JSM: I realized that they didn't want to be professional dancers, they just wanted to look like one and that was really my "Aha" moment there in that studio in Evanston, Illinois, and I thought, 'Okay, I'm going to change the format of the class. In her book "Building a Business with a Beat," she quotes what they told her: So she called up the women and asked them for their honest feedback. And so you know they thought, 'Well, I'll take a Beginning Jazz dance class.' It was a dance class, and it was hard.ĬH: Judi decided to put aside her hurt feelings and find out what she was doing wrong, how she could improve her class. So while the kids were taking their dance classes, the mom wanted to do something. JSM: So I realized that a lot of them were also stay-at-home moms, or they had children in other classes in the studio. And within a few weeks, about 90% of the women dropped out. She'd demonstrate the steps to the women, and then walk around the room, make critiques, compare their form in the mirror to her own. It was just, 'Okay, I have to train these people so they can get better as a dancer and go on and do things.'ĬH: Judi would teach a routine based on her professional training. I didn't think about health or fitness or any of that. JSM: I was teaching those as though the people in my class were intending to become professional dancers. She wanted to study theater and radio and television, but in the end, she made her decision thanks to a choreographer she had met named Gus Giordano. When it was time for college, Judi had two choices: Stanford or Northwestern. (The corn cobs on the ends of her batons might have helped.) She started dancing at a very young age - three years old - and as a teenager, went on win awards, including "America's Most Beautiful Majorette" circa 1961. The path to Jazzercise began when Judi was growing up in Red Oak, Iowa, a small town in the southwest corner of the state. And by the way, I am calling her Judi because that's what everyone calls her - her students, her instructors, her fans. And Judi is right, it did create a template for many of today's group fitness classes, your barre and your spin and your cross-training workouts. Over its 50 years, Jazzercise has made more than $2 billion in sales. So, yes, not only is it still around, there are 8,500 instructors in 25 countries, teaching over 32,000 classes a week. Account icon An icon in the shape of a person's head and shoulders.
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