Eye Candy: We Chat with Yoga Teacher, Yoga Movement Co-Founder & Director Alicia Pan
PUBLISHED April 23rd, 2021 06:00 am
For many of us, yoga is an escape from the stressfulness of everyday life. And when done right, has some amazing mind-body benefits. That’s exactly what Alicia Pan wanted to bring to the Singaporean public with Yoga Movement in 2012. Starting with a small and comfortable boutique, Yoga Movement now boasts six other studio concepts and recently opened its flagship studio in Orchard. We chat with this Yoga Movement mogul about her growing fitness-lifestyle brand.
Hi Alicia! You mention that you have over 500 hours of yoga training under your belt. How did you first get into yoga, and what made you keep at it?
It started out as a space I carved out for myself daily while I was pursuing my music career in Taiwan over a decade ago. It took me awhile to get into it as I was always more of a gym junkie – I liked higher intensity activities, sports and workouts so Yoga was something that took me awhile to get into. I eventually got Into a zone where I was noticing heaps of benefits from it in my personal wellbeing, and continued on with practicing for another couple of years before deciding that I wanted to be in the forefront leading people through their practice as well.
You were a former singer-songwriter. How has music influenced Yoga Movement? Do you still write music?
Music has and will always play a big part in the Yoga Movement Brand. All our practice rooms are named after music groups and musicians, and music is a must in every class of ours. Our pop up classes are also hugely music themed – because I personally believe that music plays a HUGE role in workout motivation. At this moment I haven’t been writing much as I’ve been hugely focused on family and the business, but eventually I hope to find the space to do it again.
The demand for your yoga studio grew really quickly. What do you think people love about Yoga Movement? What sets it apart?
YM has always been about brand and service first. We put the client experience at the forefront, and make sure that the experience is consistent throughout; from the look and feel of our website, our app and our physical spaces, to the moment you book your class on the app, to checking in and being greeted by the front desk, to the class experience, and everything bonus after! We steer clear of trying to be everything to everyone – and try to keep our offerings simple and digestible.
We know that the YM App is highly successful now, but what challenges did you first face when trying to launch it?
The race to success definitely wasn’t an easy one, considering we built the app from ground up with no third party platform for support. It took two years of our developers understanding our needs, and being around our business to ensure they understood the flow of things that needed to happen to code what was necessary for a seamless client experience. Our team worked day and night around the launch dates to ensure that everything ran smoothly. Of course at first launch there were a few hiccups – but we’ve just released the best version of it yet.
What are some of your favourite classes to teach or attend at YM?
Basics for a good active recovery and Power Flow for a good sweat!
Congratulations on the opening of your flagship store! Can you tell us about your favourite feature of the store and how this connects with you personally?
I love everything about our flagship – and am definitely very proud of it. I had to pick one, it would be our coffee bar + patio. People who know me know that I get my daily drive from a good workout and caffeine – so yeah! The wonderful addition of a beautiful patio with a coffee bar outside our practice rooms is my pride and joy.
Did Yoga Movement partner up with another brand to run the coffee bar? Are there any other lifestyle avenues/partnerships that you’re thinking of for the future?
We actually haven’t partnered with anyone – we’re running our own coffee bar! However, we do get our supply of coffee beans from Common Man Coffee Roasters, our long time friends and partners who we’ve also partnered with at our Robertson Quay location to run GROUNDED. For us, we are constantly looking for tie ups with other like-minded brands both in the f&b and lifestyle industries to create cool concepts.
Now that your flagship store has opened, what are some of your future aspirations?
We took a big step for Yoga Movement during a global pandemic with our flagship location that boasts three large practice rooms and YM’s very own café bar at 6 Handy Road, but apart from that, we do have lots going on behind the scenes right now. Some of the plans include going into new markets and branching into different things. We’re constantly watching the market and global situation as things are quite fluid at the moment, and I foresee that it will remain that way for quite some time yet so we’ve got to be flexible.
Keep up with Yoga Movement via their website & Instagram.
Top image: Alicia Pan
