Easyoga: Beat Nike with yoga

If you are a yoga practitioner but don't know about Easyoga, you are not a professional player. Want to equip yourself with a professional yoga equipment? Yoga teachers will most likely recommend the Easyoga brand. Like SPEEDO in swimming, Easyoga is gaining reputation in the yoga market for its professionalism.

The ones who built Easyoga were brothers Lu Xinqiang and Lu Qida, who grew up in Taiwan. When they started their business in 1998, the two brothers didn't even know what "yoga" was. They went from being a sports equipment trading company to founding Cebu Easyoga Sports Technology Co., Ltd. In the past ten years, Easyoga has entered more than a dozen countries around the world. In 2008, Cesbo made a profit of more than 11 million yuan, with a profit margin of 30%. In recent years, the net interest rate has increased at an annual rate of 30%.

Many netizens call Easyoga the "LV of yoga" to show how expensive its products are. A yoga mat less than two meters costs 300 yuan, and a yoga suit 2000 yuan. This price even exceeds that of first-tier international brands such as Nike, but it cannot stop yoga enthusiasts 'desire to buy. "We were very clear from the beginning that we must be professional, create a brand, and do something different." said Lu Xinqiang, general manager of Cesbo.

In 1995, after graduating from university, Lu Xinqiang joined an international sports brand responsible for material research and development. Three years later, he started a business and traded in sports equipment. "At that time, funds were limited, and there was no way to do production or OEM work. We could only do trade." Lu Xinqiang said. Put a table and chair in the corner of my Buddhist hall, connect the telephone line, install a fax machine, and start a business. At the beginning, Lu Xinqiang didn't think about what he had to do because of his enthusiasm for starting a business. His customers were scattered and his gross profit was very small. In order to make money, he would accept even non-sports equipment products. At one point, he wanted to give up and return to work in a big company. But he soon discovered that several major international brands were looking for him to do research and development of yoga materials. In 2000, the trend of yoga had not yet emerged in Asia, but Lu Xinqiang believed that the sport would soon become popular in Taiwan.

The yoga mat is the first product launched by Easyoga. Lu Xinqiang collected mats used by foreign yoga masters and studied their materials and designs. At that time, most of the popular mats on the market were ordinary plastic mats that did not take into account the characteristics of yoga exercise. Lu Xinqiang chose PVC foam in response to the support performance needs of yoga exercises, which later became almost the standard material for yoga mats. In addition, he also considered details such as anti-slip and antibacterial. Lu Xinqiang applied for more than ten patents for just one yoga mat.

This product did not open up sales in Taiwan when it was launched. In 2000, there were only more than a dozen yoga studios in Taipei. His brother Lu Qida visited one by one, but he did not sign a single order. The Lu brothers were once extremely discouraged. To their surprise, Easyoga quickly opened sales in Japan, and the professionalism of its products was recognized by customers of high-end yoga clubs in Japan. In Japan, Easyoga sells for higher prices than Nike, but sells more than Nike. Today, Easyoga still ranks first in sales of yoga sports products in Japan.

However, Lu Xinqiang's judgment of the market was not wrong. Yoga quickly rose in Taiwan, and Easyoga's reputation in Japan returned to Taiwan with the trend of yoga. Gradually, yoga teachers began to take the initiative to find Easyoga to buy yoga mats. Easyoga is sold on consignment at a yoga club in Taiwan. At first, the distribution went smoothly, but by the end of the year, various clubs began to exchange a large number of goods. Lu Xinqiang regretted it,"Consignment management is low in interactivity and it is not easy to control the market." A year later, he used the clubhouse buyout method to avoid the situation of simply pursuing sales, increasing inventory and declining profit margins. In a flash of thought, yoga mats, which originally could only be sold a few dozen a month, later sold more than 7,000 a month in Taiwan alone.

Seeing the potential of Easyoga, suppliers and foundries that had previously disdained to deal with Easyoga came to Lu Xinqiang and took the initiative to seek cooperation. Today, Easyoga still maintains a net profit of 30% every year. "The total initial order volume of startups will not expand rapidly, so they would rather be out of stock than in stock." Lu Xinqiang believes.

In the past five years, many domestic and foreign sports brands have competed to enter the yoga field, and yoga clothing, supplies and assistive devices, etc. have been regarded as emerging fields. International sports brands such as NIKE and Pumr have successively developed yoga products, but their products usually have only one style and a single style. Easyoga adheres to its professional and detailed design. For example, yoga bricks are available in different hardness sizes, and yoga nose pots that are difficult to buy on the market. These assistive devices are usually only bought by professional practitioners, and the sales volume is very small, and ordinary manufacturers will not make them. In terms of products, Easyoga also incorporates many high-tech elements, such as the application of titanium elements, exclusive non-adhesive heating laminating technology, etc.

In 2004, Lu Xinqiang started making yoga costumes. His idea is very simple. Customers only change yoga mats and other assistive devices every 2-3 years, but they can buy several sets of clothes a year, and the unit price of yoga clothes far exceeds the former. But he still had doubts. Easyoga's team was all born in industrial design and had no experience in fashion. His initial strategy was to imitate, imitate big brands, and design and produce them based on the popular rhythm clothes on the market. After the first batch of clothing went on the market, sales were very poor and they were not quickly accepted by yoga fans like yoga mats. Lu Xinqiang didn't understand why no one bought the same Easyoga brand? Until a professional yogi asked him: "What is the difference between your yoga clothes and ordinary rhythmic clothes? Why should I buy Easyoga?" Lu Xinqiang woke up: "You must be professional and be different from others."

Lu Xinqiang began to lead the team to collect foreign data and investigate the yoga ecology in Taiwan, Japan and other places. They found that yoga is static and the color of clothing must not be too bright. Easyoga uses an earth color that is close to nature, and its product design strives to give people a feeling of elegance and tranquility. In view of the characteristics of yoga exercise, they specially choose materials that are close to the body and not tight to expose the part of the shoulder blades to cater to the stretching nature of yoga exercise, etc. After two years of adjustment, the unit price of Easyoga's yoga clothes reaches a maximum of more than 6000 yuan, and the annual sales of clothing products have increased fivefold.

With the popularity of yoga in the mainland market, more and more mainland customers have begun to subscribe to Easyoga online. In 2009, Lu Xinqiang plans to set up a production base in Changzhou and an operation center in Shanghai to extend Easyoga's branches to the inland market.

At the same time, Lu Xinqiang hopes to extend the Easyoga brand to bicycle clothes and dance clothes. He believes that these products are a huge demand for "Lohas". The so-called "Lohas" is a new lifestyle currently popular. It is very popular in the United States and is being accepted by more and more people in China. Lohas does not advocate confrontational and intense competitive sports such as basketball and football, but prefers free and balanced healthy sports such as yoga, cycling, and dance. The positioning of Easyoga products is just in line with the concept of "Lohas".

When developing the "Lohas" market, Lu Xinqiang will never forget Easyoga's production rules: adhere to professionalism and pay attention to detail. For example, there is a small hidden button at the hem of the jacket of his bicycle uniform to connect the pants, avoiding the embarrassment of blowing the jacket over by the wind, which is rarely considered in ordinary bicycle clothes. (Editor in charge: Teng Yun)