When we opened Luma Goa, we did what every new hospitality business does: we listed it on Booking.com. The setup took a few hours. Within days, guests were finding us. Individual travellers, couples, people passing through Goa looking for somewhere beautiful to stay. The system worked exactly as it was supposed to.
We felt the satisfaction of watching something come to life. A space we had built, imagined, and poured energy into — suddenly visible to the world. That's the magic of the modern hospitality infrastructure. The pipes already exist. You just plug in.
"Booking.com solved individual guests in a weekend. Retreat leaders were a completely different story."
But we had bigger ambitions for Luma Goa than individual travellers. The A-frame huts were just the beginning — a few months later, we completed the yoga shala, and with that, the space became what we had always envisioned: a place built for retreats. The energy, the layout, the kitchen, the surrounding nature, and now a dedicated practice space. We were ready to welcome yoga teachers, wellness facilitators, breathwork coaches, meditation guides — people who bring groups and create transformative experiences.
So we started reaching out. We posted in Facebook groups where retreat facilitators gather, describing the space, sharing photos, putting the offer out there. We contacted facilitators directly — researching who was running retreats in India, sending personal messages, explaining what Luma could offer. It was slow, manual work. Some conversations led somewhere. Most didn't. And there was no system underneath any of it — just us, a spreadsheet, and a lot of follow-up messages.
The contrast was striking. On one side: a global platform that had solved the individual guest problem so thoroughly that it was almost invisible — you list, they come. On the other: a patchwork of Facebook groups, personal outreach, and word of mouth for an entire segment of the hospitality world that was growing fast and had real, specific needs.
"There is no Booking.com for retreats. No place a facilitator can go to browse venues by location, capacity, dietary offering, and kitchen setup — and simply book."
Retreat platforms do exist — we found them. But they tend to be job boards for yoga teachers and volunteers, or directories where venues pay to be listed without any real matching logic. Nothing that truly connects the specific needs of a facilitator — the right number of rooms, the right kitchen, the right setting, the right support — with the venues that can meet them.
And here's what struck us most: the retreat industry is not a niche. Wellness tourism is one of the fastest-growing sectors in global travel. Millions of people attend retreats every year. Thousands of facilitators are trying to build their programmes. Hundreds of venues like Luma Goa are waiting to host them. The demand is real, the supply is real — and the infrastructure connecting the two is almost entirely missing.
That gap is not a small problem. It's a large, underserved opportunity.
Combined with what we had already seen from the chef side — the same chaos, the same Facebook groups, the same reliance on personal networks — the picture became very clear. This world needs a proper platform. Not another job board. Not another directory. Something that understands how retreats are actually built: a facilitator with a vision, a venue with the right space, a chef with the right philosophy — all finding each other in one place.
That is what Tulsisphere is being built to be. And the size of the gap tells us exactly how much it's needed.