Jazzercise

Jazzercise, Inc.

Type	Corporation
Industry	Physical fitness
Founded	1969
Founder	Judi Sheppard Missett
Headquarters	Carlsbad, California
Revenue	$96 million for fiscal year 2009/2010[1]
Number of employees	228 corporate staff[1]
Divisions	Jazzercise Apparel, JM DigitalWorks
Slogan	Jazzercise - it shows.
Website	http://www.jazzercise.com Jazzercise YouTube Channel

Jazzercise franchise, Ann Arbor, Michigan

Jazzercise is a dance-based group fitness program. Each 60-minute Jazzercise class features a fusion of dance, resistance training, Pilates, yoga, kickboxing, and Latin-style movements set to popular music.

In 2015, the company began a rebranding project aimed at addressing misconceptions of the brand as dated. The success of the brand in the 1980s had proven to be a branding burden. In fact, the brand has continued to evolve over the years, incorporating modern trends in fitness as well as modern music. The rebranding project incorporated such taglines as "you think you know us, but you don't," and "breaking 80s barriers," and "our only throwback is our right hook." A new logo, new colors, and new focus are designed to appeal to women. As founder Judi Sheppard Missett notes, Jazzercise left headbands and spandex and the 1980s behind a long time ago. The rebrand is focused on dispelling outdated views of the company and its products.

Jazzercise instructors are franchise owners and therefore have individual locations, class hours, and pricing.

Early History

Judi Sheppard Missett began what would evolve into Jazzercise as a student at Northwestern University. Sheppard Missett was teaching at a dance studio and noticed her classes had high dropout rates. Realizing students were attending for physical fitness and not necessarily to become highly technically proficient, Shepard Missett began to hold "just for fun" classes that began with a jazz warmup. These classes were eventually renamed "Jazzercise". ^[2]

Growth and Franchising

Sheppard Missett's family moved to Carlsbad, California where Sheppard Missett opened her first studio. Facing high demand, Sheppard Missett trained new instructors and expanded her operations. Initially using the new technology of VHS videos, Sheppard Missett was able to train franchisees from a distance and began to sell franchise rights for Jazzercise studios across the country. ^[3]

Jazzercise in popular media

In Ron Howard's live-action movie adaptation of How the Grinch Stole Christmas, the Grinch's schedule has an hour blocked off for Jazzercise.^[4]

In the episode of Taxi entitled "Louie Goes Too Far", Andy Kaufman (playing Vic Ferrari) suggests to Christopher Lloyd (playing Jim) that he take up Jazzercise as a way of meeting beautiful women.

On The Golden Girls, Bea Arthur (Dorothy) admits taking up Jazzercise in the episodes "The Stan Who Came to Dinner" and "The Audit".

In the Futurama episode "Parasite Lost", the parasitic worms are seen Jazzercising Fry's muscles.^[5]

The Flight of the Conchords episode "New Zealand Town" of their second television series features a song called "Fashion is Danger" which is a parody of 1980s music and style, and contains a reference to Jazzercise.

"Jazzercise Instructor" is featured as a job in The Sims 2.

In the third series of The Mighty Boosh, Howard Moon goes to 'Jazzercise' classes.

In the Glee episode "Bad Reputation", a tape is found of Sue Sylvester Jazzercising to Olivia Newton-John's "Physical". In the following season's episode "Sexy", Holly Holliday is shown teaching a jazzercise class in which Will Schuester participates.

In the ABC hit show The Goldbergs, Beverly Goldberg is frequently portrayed referencing or stepping to Jazzercise.

On the October 9, 2012 episode of The Daily Show, Jon Stewart references Jazzercise in his opening monologue.^[6]

References

External links

• Jazzercise official website