To Stay True or Take the Mass Market Route?

Abstract

Singapore has won many accolades as a Meetings, Incentives, Conferences and Exhibitions (MICE) destination for 17 years in the Asia Pacific, with the industry having a projected market value of USD5,214.0 by end 2027, with a CAGR of 8.4% (PRNewswire, 2020). Eyeing this huge growth potential, Greg founded TAB Group Pte Ltd in 2019, serving the corporate and private events market. Greg wanted to create memorable experiences and connect people by curating unique events with selected vendors, making the entire event planning process seamless and transparent for customers via TAB’s online platform solution while providing excellent and personalized customer service. Response was good and TAB was ready to scale up. Then Covid-19 struck in December 2019. This global pandemic spared no economy, with many countries currently experiencing multiple waves of resurgence, prompting governments to declare lockdowns and suspensions of green lane travel arrangements. While pivoting to curating virtual experiences afforded TAB the opportunity to diversify its offerings and continue to be relevant in the new normal, ongoing restrictions and limitations placed on gatherings and group sizes by the local government inhibited TAB from taking off in the scale that it had projected. Considering the economic downturn, businesses locally and internationally, were experiencing reduced budgets on corporate events and client entertaining. With TAB’s target corporate customer segment not buying events at the same pace pre-Covid, Greg was faced with two options. The first option was to rebrand his product and market to consumers and special events. Greg would be faced with fierce competition from bigger players that already offer existing solutions and dominate this segment while potentially losing his core segment of corporate customers that demand his unique solution. The second option was to remain committed to TAB’s core vision and mission of offering TAB’s solution to a niche market. This could potentially result in prolonged limited growth in the short term. However, it would also enable TAB to build a strong base of suppliers and partners to be ready to expand when borders reopen and travel resumes.