: A New Tai Chi Center in the City of Miami - Business Plan Example

Mingwei Sun Table of Contents Executive summary 4 Introduction 5-7 Analysis 8-13 Conclusion and Recommendation 14 Works Sited 15 Appendices 16 Figure Figure 1-------------------The founder of Tai Chi Figure 2-------------------The birthplace of Tai Chi Figure 3-------------------The elderly people train Tai Chi for balance research in the City of Miami Figure 4-------------------Promote Tai Chi culture in the City of Miami The Executive Summary This report discusses building a new Tai Chi Center (TCC) in the City of Miami. There are different nationalities, different countries, different languages ​​and different cultures on earth, but humans belong to the same family and have the same desire to be healthy and happy.Modern technological advancement has accelerated peoples life rhythms, but also has increasedtheir psychological pressure, raising the likelihood of disease. People tend to pursue fast-paced daily lives, which makes them lose their balance.Chinese ancestral tradition has left us a most valuable asset: Tai Chi Wisdom. Let us realize that there are two sides to everything in life: whatever is fast requires something slow, it emphasizes yin and yang balance, a relaxation, static and dynamic binding.Tai Chi Center will try to help people absorb knowledge from our ancestors, and understand the wisdom to find a healthy and happy lifestyle, and share them with others. The purpose of the Tai Chi Center is to help people interested in its practices to enjoymental and health benefits.The Tai Chi Center will also reach out to the rest of the community. It will also serve as a bridge to help people from different countries learn about the culture of Tai Chi and integrateChinese culture toAmerican culture. Furthermore, theTCC will cultivate excellent athletes to participate in international competition to win national prestige andpromote theculture of Tai Chi. When people practice Tai Chi, they can improve cardiac health (special for people with a history of coronary artery disease);promote cardiovascular function and energy metabolism;increase the ability to resist disease; relieve psychological stressto prevent the occurrence of physiological disorders;improve older peoples mood, thinking, personality, memory, and motion stability, and can improve everyone’s quality of sleep. The TCC can achieve these goals with three important aspects: Help people interested in the practices of Tai Chi enjoy the mental and health benefits from Tai Chi lessons. 1. Training people weekly 2. Teaching in sport teams(Football, Basketball) 3. Teaching patients in hospitals Serve as a bridge to help people from different countries learn about the culture of Tai Chi and integrate the Chinese culture to the American culture. 1. Giving performance in different festivals 2. Volunteer to the church to teach Tai Chi and explain the Tai Chi culture 3. Advertise Tai Chi culturethrough social media( Facebook, Twitter ) Cultivate excellent athletes to participate in the international competition to win honor for Chinaandpromotetheculture of Tai Chi. 1. Daily physical training2.Kineticphysiology and psychology Introduction To understand what is the origin of Tai Chi, people should understand the meaning of Tai Chi. Tai Chi is taixu. The world “tai” stands for absolute vastness. The other word,“Chi” or “qi”, means emptiness. Therefore, taixu describes the environment of emptiness where there is a void. However, it is in this void that there is the true existence of qi( internal energy). This kind of energy reaches everywhere and changes of the universe and real driving force of all movement just like air we breathe to survive. Tai Chi is a way to describe the emergence of yang (positive energy) when qi is in motion, and the settlement of yin (negative energy) when qi stays motionless. This is the rule of yin yang emergence of Tai Chi. In Ming Dynasty, A Chinese warrior’s commander who is called Chen Wangting(Figure 1)create newChinese martial arts which not only has the quality of Yin and Yang, but also is characterized that with activity and looseness, some movements were energetic while others were gentle, and some rapid while others slow. As being in correspondence with human physiology and the nature operation rules, it was named as "TaiChiChuan"(Chen, 1-3) Tai Chi is a kind of Chinese cultural heritage, it is representative of traditional sports items. It has two main characteristics: naturalness and harmony. After one hundred and fifty years or so, Tai Chi from a small village –Chenjiagou( Figure 2) to the rest of China and, finally, throughout the world. Data shows that about 100 million people practicing Tai Chi in 150 countries and territories, making it a world trend. The Tai Chi Center focuses on peoples healthy and serve as a bridge to exchange traditional Chinese culture, sometimes cultivating excellent athletes to win honor for their country. Through the development process of Tai Chi, we can analyze the spread of the experiences of Tai Chi culture in order to continue to promote it. Tai Chi is a kind of Chinese Martial arts, it not only focus on fighting with opponent, it contains some philosophy, physics, geometry and so on. “Contemporary Tai Chi is typically practiced for a number of widely varying reasons: health, external and internal martial art skills, aesthetics,meditationor as an athletic and competition sport. Some medical study of Tai Chi willshowtheir effectiveness as an alternative exercise and a form of martial arts therapy. It is purported that focusing the mind solely on the movements of the form helps to bring about a state of mental calm and clarity, as being characterized by the use of leverage through the joints based on coordination and relaxation, rather than muscular tension, in order to neutralize, yield, or initiate attacks. The slow, relaxing work involved in the process of learning how that leverage is generated gently and measurably increases, open the internal circulation(breath, body heat, blood, lymph, peristalsis)”(Wikipedia.com). After people practice Tai Chi, they can improve cardiac health (special for people with a history of coronary artery disease); promote cardiovascular function and energy metabolism; increase the ability to resist disease; relieve psychological stress to prevent the occurrence of physiological disorders; improve older peoples mood, thinking, personality, memory, and motion stability, and can improve everyone’s quality of sleep. The TCC can achieve these goals with three important aspects:help people interested in the practices of Tai Chi enjoy the mental and health benefits from Tai Chi lessons; serve as a bridge to help people from different countries learn about the culture of Tai Chi and integrate the Chinese culture to the American culture; cultivate excellent athletes to participate in the international competition to win national prestige and promote culture of Tai Chi. (Figure 1---The founder of Tai Chi) ( www.baidu.com) (Figure 2---The birthplace of Tai Chi) ( www.baidu.com) Analysis Why should people and athletesget interested in the practices of Tai Chi and enjoy its mental and health benefits?One reason isTai Chi can improve heart and lung function. When people practice tai chi, they breathe naturally, through the deep, long, thin, slow abdominal breathing uniform method. This increases the capacity of the chest and improves the ability of the lung to take in oxygen.Tai chi can also promote brain cell function, so that the human nervous systems excitation and inhibition processes are coordinated and mental trauma, neurological diseases, such as neurasthenia, insomnia and high blood pressure,can be prevented and treated. In recent years, research has shown that Tai Chihelps older people with their balance and fall prevention. This area of research is so important because fall injuries are the leading cause of death from injury and disabilities among older people. The most serious fall injury is hip fracture; a lot of older adults hospitalized for hip fracture never recover their former level of function. BecauseTai Chis movements are slow and deliberate, with shifts of body weight from one leg to the other in coordination with upper body movements (sometimes you leave one leg in the air, using the other to hold the whole body weight), it challenges balance and ithelps reduce fall frequency. This benefits is supported by research in physio therapy. A report has investigated the effects of 8 weeks of intensive Tai Chi Chuan (TCC) training on physiological function and fear of falling (FOF) in the less-robust elderly. They were classified randomly into a TCC training or control group. Physical performance measures (including one-leg stance, trunk flexion, and walking speed) and interviews were conducted before and after the intervention. The TCC group showed significant improvements in balance and flexibility, and a reduced FOF, when compared with the control group after the intervention. However, walking speed did not change significantly. The results suggests that a high-frequency, short-term TCC training program can improve balance, flexibility, and increase the confidence of less-robust elderly. These suggest the effectiveness of TCC for intervention as a means to prevent falling among high-risk elderly populations. The data said: “During the intervention period, 22 subjects (91.7%) practiced TCC 4 or more hours per week. On average, 32.1 h of TCC were conducted as a group intervention, and 3.5 h at home. No subjects in the control group changed their lifestyle during the intervention period” (Zhang et al., 107). There was no significant difference between the TCC and control groups in demographic variables, history of falling, exercise habits, physical performance, and FES scores at baseline (Table 1). (www.sciencedirect.com) Table 2 demonstrates the changes in physical performance and FES scores of the TCC training and control groups, respectively. (www.sciencedirect.com) From the balance study, it found TCC improved balance function and flexibility, and reduced FOF in the elderly with a lower ability for maintaining balance. From the data in two tables, it is easy to conclude that TCC for lower balance ability can make significant improvement even in a small sample size with the short-term study. (Figure—3 This figure shows elderly people train Tai Chi for balance research in the City of Miami) From the report of Tai Chi research of balance, we also can put the Tai Chi training method into competitive sports and hold some international Tai Chi competition to promote Tai Chi culture, just like American football and basketball to spread American culture. The main reason is thata high level of competitive sport can inspire pride and mobilize thousands of people to participate in sports. Sports make up part of wholesome and rich part of cultural life. It also promotes mutual friendship understanding between people, regardless of their political system, religion and national characteristics. Tai Chi involves skill and philosophy which greatly promotes the internationalization of sports development, because it can transcend borders, languages ​​and social systems. Tai Chi not only belongstotheChinese but also to the common wealth of the world. Tai Chi is a kind of martial art that combines self-defense, disease prevention, body fitness, self-cultivation. It has very deep cultural roots, contains classical philosophy include Confucianism, Taoism and Buddhism and mix Chinese medicine theory with the martial arts exercise. It carries heavy Chinese traditional culture, using body language and cultural expressions of these excellent ideas. Tai Chi culture is the main part of the Chinese culture, but also inherited from our ancestor rich historical heritage. It not only records the occurrence of the Chinese nation and Chinese culture, the history of evolution, but also as a way of thinking from generation to generation, morality, values​​, codes of conduct, customs, with a strong hereditary, permeates every Chinese persons blood. Promote traditional Tai Chi culture in the City of Miami.People can learn how Tai Chi culture influence peoples behavior and ways of thinking, build a new culture in Miami today, provides a historical basis and objective basis, produces a profound reality of social influence. It is the cornerstone of enhancing national self-confidence, building a good basis for national psychology, and enhancing the comprehensive national strength of spiritual resources. It is a big important source of ideas to promote the integration of the harmonious world.Tai Chi culture is associated with the Olympic spirit as the representative of the same strain as cosmopolitanism as to build a harmonious nation, harmonious world source of ideas. (Figure 4---Promote Tai Chi culture in the City of Miami) Funding of Tai Chi Center Assets Non-cash Assets from Start-up $50,000 Cash Requirements from Start-up $30,000 Total Assets $80,000 Liabilities and Capital Current Borrowing $10,000 Accounts Payable $20,000 Total Liabilities$30,000 Capital Investment $40,000 Other $10,000 Total Capital $50,000 Total Capital and Liabilities $80,000 Total Funding $80,000 Location of Tai Chi Center The Tai Chi Center is located in downtown Miami, near the Coconut Grove area. Downtown Miami has emerged from the recent recession to regain it position as the heart of the city. Growth has been fueled by increasing employment in the city’s high tech companies. We believe TCC can be very attractive to our customers if we create a program that fits the time constraints of their jobs. TCC will also offer our members program that will allow them to use their lunch hours to attend workshops. The facilities are easy to access to the over 60,000 urban professionals that TCC consider potential members. There are three workshop rooms, men and women’s dressing room, and a boutique.TheTCC offer a lot of floor space for multiple classes to be held simultaneously. There is a large parking area which permits up to 300 vehicles. It is within easy walking distance from any building in the downtown area. If a customer wants to take their children, the TCC has a children’s playground for up to 200 children. Schedule and Service Tai Chi 1 / Beginneris an introductory class for students who are new to Tai Chi. This class focuses on basic poses and involves 7 movements. Tai Chi 2/ Continuing Beginneris a continuation class for Tai Chi 1. They emphasis of this courses is on refining and building endurance in Tai Chi 1 and 2. It addsmultiple movements and more details. This class is suitable for students who have practiced other styles of Tai Chi, but it is not suitable for those who have never studied Tai Chi before. Tai Chi 3/ Intermediatefocuses on training traditional Tai Chi(Old Frame One). It contains 74 movements. Students learn every defensive and offensiveskills. After this class, students are eligible to receive a coach certificate. Tai Chi 4/ Advance continues with refinements to Tai Chi Old Frame One and start Tai Chi Old Frame Two. Regular Tai Chi practice outside of class is strongly encouraged. After this class, students begin to compete in Martial Arts tournaments. Bonus: The TCC will offer free flight and ticket to the Tai Chi museum in Chen village( birthplace of Tai Chi) to advanced students who are accepted to National Competition. Products Tai Chi books, shirts, athletic pants, shoes, swords Business plan Tai Chi is a growing business across the world and the people those who are suffering from life style disease or wants to be fit physically and mentally become the customer of the centre SWOT Analysis Strength Weakness Practicing Tai Chi is a growing trend worldwide as it helps to maintain physical and mental health. A large chunk of people are still not convinced about Tai Chi. Getting a trained and authentic Tai Chi instructor becomes difficult. People from first world country trust and interested in these conventional Chinese healing process. Mushrooming of healing centers like Tai Chi training institutes makes it difficult to control the quality. So the credibility and the image are at a stake. Joining Tai Chi is a trend now but trend can be temporary. Opportunity Threat Objective: TCC is expected to reach its breakeven in three years. As the total funding is $8,0000 it is expected to collect that much revenue from three years. Within first three years it would increase its visibility in Miami and spread awareness about Tai Chi so that at least it can cover its variable cost part. From the fourth year onwards it is expected to yarn profits. By the fifth to seventh year it would be established in its business. It would have foothold in that market. It would open more than one centre at Miami and have planned to open other centers at other cities. Within this period it would collect a good reserve and surplus it its bank. Background of the organization:This organization is already present in the health, cure, and healing business by using conventional Chinese therapy. The primary services: It would offer Tai Chi training classes and Tai Cho healing therapy. Uniqueness of TCC: It is directly linked to the native village of Tai Chi. the instructors are authentic and highly trained in Tai Chi. it also offers its advanced students to go the birthplace of Tai Chi and learn and experience more. Legal structure:It is already a private limited company and it is spreading its wing in Tai Chi Porter’s five force model Barrier to entry: Starting a new unit is always difficult when it is some offbeat thing like Tai Chi the challenge is harder. Getting foothold is tough as people are not fully convinced. Collection of fund worth $80,000 is another big challenge. Getting permission from the government to run an alternative therapy unit is another tough job. Threat to substitutes: Theother existing alternative healing classes and Tai Chi classes can give tough competition to TCC. The market of Tai Chi students is small and it is already pre occupied. So it has to have a plan to divert the traffic towards TCC Supplier’s power: Supplier’s bargain power is a bigthing for the new entrant. But in the business structure for TCCthe role of supplier is limited. Yet, getting proper location and trainers are tough Buyer’s power: There is a general conception that these alternative therapies, conventional Chinese culture are not as effective as the modern medical science. So the number of prospective clients is limited. TCC should have a strong marketing, advertising and promotional plan. Degree of Rivalry It is an open market and the competition is also open. Other Tai Chi training classes have their own clientele. What it has to do it to find out them and offer them something more. It students are getting more services at the same price or discounts or anything else then they will convert to TCC. The management and policy:It would be managed in corporate hierarchical style. The skills include running a Tai Chi training center are subject knowledge of Tai Chi, Marketing skill and overall managerial skill. Aggressive marketing or aggressive business strategy will not be taken rather it will stress on client satisfaction and their feed back Employee manager relation: There will be open and free communications between employee and managers. Among the managers one person will be given the charge of human resource department. The same person will look after the recruitment process as well. The performance appraisal will be done by the manager. While judging the performance the employee’s creativity and innovation will be taken care of. Incentivesand bonus will be given according to the performance to motivate the employees. As and when required training sessions will be conducted for the development of employees. Business Expansion: Though currently there is no strategic alliance is there. But if such opportunity comes to TCC the company will consider it. In future it has a plan for franchising. The general practice of responsibility and revenue sharing in franchising model will be followed for TCC. Market Analysis: customers are basically young adults and middle aged people. These who are suffering from life style disease like, stress, tension, depression, spondylitis, arthritis, obesity, diabetes, etc. are expected to come and practice Tai Chi to get rid of these problems. Reasonable and competitive pricing strategy will be followed. As this training are not necessary item in a person Competitors: there are other organizations as well who are competing in the same domain. For instance, MiamiTaiChi, Body and brain Miami, Taoist Tai Chi Centre Miami, Moving meditation and many more. But this organization TCC will offer more authentic services and would follow more scientific and conventional technique to practice Tai Chi compared to its competitors. As it will focus more on one to one student interaction and client’s satisfaction so it will give an edge over others. After 3-4 years it would like to present its position as a premium brand in the Tai Chi training market in Miami. After 5-7 years it would like to have major market share. Location: Miami is a modern city with all up to date amenities. The habitats of the area are also interested to practice conventional things.as many other Tai Chi centers are running successfully in Miami, so it is expected to well.as the location is in heart of the city it is easily assessable by the customers. Operation management:Not much equipment will be required in the training business. Basis infrastructure and fundamental equipment are needed. Basis service providers and suppliers will cater the requirements. The trainers will be the long term employee of TCC and long term relationship will be maintained. The quality of the services will be maintained through strict auditing and performance appraisal of service providers. Feedbacks, satisfaction level and suggestions will be taken from clients. Financial management: A proper finance and accountancy management will be done with the help of experienced professional. A total of $80,000 will be required and to reach breakeven by 3 years there has to be 30% rate of return. So within the first three years $80000 has to be collected. In the first year TCC is expected to $20000. In the second year $25000 revenue will be generated and it will collect $35000 by the end of third year. If TCC will able to collect Funds worth $40000 in the fourth year, then it is seeing some profit. Generally funds will be raised through debt like bank loan and bond and capital infusion. After 5-7 year when TCC will go for further expansion extra funds will be needed. If it runs successfully for yeas then it will explore the avenue of equity market Marketing management: Marketing has to be the very strong section in TCC. Any new entrant has to go for aggressive marketing because it has no existing market. The entire market has to be developed. For the first stem it has to recruit few marketing professionals. It would be better if those marketing persons have previous experience in marketing for Tai Chi training institutes. Then a list has to be prepared with the name of prospective clients. It should include the name of the existing students of other Tai Chi institutes. Then try to convert then towards TCC. Health centre and health conscious people can also be promoted. People who are using other conventional health and healing process apart from Tai Chi such as yoga and aurveda can also be contacted to promote Tai Chi. But for general marketing campaign it has to depend upon conventional marketing technique like leaflet, brochure, promotional literature etc. but to tap the young generation modern techniques like website, social networking sites, face book, twitter mobile SMS should be practiced. It has a plan to promote not only the Tai Chi training but the overall conventional Chinese culture such as Tai Chi. To do that free seminars and free consultancy can be given. In this way the general attention can be drawn among the people. Conclusion and Recommendation Created during the Ming dynasty by Commander Chen Wangting in Henan province, Tai Chi is based on the martial arts form of Chinese medicine. During Tai Chi you are focusing the mind solely on the movements of the form which helps to bring about a state of mental calm and clarity. At present, Tai Chi and its culture have spanned all of China and has gone forward into the world. It is a becoming and an important bridge between the Chinese people and foreign friends. In order to maintain the overall balance,a high-tech society must also be a high cultural society. Facts have proved that in the international arena, the competition in the global competition different culture play an increasingly important role in national pride. More than physical exercise, Tai Chi provides many cultural benefits including philosophy, medicine, martial arts. As is a part of the cultural industry, Tai Chi can help innovation and development for the new ways. To develop a long-term plan for high-tech creative projects, such as how Tai Chi improve elderly people’s balance in City of Miami, how Tai Chi can improve football players’ stability and decrease injury, we should increase capital investment and build Tai Chi Center to attract more people to the purpose of learning, communicating, visiting. Works Cited Jian-Guo Zhang, Kazuko Ishikawa-Takata, Hideo Yamazaki, Takae Morita, ToshikiOhta."The effects of Tai Chi Chuan on physiological function and fear of falling in the less robust elderly: An intervention study for preventing falls" Archives of Gerontology and Geriatrics. Volume 42, Issue 2, March–April 2006:107–116. ScienceDirect.com. Web. 31 May 2013. Guangyi, Ren."Chen-style taichichuan."Wikipedia.com. 1 Dec.2002.Web. 31 May 2013. Zhenglei, Chen. Chens Tai Chi old frame one&two.Toroto: Jack Yan, 2011. Print. Read More