PRECIOUS Entertainment has been around for almost five years now and it is a talent and events management company which owns a performance training school, Kids Performing.
The Academy is at the heart of the whole organisation and all the other spokes of the wheel complement this key facet of our business. The other spokes are our artiste management arm, events management arm and also our Lifestyle component which is Popstars City which houses a cafe and merchandising store. I own Precious Entertainment together with Kuo Po, the Artistic Director.
Honestly, this is the first real severe recession the company has been through but previously it was affected by the terrible bout of Hand, Foot and Mouth disease which hit Singapore and affected many child-related businesses. Due to the long drawn affliction, parents kept their kids away - understandably.
Business has been stable with our intake of children increasing each term actually as the school's good name has been spreading word by mouth and many satisfied parents kindly give us strong referrals- they and kids' amazing stage performances through the many performing platforms we create for them, are our best forms of advertisements. So, we have not seen declining student numbers.
The challenge is more being able to build the student numbers as rapidly as Kuo Po and I would like, and the economic slowdown means we have to manage our expectations. Cashflow is the real issue though as many clients are slow to pay and this can put us in a real conundrum when we have high overheads with a much bigger 7,000 sq feet floor space and bigger team now.
Still, we've learnt essential lessons: Doing our sums more carefully when starting up, being savvy of the different loans and financing schemes available to keep the business healthy.
Also, learning to structure deals more cleverly. Several partnerships did not work out financially when the other party got hit with low numbers or lack of financing and we then end up being the party who gets hit financially through no fault of ours so it is important to add in a clause for compensation for " no show" or last minute cancellations so that we at least get some monetary compensation.
Kids on Stage
One unique part of Kids Performing is that we have a strong social outreach program to support children from financially disadvantaged homes called Kids On Stage (KOS), despite the fact that many of our school's children come from affluent homes. We provide these financially disadvantaged kids training and scholarships as performing arts teach many essential life-skills like self-confidence, eloquence, creative expressions and teamwork.
It is definitely empowering to know you are in a business that could make a difference to young people's lives. This is truly what keeps Kuo Po and I going despite some of the daily challenges we face operationally.
But there is only so many we can reach out to ourselves- we need more corporate and individual sponsors to come forward to sponsor camps, workshops, training, equipment etc for these kids. Interested parties can contact us at kp@kidsperforming.com if they are keen to support us in any way at all.
