
Ask HN: If you were a small yoga studio, what would you pivot to? - flyGuyOnTheSly
I help out at a few yoga studios and I am worried.<p>They started streaming online classes and trying to charge a fraction of what they usually charged for classes and that is not working out.<p>We put on a live streaming class this morning and asked for a donation of $5, I made the payment experience seamless, and the streaming video quality was great.<p>We only received a single $5 donation... from about 20 students who practiced... which is a decent number for our smaller studio.<p>Worst of all we now find ourselves in direct competition with hundreds of other much more professional online yoga&#x2F;fitness streaming services. Like yyoga who only charges $8&#x2F;mo for hundreds of pre-recorded yoga classes. Or glo.com who charges $18&#x2F;mo for thousands of pre-recorded classes of all kinds.<p>The studio owner has negotiated the studio&#x27;s rent to be cut in half for the next 2 months which is great!<p>However, the studio wasn&#x27;t profitable to begin with, and the owner is being forced to eat 100% of that rental cost out of her own pocket.<p>Yoga teachers are not employees, so at least up here in Canada, there is no help from the federal government to give money to yoga studios to subsidize employee wages.<p>That&#x27;s another discussion in itself, yoga teachers should definitely be employees with full health benefits imho but they&#x27;re not and here we are.<p>Case in point... we have a group of 10 yoga teachers all teaching for free, a small staff of energy exchanges who work for free and are currently helping setup the online streaming classes, and a studio owner who is left footing 100% of the bill for rent... with the occasional $5 donation being thrown her way.<p>This is not sustainable.<p>The teachers will get tired of it eventually, and the owner simply can&#x27;t afford to shell out the entire $2,000 check she will be getting from the government (that is meant to cover her food and living expenses) paying rent on the studio building.<p>What would you do?
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DLA
I would think about:

A. Close the studio to stop the rent bleed. That, as others have said, is the
landlord’s problem. Seek legal advice to do it right.

B. Focus on the online content space but partner with teachers to share
profits. Teachers are unemployed too without the studio.

C. Focus on live classes. People are home and as social creatures we crave
social connections. Innovate. Maybe have users all join a multi-way Facetime
or other live session video. This lets teachers and students connect and can
help with coaching and social interaction.

D. Market. Market. Market. Use social. Connect with current customers and
explain what you want to offer. Give away short classes to draw people in.

E. Maybe take a small loan (not sure what government programs you can access)
and help employ some great teachers as partners in all this virtual fun. Maybe
seek a grant.

F. Learn from all this and make a course on how to take a studio (yoga and
beyond) boldly into these uncharted waters. Charge for this content as it will
be a valuable business strategy guide to other studios.

G. Seek out health care companies, hospitals, fire stations, police, etc. All
of which are on duty and stressed as hell. Yoga can help. This fight needs to
be managed for the long run. Keeping first responders in good physical and
mental shape is vital.

H. Following ALL medical guidelines & Gov rules etc. MAYBE offer a very widely
spaced yoga program outside in a park for less than the allowed group size.
Get some wireless speakers and space em out. Draw on the ground to ensure
more-than-very-safe spacing. Social experience at a distance. I am NOT/NOT
advocating a big (or even medium) group thing there. Follow! all! regulations!
And then triple the separation. Zero chit chat after class. Mamaste & go your
separate ways. Give free slots to some doctors/nurses to keep it even safer
and benefit awesome medical professionals!

And good luck.

~~~
flyGuyOnTheSly
Thank you kindly for that long list of well thought out suggestions!

I will read and really think about each one more thoroughly in the morning.

Have a great night!

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streetcat1
So here are some suggestions:

First of all, you can close the studio. I am not sure what is the legal
structure of the company and if there are any personal guarantees, but this is
not a regular situation. I.e. if you do not have customers, how do you suppose
to pay your rent.

If not:

1\. Try to offer 1-1 remote sessions. You might get more than 5$.

2\. Go behind your regular customers. For example, try to go after companies
that are operational and would like to offer Yoga to their overwork staff -
e.g. warehouse employees, Hospitals etc. They might be able to charge your
lessons on some sort of relief fund.

3\. Ask companies that move remotely if they can introduce remote Yoga as part
of their remote schedule. I.e. as a way to keep the team engaged. Companies
are usually more willing to pay than consumers.

~~~
flyGuyOnTheSly
Those are some really great suggestions, thank you for those! I will pitch
them to the owner ASAP!

~~~
streetcat1
Sure. Good luck !

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AnimalMuppet
Me? I'd look into breaking the rent contract, or at least "suspending" it.
That's supposed to be a thing, at least in the US (though I have no
information on _how_ or even _whether_ it actually works). But, basically,
"Hey, owner, I can't pay you the rent while this is going on, because I don't
have any customers. You can sue me, and I can declare bankruptcy. Or I can
just not pay you until things get back to normal, and when they do, you've got
a customer for your space again."

Note well: This is not legal advice. It's probably worth asking them, though.

~~~
flyGuyOnTheSly
This is the same suggestion I just made to one of the owners.

If the government is literally blocking you from opening the door to
customers, the building is worthless for the time being, and she shouldn't be
expected to pay anything for it imho.

This is more her landlords problem than it is her problem imho.

The landlord's government has declared that their land is not allowed to be
frequented by customers for the time being.

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SilentDonor
Also just a thought - consider offering online training classes to prospective
yoga instructors. Maybe you can attract a more well-known yoga teacher in this
regard, which will increase the attraction. You can charge people to learn
from a popular yoga master (unsure of the industry terms in this space so I'll
stick with 'yoga master'). Hope you continue to navigate through this tough
situation!

