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Yoga Conference

business of yoga workshop
Starting the yoga business of your dreams can be daunting. Our field of experts will share vital methods to ensure your success in many areas including legal issues, social media and marketing, and finances.

Thursday

Thursday, January 17 — 9:00am - 10:15am
Yoga Studio Ownership 101
Learn step-by-step tips for starting a studiofrom leases and special packages to designing your curriculum to recruiting and training your teachers.

Tim Dale is the cofounder of Yoga Tree studios, the several locations of which house San Francisco's premier yoga studios and teacher training center. Tim's vision for creating community through Yoga Tree is indelibly imprinted on every aspect of the business. Whether it's creating new and compelling workshops or incorporating music and art into programs, Tim always finds a way to bring something new and fresh to the yoga kula. Prior to opening Yoga Tree, he owned and operated many of San Francisco's most popular restaurants and nightclubs.

Tara Dale is the cofounder of Yoga Tree studios, the several locations of which house San Francisco's premier yoga studios and teacher training center. Tara has instructed hatha yoga since 1995 and has been teaching at Yoga Tree since its inception. She teaches Tantric-based hatha and is inspired by John Friend, Shiva Rea, and Judith Lasater.


Thursday, January 17 — 10:30am - 11:45am
Creating A Viable Studio
Learn how to use high-level strategic planning to create an annual budget and identify simple metrics to gauge the health of your business. Come discover how to analyze your operating expenses, incentivize your teachers, and easily evaluate your efforts from month to month.

Nicole Chetaud is an experienced events professional and dedicated yoga instructor. In 2010, Nicole joined MINDBODY, Inc., where she oversees the marketing, sales, and planning of MINDBODY University (MBU), a highly successful business intensive hosted around the world. In her role as sales manager, Nicole also presents on technology and business at MBU events. Nicole has also been teaching Bikram Yoga since 2005, and has recently completed her 200-hour certification with YogaWorks.


Thursday, January 17 — 11:45am - 12:15pm
Lunchtime Demo
How to use MINDBODY Business Management Software (optional)


Thursday, January 17 — 1:00pm - 2:15pm
Yogic Accounting: How To Live Your Life As a Tax Deduction
Come discuss the connections between yoga and accounting. We'll learn techniques to approach and organize accounting, as well as bookkeeping practices related to running a business in an easy and stress-free manner. We'll cover issues including the tax implications of different types of business formations, startup companies, individual tax strategies, using bookkeepers, and how to live your life as a tax deduction.

Joshua Cooper is founder and president of Tax Lovin', an accounting company dedicated to educating clients about tax-related issues. He received his master's degree in accounting from the Fisher School of Accounting at the University of Florida, and went on to become a CPA and founded several startup companies. Joshua has a passion for yoga and has implemented the concepts of balance and focus into his accounting practice. He has written several articles about the healthy ways to approach accounting, and teaches accounting techniques and seminars to business owners in the San Francisco Bay Area.


Thursday, January 17 — 2:30pm - 3:45pm
Common Legal Issues with Starting a Yoga Studio
Opening and running a yoga studio requires sound legal preparation, in order to protect your tremendous investment of time, money and energy. In this lively and informative class, we will discuss choosing a business entity type; banking; contracting with teachers, employees, students, business partners, and landlords; complying with state and federal rules and regulations; obtaining insurance; protecting copyrights, trademarks, and trade secrets; and, hiring a lawyer.

Ron Weikers is a partner in YogaBalance Yoga Studio in Manchester, NH. He is a high-technology attorney with Software-Law.com, where he handles technology licensing and litigation matters for clients across the country. Ron is also an Adjunct Professor of Law at the University of New Hampshire School of Law, and has published several books and numerous articles on legal issues.

Ann Weikers is a registered yoga teacher and a partner in YogaBalance Yoga Studio in Manchester, NH. Ann has been practicing law for over 20 years, and currently works as in-house counsel in the property and casualty insurance industry.


Thursday, January 17 — 4:00pm - 5:15pm
How to Market Your Studio
Having great teachers, a sacred space, and a caring staff are essential to retaining your student base. But how do we get students in the door in the first place? We'll examine the effectiveness of traditional marketing strategies and guerilla marketing techniques and creative ways to market your company with Facebook, Twitter, e-blast campaigns, and more. Then we'll discuss how to get your best asset--your teachers--to bring more students through the door.

Kathleen Holm has been managing yoga businesses for more than a decade. Starting as operations manager for Jivamukti Yoga Center in New York, she went on to serve as the general manager for Yoga Tree in San Francisco. Kathleen is currently the owner of Aha in San Francisco's Cow Hollow neighborhood on Union Street. Kathleen is also the founder of a yoga video production company, www.myyogaminute.com, whose goal is to help market yoga teachers on a global platform by spreading yoga through iPhone and iPad applications.


Friday

Friday, January 18 — 9:00am - 9:30am
Growth of Yoga
A look at the growth of the yoga market in America including the 2012 Yoga in America study.

Bill Harper has been the publisher of Yoga Journal and Vegetarian Times since 2006. He started in the publishing business at Esquire magazine. In 1980 he moved to Los Angeles as the head of the West Coast office of Wenner Media, the parent company of Rolling Stone. There, he helped launch another Wenner publication, Men's Journal, and worked on the transition of Us magazine to a successful weekly celebrity publication. In 1999 he formed Bill Harper Associates.


Friday, January 18 — 9:45am - 11:00am
Building Community
Building a sangha, or community, is the art and practice of coming together with people with a shared purpose of and commitment to a spiritual path. Communities provide a sacred space for inner growth, nourish us, and teach us valuable lessons about living. Learn the incredible gifts and joys of creating and providing a sacred space of transformation, and explore practical and creative tools to work with many challenges of the business of building a community. Create your space of tremendous power to celebrate spiritual life--for both individual growth and realizing a peaceful and positive change in society. This session will be taught by Megan Hunt, Marketing Manager from Laughing Lotus.

Megan Hunt is the Marketing Manager at Laughing Lotus Yoga Center SF. Her experience in public relations, marketing, events and community building combined with her passion for yoga, led her to work as a consultant to yoga studios. Whether refining curriculum, increasing and retaining membership, or developing creative community initiatives, her efforts reflect the belief that sacred space and sustainable business can go hand in hand. She is so inspired by the amazing community created by Jasmine Tarkeshi, co-founder of Laughing Lotus Yoga Centers, and honored to work with her to continue to support and grow that community. Megan studied English Literature at the University of Colorado at Boulder.


Friday, January 18 — 11:15am - 12:30pm
Grow Your Local Customer Base with Online Tools
Building a sense of belonging and community is crucial to the success of your studio. Creating an online strategy can help, although it can also seem daunting. Using Google's suite of products—particularly video, social, and local features—we'll explore how to engage with your clients, consolidate your community, and acquire new clients. Our discussion will include paid and free products that can be used together or individually, such as YouTube, Google+, Mobile, and local listings, and how they can fit within your other online and offline initiatives.

As global video lead for small and medium-size businesses (SMB), Valentine Matrat drives video advertising adoption and revenue for Google's small and medium-size clients. Since joining Google in the European headquarters in 2008, Valentine developed expertise in SMB online advertising, YouTube, and video offers. Prior to joining Google, she worked in online ads account management for Netbooster in Paris. Born and raised in France, Valentine holds a bachelor's degree in international business from ESSEC, Paris, and a master's degree in public communications from American University in Washington, DC.


Friday, January 18 — 12:30pm - 1:00pm
Lunchtime Demo
How to use MINDBODY Business Management Software (optional)


Friday, January 18 — 2:00pm - 3:15pm
Alternative Revenue Streams
A thriving yoga studio is built around a hub of drop-in classes. But to keep your students' commitment to their practice growing and to make your business really hum, things like retail, workshops, events, retreats, and trainings must orbit that dynamic center. Learn the why's and how's of adding ancillary revenue streams to your studio's core business.

Kaitlin Yount is the General Manager of Teacher Training at YogaWorks. She spent the bulk of her career working for a private equity fund in Southeast Asia and has experience in both the Healthcare and Clean Energy industries in India. She subsequently followed her passion for yoga out to Los Angeles where she joined YogaWorks, first as a strategy consultant and then as manager of the Teacher Training department. She has a Bachelor of Arts degree in Economics from UC Santa Barbara and an MBA from Harvard Business School.


Friday, January 18 — 3:30pm - 4:45pm
How to Create a Social Bottom Line for Your Yoga Studio: Piedmont Yoga Studio—A Case Study
Learn ways that your studio can bring yoga to underserved people in your community. Explore how to implement an inclusive way of doing yoga business through developing an accessible space for practice, seeking out teachers that can carry your mission forward, and finding creative ways to partner with the nonprofit world to seek out appropriate support for the programs you want to develop. By adapting the yoga practice to underserved groups in your community, you'll find that the result is a sustainable yoga community that is continually fed by the powerful gifts of service and inclusion. Our panel presentation with JoAnn Lyons (who works with physically challenged students), Vickie Russell Bell (who has developed a program for students with Parkinson's Disease), and Cheryl Fenner-Brown (who teaches classes for cancer survivors) will be moderated by Richard Rosen.

Richard Rosen, a contributing editor for Yoga Journal, is director of the Piedmont Yoga Studio in Oakland, CA, and author of four books, The Yoga of Breath, Yoga for 50+, Pranayama Beyond the Fundamentals, and Original Yoga: Rediscovering Traditional Practices of Hatha Yoga, and a seven-CD set The Practice of Pranayama.