It started 50 years ago with a dance teacher and 15 students who wanted to get fit. Now the Carlsbad-based Jazzercise has 32,000 classes a week across the nation and in 25 different countries. Through the ups and downs of the fitness industry, Jazzercise has found a way to keep current and popular with several generations of women.
As part of the company’s 50th anniversary, Jazzercise founder and CEO Judi Sheppard Missett is out with a book about her business success. The book, “Building A Business With A Beat” follows Missett’s career as an aspiring dancer turned exercise pioneer.
In the 1960s, she wrote, fitness workouts were tailored to men in gyms or the YMCA. Missett said she broke through by seeing that women wanted to get fit too but with an upbeat, dance-based workout.
As more was learned about the impact of different types of exercise, Missett introduced strength training, aerobics and even specialties like kickboxing to the Jazzercise lineup. She said she’s worked to ensure that Jazzercise never becomes old-fashioned.
Missett offers words of advice to others who’d like to start a successful business. She said when entrepreneurs find their passion and follow their gut instincts, they are more likely to be successful. And if the enterprise also helps the larger community, it should be able to withstand the test of time.
