyers to the HUB, ECC, and other strategic areas on campus
- Offering a FreeDay, once a month to bring in UW students
Updating Social Media
Managing Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and Tumblr accounts
Instituting recognition program via social media for “Instructor of the week” or “Client of the Week” bios
Working on Partnerships with RSOs A student intern would have a fair bit of knowledge about the University of Washington and a network of fellow students
In terms of tackling the problematic lack of UW students/brands, working on bridging partnership opportunities with UW student organizations can also be effective
For example, FIUTS is an RSO centered around ushering International Students into the Seattle Community. If possible, District Yoga should form a partnership/collaboration with the FIUTS executive board. District Yoga can possibly host social events at yoga studio would help to increase the retention rate, as well as the amount of referrals to District Yoga. - -
Secondly, partnering with UW First Year Programs to put on a group yoga session as a Dawg Daze event is a possibility. Every year at UW there are 2 Dawg Daze “seasons” - one in the fall, and one in the winter and offering a preview yoga session on an on campus location as an opportunity to continue marketing District Yoga to the UW student community is a fantastic opportunity, especially in the beginning of the year when students are most looking to join organizations.
Thirdly, Yogis at UW is another student organization that does not have a studio of their own but seeks to provide yoga to UW students - providing them studio space for a fixed group rate is another option.
Fourthly, District Yoga can come to campus and have a welcome to yoga (i.e. Basic Yoga 101) - welcoming session on campus (teaching a guest session at either the IMA or in Fitness Center West) to make students feel well, and comfortable beginning to practice yoga while publicizing their studio.
The third issue we wanted to address is the regarding revenue. A big part of our financial analysis had to do with creating ways to boost revenue As of right now, District Yoga has a monthly net revenue of approximately negative $3000. After reviewing District Yoga’s profit and loss charts, it was evident that their rent expense far exceed any other expense. Rent expense represents 57% of all total revenue! To combat this issue, we’ve come up with three recommendations to earn extra revenue outside of District Yoga’s regular classes to pay the expensive rent.
According to our survey, a certain percentage (FIND OUT) students were willing to spend
For our research, we examined what other ways Yoga Studios had generated their revenue besides their regular classes. We decided to focus on two aspects of this.
we examined yoga studios such as Modo Yoga and Core Power to show how having special classes and workshops positively impacted their studio from a financial standpoint. For special events and workshops, they were able to charge higher prices for those specific classes because they were themed or had a unique and specialized instructor come in. Modo was charging its teacher training $4500 per client, over a one month course that really takes yoga to an advanced level. Core power offered many workshops that encouraged its clients to try new styles, have extra time to practice, learn from experienced individuals and build community amongst each other. This is extremely vital in targeting UW students as these workshops are less intensive than Bikram and Vinyasa classes and are beginner friendly.
It’s evident from the financials that special events drive more attendance and more revenue. District Yoga held a Glow & Flow event with a renowned instructor which was attractive and successful because it was different from normal Bikram and Vinyasa classes. From our data analysis, District Yoga had an average of 8.4 students per class during the months of July and Dec 2015. However, from the Glow & Flow event alone, there were 26 students. Having special events once or twice a month not only generates extra revenue but also demonstrates the creativity and unique classes that District Yoga has to share with its clients. This concept can also apply to workshops. You can only hold so many special events such as Thanksgiving Yoga, Halloween Yoga etc. In times where there are less theme-applicable classes, we can implement workshops to teach different styles of yoga or different intensities. For example, District Yoga can hold beginner level workshops and target the UW population and introduce to them the art and appreciation of Yoga.
For teacher trainings, there can be a huge upside in the long run. District Yoga has the potential to charge $500 per client for teacher trainings. The aforementioned $4500, one-month program is not viable for District Yoga’s model because the current staff can’t afford to do a month long teacher training expedition. We chose the 200-hour program that instructors can be certified in then teach at District Yoga
This is what their cash flow currently looks like. As Alan mentioned before, District Yoga is currently losing about $3,000 every month
If they keep their business structure as it is, they will keep losing $3,000 every month
This is how we predict our recommendations would impact the studio. we predicted that 10-15% more students will visit the studio from new marketing strategies and UW students ambassador
Instructor training will bring in additional $1000 to their revenue each quarter. And workshop has been attractive to students and we believe that having them more frequently will bring $900 a month
And this is what the studio’s cash flow will look like with all our recommendations implemented
As a result, the studio will double its revenue by the end of 2018 by implementing new class schedules, workshops, as well as instructor training program
District Yoga will establish its value by promoting their website and social media more strategically
Finally, having Student Ambassador will help the studio increase its awareness in community around U-District and among UW students
Now I will pass it to Morgan for the conclusion
We recommend to increase UW student clientele, by adding additional class, utilizing UW student embassador, and reaching out to registered student organization and networks.
Essentially, we want District Yoga to become a more inclusive and relaxing brand for UW students. And by adding weekend class, improving online presence, and offering instructor training program and weekend workshops, it will increase traffic and profitability of the business.
When Whitney came to us, he brought up the problem of inconsistent customer flow. We went in and assessed the attendance across different months on Mind Body, which is the internal membership enrollment tracking system. The inconsistency has been improved since 2014, especially in the months with low attendees like Jan and Aug. We took last month as a sample month, and came up with average attendance for each class. 6pm Bikram 60/90 has been the most attended, and class offered at 12pm has the lowest.
We conducted two surveys to look at the preference of our two demographics: current customers, and UW students.
When Whitney came to us, he brought up the problem of inconsistent customer flow. We went it and assessed the attendance across different months on Mind Body, which is the internal membership enrollment tracking system. The inconsistency has been improved since 2014, especially in the months with low attendees like Jan and Aug. We took last month as a sample month, and came up with average attendance for each class. 6pm Bikram 60/90 has been the most attended, and class offered at 12pm has the lowest.
We conducted two surveys to look at the preference of our two demographics: current customers, and UW students.
