NATIONAL ECONOMICS UNIVERSITY

SCHOOL OF ADVANCED EDUCATION PROGRAMS

MEMO 1 REPORT

GROUP 11
PHAM THU Y DU ONG - 11196408

NGU YEN THAO NGUYEN - 11193894

NGUYEN PHUONG LINH - 11192929

LE DOAN ANH THU - 11194959

NGO QU ANG TRIEU – 11195468

I. INTRODUCTION

The Yoga market has been experiencing an unprecedented growth rate around the world in recent years.
However, this vast commercialization has intensified the competition in the market, and also created a
tension with the belief that yoga is a mental and spiritual practice and cannot be considered a profitable
business. One promising solution to these challenges is Yoga Social Enterprise - a commercialized yoga
business that maximizes improvements in social well-being.

Given this opportunity, Krama Retreat - a yoga tourism social enterprise has been proposed in Cambodia.
Krama Retreat has a mission to empower youth development in Cambodia, and offers two main services:
(1) venue hire for international and domestic yoga studios, and (2) classes and other wellness services.

In this report, our team summarizes the key ideas of the concept, criticizes its strengths and weaknesses,
and provides an approach to the concept screening and testing stage.

II. CONCEPT SUMMARY

1. Key stakeholders

The key stakeholders of this concept includes:

• Nicholas Shipley and Lia Burns - two proponents of Krama Retreat and also the owners of the site
of Krama Retreat. They both have experiences working in the public health and tourism sector
and their mutual personal goals are to combine their interests in international development,
public health and social enterprise. Therefore, the two proponents fit the proposed concept.
• Krama Yoga - Cambodia’s only yoga Non-Government Organization (NGO) and the longest
running public yoga studio. Since Krama Yoga is a partner with profound knowledge about Yoga
retreat, they fit perfectly with the main service of the proposed concept. Moreover, the existing
Krama Yoga’s capabilities and mission are also complementary to the development of the
operation of a yoga retreat destination.
2. Target market
A number of potential consumer (B2C) and business to business (B2B) target markets would be served:
• Cambodian yoga practitioners (B2C) - includes expatries, tourists and Cambodian nationals
seeking participation in yoga services.
• International yoga practitioners (B2C) - individuals seeking yoga tourism opportunities.
• Cambodian based yoga practices (B2B) - corporate wellness programs seeking a location to
offer/extend their service offering.
• International yoga practices (B2B) - yoga businesses seeking to extend their service offering and
increase their business.
These above target customers can also be segmented into geographic market: Cambodia market and
International market.
3. Value proposition
• Aim. The core value proposition of Krama Retreat is to create a commercial center that uses its
profit to benefit the poor people in Cambodia. Operated as a social enterprise with a number of
levels of cooperation and business-model alternatives: Fee-for-service, Participatory and NGO.
• Location. Krama Retreat is a yoga retreat located at a prime riverside location in Teuc Chhou,
Kampot - an area that is becoming a popular attraction for a variety of international and local
tourism, providing yoga and wellness services from domestic and international yoga studios for
social rehabilitation.
• Business-model. Krama Retreat can be operated as a social enterprise with a number of levels of
cooperation and business-model alternatives can be explored including, but not limited to: Fee-
for-service, Participatory model, Branded NGO/social enterprise model.
4. Competition
Direct competitors: Other regional (Cambodia, Vietnam, Thailand, Indonesia) yoga destination

III. CRITIQUE OF THE CONCEPT

1. Strengths

• Krama Retreat has a lot of information to support its proposed concept, from the stakeholders’
information, the goals to the plan and timetable. These abundant sources of information will help
the business/organization analyze the general tourism market and make more chances to develop
in this market.

• Nicholas Shipley & Lia Burns both have knowledge and experience in public health, society,
tourism. Moreover, they also lived and worked in Cambodia for a period, so they can understand
basically about the people and the region's cultures.

• Krama Retreat Center is the perfect name which fits to the main point of this idea – yoga. Yoga
is retreating and one of the most useful and healthy ways to retreat is yoga. As a result, this name
can describe the idea perfectly.

2. Weaknesses

• There is a lack of specific competitors, customers and market’s profiles to attract. This loss will
make difficulties for the organization to have the clearest direction as well as effective and feasible
plan.

• There is an unscientific between its target markets and its location. In the Concept Note, Krama
Retreat Center’s target markets are international markets such as big yoga markets (USUK,
Australia - developed countries) but its location is Cambodia – a developing country. As a result,
the difference between the region’s cultures and other characteristics will make the idea difficult
to attract the yoga practices from international markets.

Conclusion: This is a new and modern idea which has many potential to exploit and develop in the social
and public health industry. It will be much better to add and refine some criteria as well as information
accordingly to increase the concept’s feasibility.
IV. APPROACH TO SCREENING AND CONCEPT TESTING STAGE

1. Screening

Identify the criteria:

• The familiarity with the yoga market
• Potential market size
• Relationship with the target customers
• Innovativeness of the proposal
• Estimate of the development cost
• Strengths of competitors
• Capital resources available
• Relationship with suppliers
Use predefined criteria to score the concept: we use a weighted sum of all the criteria to roughly
evaluate the concept. Each criteria is given a score from 1 to 5 with the corresponding weight
proportional to the importance of the criteria, and all the weights sum to 1. The concept must
pass a predefined threshold in order to move on to the concept testing stage.
2. Concept testing

As the Krama Retreat proposal is in a very early stage, we conduct concept testing to clarify the concept,
make it more detailed, and to find out what improvements that need to be done. Our group approaches
this stage by using both primary and secondary data.
a) To collect primary data, there are two decisions that need to be made:

Define respondent types. There are five main respondent groups that can provide useful
information and feedback to the proposal:
• Nicholas Shipley and Lia Burns, who are the owners of the location and also proponents
of the concept.
• Krama Yoga, which is a potential partner of Krama Retreat.
• Experienced yoga teachers that usually take their students to yoga retreat location
• Yoga practices/businesses that want to expand their service offerings but are not sure
what to do yet
• Individuals that understand clearly the concept but do not have intentions to purchase
Select response situation. For each category of respondents, we use the response situation that
is most suitable for them:
• Nicholas Shipley and Lia Burns: Direct meeting with them
• Krama Yoga: Meeting with their business leaders and staffs
• Experienced yoga teachers: Interview individually
• Yoga practices/businesses that want to expand their services: Direct meeting with their
business leaders and staffs
• Individuals that do not have intentions to purchase yet: Interview individually
 b) To gather secondary data, we can make use of several sources:
• Internet sources
• Internal report, records
• Published researches
• Commercial information sources: Newspapers, magazines, etc.

V. KINDS OF INFORMATION NEEDED AND HOW TO OBTAIN

1. Needed Information that can be gathered from the respondents

Respondents Kinds of information and how to obtain

Meeting
Nicholas Shipley
- Their influence, interest and involvement in the - Their expertise in Yoga
and Lia Burns
development of the concept - Information about their financial resources

Meeting in groups with business leaders & staffs

- Their current target customers - Their influence, interest and involvement in
Krama Yoga - Information about their financial sources the development of the concept
- Their initial thoughts of this concept - What do they require from Krama Retreat
- Their willingness to extend to Krama Retreat before collaborating

Interview
Experienced yoga - Yoga retreat services have they used and how - What do they think about the uniqueness and
teachers they experienced it importance of the social impact of Krama
- Area they often choose to go to Retreat?
- Benefits of a retreat location they seek for - How likely are they to pay for it
- Problems they have encountered while using - How would they improve this concept? What
these services other information would they need

Yoga practices or Meeting

businesses that - Services that they currently provide - Their interests, opinions on the Krama Retreat
want to expand - Options they already have in mind to expand concept compared to other options they have
their service their services - How they react to the price
- What they look for from a new service - What other information they need

Individuals do not Survey/ Questionnaire

have buying - Why do they not have intentions to purchase for - What changes should be made to make them
intentions Krama Retreat? satisfied with the concept
- What they look for from a yoga service
2. Other additional information that can be gathered from other resources

Data of Krama Retreat current and potential competitors: gathered from articles, competitors’ websites,
etc.
• Services they are offering
• Their value proposition
• Differences between Krama Retreat and its competitors
Data of yoga practices and corporate wellness programs in Cambodia and other countries: collected
from published research, articles, etc.
• Size of company
• Location
• Company mission and goals
Data of yoga practitioners and tourists in Cambodia and other countries: collected from published
research, articles, etc.
• Demographic: Age, Location, Gender, Income, etc.
• Psychographic: Personality, Interests, Lifestyles, etc.
• Behavioral: Readiness to buy, Purchasing history, etc.
Report of Yoga industry and Trends: gathered from published research, articles, etc.
• Market size
• Profitability
• Growth potential

(Table of Activity 1 – Krama Retreat Orientation is attached below)

 ACTIVITY 1 TABLE – KRAMA RETREAT ORIENTATION
What do we know now? What do we need to know? How will we find out?
(Take this information (After reading the concept note, what (What additional research will you
from the Concept Note) information will you need to ‘test’ the need to conduct and what sources of
feasibility of the proposal?) data can you explore to identify your
missing data)

Stakeholders - Nicholas Shipley and Lia Burns:

- Internal stakeholders: - Influence: How strongly can they
influence the concept? + Deep research on their resumes: past
Who are the key + Nicholas Shipley and Lia and current activities and projects,
stakeholders in Burns - Interest: How interested are they in the achievements, working behaviors,…
the concept? result of the concept? + Direct interview: their intentions
+ Krama Yoga
when entering the yoga industry, their
- Involvement: How much do they want to
- External stakeholders: personal view on yoga retreat, their
get involved in the development of the
desire and the ability to work with each
concept?
+ Yoga practitioners other
- Stakeholders’ company and company - Krama Yoga
+ Yoga practices and performance
businesses (key customers) + Deep research on their website
- What are their financial sources?
+ Existing customers of + Direct interview with their managers
Krama Yoga - What kind of problems are they facing? about how they currently operate the
enterprise, revenue stream and future
- Nicholas Shipley and Lia Burns: Their plans
business skills especially in social
enterprises, financial resources

Krama Yoga: How they operate their

company, financial report and record,
sources of funding

New product ‘fit’ - Nicholas Shipley and Lia - Nicholas Shipley and Lia Burns: - Nicholas Shipley and Lia Burns:
Burns:
Do they have expertise in yoga? + Interviews, face to face meetings,
How would you + Nicholas Shipley and Lia emails.
assess the ‘fit’ Burns have a 30-year lease Their financial resources
+ Gather information through their old
each in relation to on the land in Kampot. Their experiences in health and tourism researches to learn about their
the proposed sector
+ Nicholas and Lia both experiences
concept?
have experiences working - Krama Yoga:
in the health and tourism - Krama Yoga:
sector and their mutual + Initial thoughts of Krama Retreat + Interviews, face to face meetings,
personal goals are to + Are they willing to extend to Krama emails.
combine their interests in Retreat?
international development,
 public health and social + Are they financially capable of + Gather information from its website,
enterprise. Therefore, it fits cooperating? company portfolio
the proposed concept.
+ Do they have the skills, expertise and - Other stakeholders:
- Krama Yoga: other resources (human, …) to run Krama
Conduct surveys, questionnaires online,
Retreat?
offline
The existing Krama Yoga’s
+ Krama Yoga target customers
capabilities and mission are
complementary to the - Other stakeholders:
development of the
operation of a yoga retreat Does the proposed concept fit with the
customer (Yoga practitioners, Yoga
destination.
Practices and Businesses, Existing
(Through its Phnom Penh- customers of Krama Yoga)
based Nataraj Yoga Studio,
Krama yoga offers fee-for-
service yoga classes that
generate revenues used to
support the delivery of its
not-for-profit social
rehabilitation programs)

Target Customers 1. Yoga practitioners in 1. Yoga practitioners in Cambodia 1. Yoga practitioners in Cambodia
Cambodia
+ How many tourism services have they + Internal sources of former customers
Who is / are the expatriates, tourists and used and how did they rate them? of Krama Yoga
target Cambodian nationals
- Which area do they often choose to go + Published sources: research of yoga
customer(s)? seeking participation in
yoga services to? customers in Cambodia
How would you
- Why did they choose those services? - Conduct research:
describe them? 2. International yoga
practitioners - What specific benefits of a retreat + Surveys with direct questionnaires at
location do they seek for? yoga studios, yoga shops
What needs are individuals seeking yoga
identified for tourism opportunities + Which price are they likely to accept? + Surveys with online questionnaires on
each? forums, social networking sites,
3. International yoga + Demographic: Age, Location, Gender,
especially on yoga page
(geodemographic/ practices Income level, Educational, Occupation,
psychographic/ Ethnic. + Face-to-face interviews
yoga businesses seeking to
VALS typology or
extend their service + Geographic: city, region, country + Focused group interviews
other.
offering and increase their
How might we businesses + Psychographic: Personality, Attitudes, 2. International yoga practitioners
think about Values, Interests, Lifestyles, Behavior.
4. Cambodian based yoga Conduct research through
segmenting + Behavioral: Engagement, Readiness to questionnaires, surveys and interviews
practices
customers?) buy, Purchasing History, Product usage, … online to collect information
corporate wellness
programs seek a location to 2. International yoga practitioners 3. International yoga teachers and
studios
offer/ extend their service + Same information as yoga practitioners + Gather data from businesses’
offering by attracting in Cambodia websites, company portfolio, company
records, ...
+ The reason behind choosing a yoga
retreat abroad + Face to face Interviews, meetings
with business leaders or yoga teachers
+ Requirements for a yoga tourism are highly recommended for detailed
abroad: facilities, location, the maximum
information.
number of people participating
+ Gather data from published sources:
+ The price they willing to pay for yoga Research of yoga practices and
tourism abroad corporate wellness programs
3. International yoga practices
4. Cambodian based yoga practices
+ What are the services that they - Face-to-face interviews with business
currently provide?
leaders and staffs
+ Company goals and mission - Researches and surveys with online
questionnaires on social networking
+ How many tourism services have they sites
used and how did they experience it?
- Collect customer data through emails,
phone calls
+ Which area do they often choose to go
to?
+ What specific benefits of a location they
seek for?
+ Convenience: Geography, Language

+ Firmographics: Size of company,

Services provided
+ Expectations and requirements for a
yoga retreat
+ The price they willing to pay for yoga
retreat location
4. Cambodian based yoga practices
+ Characteristics of the businesses
+ Company goals and mission
+ How many tourism services have they
used and how did they experience it?
+ Expectations and requirements for a
yoga retreat
+ Which price are they likely to accept?
 Geographic Two geographic markets:
Markets - The market size, profitability, demand, - Gather data from market research of
- Cambodia: etc. of each target market (for example if Krama Yoga
What is/are the
the profitability of international >> local,
target geographic + Tourism arrivals - Data from published sources:
increased from 2,508,289 we can omit the local market)
market(s)?
in 2010 to 5,011,712 in + news, social media
- Each market growth potential
2016
- Other macro environment: culture and + researches that have been carried out
How do we + Clients of yoga practices about Yoga market in Cambodia and in
politic
describe are typically educated other countries
these? (consider professionals (80% female) - Are these two markets compatible (can
market between the ages of 25 and + reports of yoga industry (Ex:
they coexist)?
55 with above average Infographic: The Growing Yoga Industry
size/revenue,
demand analysis levels of discretionary - If yes, how do we serve these two – Our Insights and Conclusions by Shift)
geography, income and the willingness markets simultaneously? Each market is
another to spend on appropriately served at a different time of the day,
packaged services. different locations, or we just do not care
dimension)
(anyone can book at any time and for any
- International: location regardless of the market).
expenditure on yoga
practice is increasing
significantly
+ Australia, AU$536m and
growth rate 3% per annum
+ USA: 87% growth rate in
the five years to 2016
+ UK: £834 p.a. and 2%
growth
+ Japan: ¥200bn per annum
(These are information
about Cambodia and the
International Yoga Market
in general. There are
missing data about specific
geographic target markets
of Krama Retreat)

Value proposition - Core value proposition of - What problem does this USP that Krama - Conduct a survey with customers to
Krama Retreat: to create a Retreat is offering solve for the have a deep understanding about the
What do you
commercial center that customers? factors that make customers satisfied
believe the USP / uses its profit to benefit the and the factors that need to be
SCA for Krama - How will this USP impact customers’
poor people in Cambodia. improved at Krama Retreat
Retreat is? lives?
- The location comprises a
prime riverside location in - How does this USP differentiate Krama
Teuc Chhou, Kampot; an Retreat from other competitors?
 area that is becoming an - Why will customers choose Krama
increasingly popular Retreat over other competitors?
attraction for a variety of
international and local - Customers’ satisfaction and attitudes
towards services offered by Krama
tourism.
Retreat
- Operated as a social
enterprise with a number
of levels of cooperation
and business-model
alternatives: fee-for-
service, participatory and
NGO
- The existing Krama Yoga.
Krama Yoga is uniquely
positioned as an existing
non-government
organisation offering yoga
for social rehabilitation.
- The facilities and services
offered by Krama retreat.

Competition - A regional (Cambodia, - Information about other international - Conduct surveys, questionnaires on
Vietnam, Thailand, competitors: target group, location, target customers to gather data about
For each target Indonesia) yoga
services offering, price, strategies competitors
group, what is the
destination/competitor
competition, - Competitors’ strengths and weaknesses - Other sources:
direct and - The Yoga Nomads
(specialist ‘ancillary’ - Differences between Krama Retreat and + Public researches, articles and social
indirect?
services), who are its competitors media
emerging to support yoga - Other services that are potentially + Competitors’ website
services providers to adopt indirect competitors to our retreat service
more business-like (hotels, resorts) + Competitors’ portfolio
approaches to their yoga + Customers reviews and comments on
practices competitors
- Other yoga studios - Use positioning map to get an
(individual yoga teachers overview of competitors and Krama
and small location-based
Retreat
practices)
- Commercially focused
yoga tourism/ retreats in
Cambodia in Siem Reap and
Phnom Penh