Navigating your Business through a Pandemic
FOREWORD
I was blessed with a unique career journey, one which seldom found me behind the office desk. From an Infantry Officer in The Singapore Armed Forces to a Corporate Leadership Chief Trainer, I enjoyed the mobility of my work and insight to various corporate cultures and management system.
Now, I run 2 successful businesses; Biking Singapore and Grace at Work Teambuilding offering sports and events management services. The article that follows shares my journey both successes and failure, which I hope will help your journey as a business owner
Now, I run 2 successful businesses; Biking Singapore and Grace at Work Teambuilding offering sports and events management services. The article that follows shares my journey both successes and failure, which I hope will help your journey as a business owner
In an earlier article, I shared how Diversification help our Company maintain agility to navigate the COVID 19 storm. In this article, I will be walking through that specific time period to share the thought process and strategic decisions made to conjure possible business opportunities.
When the COVID 19 situation worsen in Singapore, the government implemented a 2 month long Circuit Breaker, intended to break the rate of transmission from April 2020. The near lock down restriction, had 80% of the workforce adapting to a new #WorkFromHome culture overnight.
Understandably the home confinement for the nation also resulted in a stronger desire for exercising outdoors, which was still allowed in the pretext of physical and mental wellness. For some, jogging was the choice of liberation while others preferred cycling, as it offers the distance and freedom many yearn for during this period.
To capitalise on the possible opportunity (It was still an assumption at that point), our mobile bicycle rental was the most suitable service to build on. Starting off, we put the Model of Strategic Adaptation to use in producing the right marketing mix. (This business model is unique to SMEs due to our size and agility, more depth in another article)
We weren’t exactly sure whether our tourist focus bicycle rental service would be in demand, since most families in Singapore would own bicycles or have access to public sharing bicycles. So we decided to repackage our mobile bicycle rental to suit the Circuit Breaker period.
The primary change was to promote our performance mountain bicycles over the less performing tour bicycles.
Use of our mountain bicycles in the company was usually reserved for advance cycling classes. The technicality of the equipment means careless use would result in damage to these costly bicycles. However, in this situation we had to accept the possible risk in damage versus loss in revenue.
2 weeks after we launched the Circuit Breaker Rental Package, we begin to receive bookings enquires and soon we notice an interesting trend.
It seems our targeted rental strategy was drawing interest from expatriates, who mostly resides in the higher end central district, Orchard Road.
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Since most of the expats do not own a bicycle or were unable to purchase one before the Circuit Breaker. The promise of freedom has come in the form of our Performance Bicycle Rental. With our bicycle they can now journey out off their concrete jungle, to reach the closest nature park or coastal trail for a good work out. Gaining a couple of hours of fresh air in their opinion was priceless and as one client quoted, crucial to restoring sanity during the confinement.
Through this opportunity, we took time to interact (virtually) with the client’s to find out more on their consumer behaviour and motivations to spend through our services.
