Everything you need to know about your Welcome Gift and forming Partnerships

Are you visualizing your first retreat? Are your guests arriving full of excitement and expectations for a meaningful experience? What better way to welcome them than a thoughtful gift waiting for them upon arrival? Your Welcome Gift is a great way to make your guests feel valued and appreciated.

Here, we will discuss some great ideas for your Welcome Gift, and we will also talk about it as a great opportunity to form partnerships. Your partners cannot only sponsor your gifts, but also help with marketing when the time comes.

Your Welcome Gift as inspiration for forming partnerships

You can start thinking about your Welcome Gift well ahead of time, as it can provide inspiration for networking and finding the right partners for your offering. It can form the basis of a valuable collaboration.

When it comes to forming partnerships, think small and big. You can use your friends, fellow teachers, or the yoga studios where you are teaching. You can even partner with your good old local coffee shop! They can definitely help you spread your word. For example, you could recommend their coffee and then later leave some flyers with them.

You can form partnerships involving anything related to yoga. It can be beauty products, energy bars, anything you can think of. You can become a brand ambassador for a local company, a small business or even a bigger yoga brand, like yoga mat suppliers, yoga clothes brands, etc. Don’t hesitate to contact as many people as you can access to create partnerships that can later help you to create some buzz.

Once you have found the right partners, you can easily leverage them later, both for your Welcome Gift and during the marketing phase.

Forming Partnerships and marketing your retreat

Keep in mind that when you start planning and marketing your retreat, and you reach the point of trying to close sales (yes, that point!) a partnership with a company can prove invaluable!

For example, you can offer a giveaway when you form a partnership with a company that is willing to cover the cost of a guest. Your giveaway will create hype and make your retreat a talking point. People love free gifts, and this is a great way to get them interested!

Yogascapes is one company that is open to such collaborations.

Some ideas for your Welcome Gift

It’s always a great idea to offer your guests a Welcome Gift when they arrive. It can be waiting for them in their rooms to welcome them to the experience.
The best—and cost-effective—way to offer a useful and beautiful gift is to team up with a local company that is willing to provide a giveaway. Companies are often willing to sponsor products in exchange for posting and sharing information about their brand. They can provide products for your Welcome Gift, such as water bottles, sunscreens, soap, journals, yoga mats, etc.

Ideas for your Welcome Gift include:

• A personal note
• Fresh flowers
• A yoga mat
• A journal and a pen
• A water bottle
• A charm bracelet

You can include anything you want in your Welcome Pack as long as it is valuable to your tribe and achievable for you! No need to go overboard with anything that takes too much time or effort (or money) and makes you resent the experience of giving. It is a token of your appreciation and tangible proof that you are a generous soul, and you care.

Wrapping Up

If you are planning your first retreat and you’d like to discuss ideas for your Welcome Gift or how to form a partnership, you can contact the people at the Yoga Loft. They really know their stuff, and they are such a fun group. They go out of their way to create a welcoming environment and they can help with marketing too. Check out their offerings.