How I Built This with Guy Raz - Jazzercise: Judi Sheppard Missett

Episode Date: January 18, 2021

Judi Sheppard Missett wandered into her first dance class when she was 2, and hasn't stopped dancing since. In the late 1960s, she was teaching jazz dance in Chicago and her students—mostly young moms—complained she was acting too much like a Broadway taskmaster, when all they wanted was get in shape and have a good time. Seeing an opportunity, Judi created Jazzercise: a hybrid of aerobics and dance that ushered in a new culture of spandexed, synchronized movement and became one of the first workout programs for women with mass appeal. With the help of video technology and franchising, Jazzercise eventually spread around the world, growing into the $100 million business it is today. Order the How I Built This book at: https://smarturl.it/HowIBuiltThisSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

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walking distance from so much of the city, made it feel less like a visit and more like we were actually living there. Plus, taking a trip is the perfect time to host your space on Airbnb. Your place with all of its personal touches and its amazing location could make someone else's vacation even better. Your home might be worth more than you think. Find out how much at Airbnb.ca.com slash host. When I started this class, you know, I had many dancer friends, and they said to me, what in the heck are you doing? And I said, what do you mean?

They said, well, you're bastardizing the art of dance. And I said, well, you know, I'm doing this to help these women, and they're feeling better about themselves, and they're happy. And plus, I'm able to teach them an appreciation for dance that they never had before. So now, when they come to watch you, my friend, perform, they're going to appreciate what you have to go through to do what you do. From NPR, it's How I Built This, a show about innovators, entrepreneurs, idealists, and the stories behind the movements they built.

I'm Guy Raz, and on the show today, how Judy Shepard Masset became one of the first people to turn exercise into a business, and that business into a brand, jazzercise, still around and now grossing $100 million a year. Even by Southern California standards, my mom was a big. bit of an outlier. Back in the early 1980s, our kitchen pantry was stocked with things like kinoa and carib beans and Ezekiel bread, and her fridge was packed with things like Hickama and rainbow charred and sprouts. At school, I'd look enviously at the other kids as they feverishly pulled out twinkies and ho-hos and fruit roll-ups from their lunches as ion-wrapped in Ezekiel

bread sandwich stuffed with avocado alfalfa sprouts and tomatoes. My kids, my kids. juice box was the school water fountain. And my mom was already practicing yoga in the late 1970s, and she always had a keen interest in new fitness trends. So in the early 1980s, she became, for a brief moment, an early adopter of jazzercise. Saturday mornings, she'd move the coffee table in front of the TV, pop in the jazzercise video, and start to warm up as the theme song played. On the screen, a group of mostly women moved their bodies to a combination of novelty and disco songs. It was all about constant movement, hip gyrations, high knees, toe touches, a mixture of dance and aerobics.

Jazzercise. And then it kind of ended. The leotards, the leg warmers, the white rebocs, all packed away, and jazzercise seemed to fade away. Or so I thought, because Jazzercise today is a $100 million business with more than 8,000 franchise locations around the world. But even more significantly, the story of Jazzercise is really the story of the rise of group fitness in the United States. And unlike celebrity-driven workouts like Richard Simmons or Jane Fonda, Jazzercise very intentionally focused on its program rather than its founder. Judy Shepard Massat. But Judy is probably as important to popularizing group exercise in the U.S.

as Julia Child was to teaching Americans about French cooking. Because before Jazzercise was created in 1969, exercise was considered a thing mainly for men, and it mainly involved lifting weights. Now, Judy never intended to turn what started as a dance class into a multi-million-dollar business. business. It just sort of evolved into that. And the jazzercise phenomenon also happened just as the technology of home video was starting to take off. And Judy figured out how to tap into that audience before anyone else did. But long before all that happened, Judy intended to spend her life as a professional dancer. For as long as she can remember, dance was the central thing in her life.

My first encounter with dance was in Coronado in the San Diego area. And my mom and I were out walking and there was a dance studio, and the kids were in the studio dancing. And so I wandered in. And my mom just kind of let me stand there, and I started dancing and trying to do what the kids were doing. I was about two and a half. And the teacher came over to my mom and said,

you know what, this little girl, she's got a gift. I think you better find a dance class for her. Wow. And my mom said, well, we're moving to Iowa. And he said, well, you look up somebody in Iowa and get her in a dance class. Wow. Yeah. You know, it's interesting because you can see that sometimes, little kids, like on the soccer field.

You know, there's a little kid who just, their little body, the way it moves, just intuitively understands the game. and so I'm not surprised. And so when you went back to Iowa, did your parents do that? Did they put you in a dance class? Oh, yes. We moved back to Red Oak, Iowa. My parents were from that area in Iowa. And my mother was an incredible woman.

She was an awesome mentor for me. She found a dance teacher. And they took me to class. because I was the littlest kid in a studio there in Iowa. And so I danced in my first recital when I was three, and I did a solo. And, you know, eventually as I got older and I got better, I needed, you know, different instruction. And the instructor that I was going to was originally from Council Bluffs, Omaha area. and she moved back there.

So that left me without a teacher. So my mom was very energetic, and she went to Omaha, and she recruited some of the assistance of my dance teacher to come to Red Oak and open a dance studio so that I could have lessons, but also she promoted it within the town so the other kids in town could have lessons. as well. And then I got a little bit better and better, and finally we had to drive to Omaha to my original instructor so that I could continue to progress in my dancing. And that was 50 miles

round trip. So she would take me two times a week. Now, at the same time, everybody in town said, Well, Judy, why don't you open a studio? So I was 13, and my parents fixed up the basement of our home and made it into a dance studio. Wow. Yeah, and about, gosh, three months, I had 100 little dancers, little students. You were teaching dance when you were 13? I was, yeah. Judy, what was it about?

Because from the time you were two and a half, somebody recognized. a natural talent in you, and then clearly you loved it. Yeah. What was it about dance that you just connected with? Yeah. Well, I don't know exactly what it was, but I just knew that it made my life better. You know, no matter what I was going through,

dance was always the thing that got me through, whatever. And I still love it. You know, I love teaching. I love doing choreography. I love taking class. I love everything about it. And what kind of dance was it? Was it like jazz dance or tap dance or ballroom dancing?

What were you doing when you were, you know, 10, 11, 12? I was doing tap. I was doing ballet. I was doing jazz. And it wasn't until I went to Northwestern University that I got into any kind of. of modern or contemporary dance. But primarily it was tap ballet jazz and acrobatic because I'm very flexible, still even today.

And so I was, you know, that was a crowd-pleasing kind of routine to perform when you were doing all these acrobatic tricks. So, you know, I think also I love performing. I love being on the stage. And the neat thing about what I do today is that my audience is an active one. And when I was dancing in the theater, I had a passive audience. You know, they were watching, but not doing. Now, today, I'm dancing on the stage and the people in front of me are dancing too. So my ego is fulfilled because I still get to perform even though I'm teaching. Yeah. So, I mean, the thing I think is important to point out, Judy, is that you weren't just a good dancer.

You were like the equivalent of a Division I athlete in dancing. Like you, I think at age 14, like you joined a touring company and then you would spend your teens touring in shows that like West Side's Story and Funny Girl and Hello Dolly. Like you went to New York and Chicago and Atlanta and Miami. I mean, you were a professional performer. Yes. And that's really what I hope for to be able to do more performing like that. Yeah. Once I got to Chicago, where I went to school, I also was mentored by a fantastic jazz dance master.

His name was Gus Giordano. He has passed since then. But he really gave me so many opportunities. You know, I dance with his professional company. I taught in his studio. He was a tremendous mentor. So you get to Northwestern, I think, around 1960. And this is really before, you know, universities would become kind of hotbeds of radicalism and the hippie movement.

I mean, this is still the early 60s were. basically what we think of as the 50s. And what do you remember about? I mean, it's probably a much more conservative place than it would be today, right? I mean, it was, I don't know. Or was it? Did you feel like liberated, in a sense, when you got there? Yeah, I felt liberated.

I think people were more open-minded in that university culture, which I really came from conservative Iowa. and Northwestern was not. And I love that. And then of course, as we advanced through the 60s, there were many things that started coming to a head. And especially in Chicago, if you remember the late 60s, which I lived in Chicago through all that.

So I felt blessed that I was able to have that experience and make up my mind about a lot of things. Yeah. That otherwise, if I'd stayed in Iowa, I might have just followed my parents' ideals. And this way I got to figure out what mine really were and my values. And meantime, I think at a fairly young age, like 20 or 21, you got married to a guy named Jack, who you'd met at Northwestern. Yeah, we met on a blind date, and it was during the summer, and it was sort of love at first sight, really. And when I graduated, and Jack was still a senior at Northwestern, he was a journalism major, we got married.

Wow, wow. And I guess Jack eventually he got a job as a reporter for the local CBS station in Chicago, and pretty soon after that, you guys have. a daughter, Shanna. Yeah, yeah. But, you know, back then, she was born in 1968, the end of 68. I had to disguise my pregnancy so that I could continue to work. I was doing choreography for a club called the Gaslight Club. Why did you have to disguise it? Well, they would be afraid of hiring me as a choreographer and a dancer that something might happen, they would be liable, you know. Right. And so I was working for them doing choreography, and I needed that job. This was a really good job where I didn't have to travel so much or anything.

So I just, I was very careful about weight gain. I wore clothes that pretty much disguised it. To the point of two days before I delivered Chana, I had done a bunch of choreography with this club. Nine months pregnant. Yeah, nine months, yeah. And then two days later, I delivered Chana, and I was supposed to do rehearsal that day. And so Jack had to call them my husband and say, you know, Judy won't be in because she's in the hospital. And they said, oh, my gosh, did she get hurt or what happened? And he said, no, no, she had a baby.

And they said, she had a what? Did you adopt? And he goes, no, no, it's our child. And they were bowled over. That's unbelievable. You know, we laugh about that today. But, hey, you had those kind of things you had to do. All right.

So you are a young mom. And you're also working at Gus Giordano. jazz dance company in Chicago. Yeah. And I guess you start teaching dance classes there to other young moms like you. Yeah. I was teaching jazz dance classes in the studio. And I was still working, you know, in the theater.

I had an agent and was doing stuff like that as well. And I was teaching in the morning, which tends to be a time when a lot of stay-at-home moms would take class. And they would come take a couple of classes and then I never see him again. And I was like, oh my gosh, what in the world is going on? And so I thought, well, I don't like this. What am I doing wrong? And I went to talk to some of them. And they said, well, Judy, you know, we like it, but you're teaching it like we're going to go on and be professional dancers. And we don't want to do that, but we do want to look like a professional dancer. We want to have those bodies.

And so, you know, what can you do for us in that department? And I thought, wow, that's really interesting. Because by then I'd kind of gotten into the whole fitness thing, which nobody really was into much of at that point in time. Yeah. I mean, this is 1960. Sixty- Sixty-eight, 69, yeah. Fitness wasn't a thing?

I mean, Jack La Lane was doing things in California and right? Well, yeah. But it was something you did to look good if you had time to do it, but, you know, not a lot of women were into it. You wouldn't, like, see people jogging around the lake in Chicago in 1968. Not too often. Okay. You know, there would be some, but not like today. Anyway, so I thought, okay, Gus, can I try something different?

Kind of, you know, to reach out to this whole new group of people that we could bring into the studio who otherwise wouldn't come to a dance studio. And he said, sure, why don't you take that empty studio that's downstairs and try a class once a week? and so I put flyers up in the studio to promote it. And just to clarify, what were you advertising? I mean, you were teaching a dance class, so how was this going to be different? What did you call it? Or how did you describe it? Well, I called it something like jazz dance for fun and fitness.

Right. And so the first class I had 15 people. What I did was I turned them away from the mirror. I made the movement simple, easy to follow, and I told them, just follow me. I will be your mirror and we'll have fun and we'll do movements that will really tone your body and your muscles and make you strong,

but it'll be fun. And you played music? Oh, yes. Oh, yeah. You just put it on the radio or you had like a, this is kind of pre-cassette? No, no, they didn't have cassettes then, but I used albums and records, 33, 78s, 45s, you know, all of that. You just put a record on, and what kind of music were you playing? Well, I played things that you were hearing on the radio, you know.

So there was a variety. Soul songs like The Temptations or the OJs, a lot of songs from different shows, musicals. you know, that were popular at that time. That was always fun because then people felt like, oh, I'm dancing on Broadway, you know. So did you have to map it out or did you kind of just intuitively just say, you know what, I'm just going to kind of move a little bit this way and then I'll move this way and we'll just see how it goes. Yeah, no, I mapped it out. Okay.

Tell me how did you do that? Well, I just thought, okay, how would I do this if I were, producing a dance concert. So, you know, there would be an opening number and there would be lots of fun, different kinds of numbers, and there might be a slower number. And then, of course, there would be a finale. And it was all based in jazz dance technique because that's really became, you know, the expertise I had was in that, really. And I think the class was 45 minutes. You know, we did the last number, kind of ended on a bang,

and everybody applauded, and it was like, whoa, that was, it's over? Is it over already? They always would say that. It's over already? Oh, my gosh, it went so fast. And when I did the second class, I had 30 people. because each of the 15 brought a friend. And then the next week, I had 60 people,

and the room wouldn't hold any more people. And I thought, wow, this is pretty darn cool. Yeah. But I will tell you a little wrinkle in all of this, okay? When I started this class, you know, I had many dancer friends, and they said to me, what in the heck are you doing? And I said, what do you mean? They said, well, you're bastardizing the art of dance.

Oh, yes. Uh-huh. Yes. I was waiting for that to happen because you're a professional. Yeah. You're a professional. This is an art form. Now you're just turning this into some nonsense exercise.

What are you doing? Right. That was it. And I said, well, I, you know, I'm doing this to help these women. And they're feeling better about themselves and they're happy. so I don't think there's anything wrong with it. And plus, I said, you know, these are people that would never come to a dance studio to just take a dance class because it would be a little bit intimidating for them.

But they're coming here. So I'm able to teach them an appreciation for dance that they never had before. Yeah. So now, when they come to watch you, my friend, perform, they're going to appreciate what you have to go through to do what you do. So I, you know, I wouldn't take any of that guff from them because I think you're right. I mean, this is the classic story of the professional practitioner popularizing something. You know, it could be the story of Headspace and Andy Puddikum, who was a Buddhist monk, but who brought that to the way. world through meditation. I mean, right, when you're a practitioner and then you try to create

something that's more accessible, your friends who are like, hey, this isn't pure, they're going to come after you. Exactly. That's exactly right. So the women who are coming to those classes were saying to you, Judy, I really want to, I want to look better. I want to have a better, they would say a better figure, I guess, at that time. Right. Yes, they would say that because, you know, these were women who really weren't moving much. So, one. Once you put a little movement into their lifestyle, I mean, you know, the pounds came off. And by the way, I mean, what's so remarkable to me is that today, the fitness industry, and I don't know the exact numbers, but I would venture to guess that most of the revenue in the fitness industry overall comes from women, not from men, that there's so many fitness programs, whether it's bar or yoga or zumba or jazz or whatever they may be that really are dominated by women. But in the 60s and 70s, it sounds like that was really that culture just did not yet exist.

No, it really didn't. You know, today a lot of people say, oh, well, Judy, you pioneered the whole thing. And, you know, I guess I could be one of the pioneers, I would say that. But, you know, there was the Lottie Burke method. Right, who came to the U.S. and was doing Pilates, right? Yeah. Bonnie Pruden, I don't know if you remember her. I don't know that name, no.

Yeah, she was doing things for women. But it was kind of, I don't know, it was very feminine and, you know, let's not sweat too much, that type of thing. Whereas I, because I'm a dancer, I'm used to sweating all the time. So I was giving permission to these women to, you know, hey, it's okay to sweat and it's okay to work hard. And it's okay to feel how your body reacts to the movements that you're doing. And, you know, if you feel a little sexy doing it, that's okay. And I was always proud that I was able to give a lot of women the feeling of power. because they got in touch with their body.

They got stronger and healthier through what we were doing. Yeah. You know, when I was researching for this interview, one of the things I came across was that in the 60s, apparently, in the U.S., at least, there was new research that came out that really touted the benefits of aerobic exercise, which I guess started people to think, hey, maybe we should start to do this. Do you remember that people talking about aerobic exercise is good for you? I remember a little bit of it. Yeah, and we're actually more in the 70s. And then, of course, there was the Air Force exercise book. And, you know, the special things that people in the Air Force did, that became kind of popular.

Right. That was like a huge deal. I remember that. I remember my mom having those books. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. But, you know, the thing is it still was geared more toward men. You know, I had an experience while I was developing this and teaching this class in Evanston, after my daughter was born, I had been going to the Y in Evanston and swimming and stuff while I was pregnant.

So after I delivered her, I went to the Y and went back and I was doing things. They had a testing of fitness. And I thought, well, I think I'll do that. So I went in and they said, well, you know, we don't really have any charts for women. So we'll have to base your outcome on, you know, the male. This is like how many pull-ups can you do? How many push-ups can do? Yeah.

Sit-ups can do that kind of stuff. That kind of stuff, yeah. So I said, well, you know, that's okay. You can, you know, scale it down or whatever you want to do. And afterwards they're like, holy smokes, what do you do? And I said, well, what do you mean? They said, well, my God, you're better than a lot of the guys that come through here. And I said, well, I dance.

That's what I do. They said, you're not a runner or, you know, a swimmer or anything. I said, no. And they were, you know, bowled over. And so that was another motivation for me to keep doing this class, you know. Yeah. And I'm just curious after, because this is the, late 60s, early 70s, after these classes ended, did any of the women who took it, would they, like, light up a cigarette?

Oh, sure. Yeah. Oh, yeah. That's, you know, oh, my gosh. I never smoked, so I could never understand it. Yeah. Yeah. But I'm just imagining the corridors outside that class, that jazz dance class.

Well, you know, dancers are no. notorious for being smokers, you know, because I, you know, they always had the false impression that smoking kept their weight down. Yeah. Yeah. All right. So you're doing all this stuff. You've got a baby girl and you're teaching dance and you're also staying active in the professional world. But I guess around like 1972, like there's some major changes at the TV station where Jack is working.

and he loses his job. And I guess sort of prompts you guys to move out to California. Is that right? Well, they fired 40 people. And Jack was one of them. And so it was like, okay, we have savings. And he has a family out here, which was, you know, nice. Then, of course, there's just the Chicago Wood.

weather. And we thought, oh, it's so pretty in California. And my agent in Chicago said, well, you know, if you go, I can still get you jobs out in L.A. And I thought, okay, now I hated leaving Gus, but he was so supportive. And he just said to me, Judy, you know, go with your family and see what happens. You can always come back to Chicago. So, yeah. So really, This was kind of like a lifestyle change. You're both a young, a young married couple with a little kid. And you settle in San Diego. Right.

And I guess you could find work pretty quickly teaching fitness. Was that your plan that you would just find a place to or teach dance, rather? Was that your, was that the plan? Yeah. Well, I don't know that we had a plan. We knew we had enough money saved that we could figure out what we wanted to do for a year or so. you know, and we actually settled in Oceanside, which is North San Diego County. Right.

And I thought, okay, well, you know, I'd like to try teaching this class dance for fun and fitness or something like that. So I just found some parks and recreation departments and told them what I was doing. and everybody just was very open and like, oh, sure, let's see what you can do. And the YMCA's a couple of them. And, you know, Southern California is so body beautiful and health conscious, even back then. And, I mean, at this point, right, Judy, in your story, you are now an entrepreneur. You are now a business person, even though I cannot imagine you thought of yourself that way. Oh.

You were just like, I'm going to teach some classes. Right. Did you have like a sense of what you were going to price the classes at or was that not even a priority for it? You didn't really care. I didn't care. Frankly, money has never been a motivator for me. I just wanted to try out this class and see if people would like it. How did they know about it?

I mean, the first time, do you remember the first class you had in the San Diego area after you moved there? I mean, I guess you put up maybe some flyers or. Yeah. And did lots of people show up? That, well, in the beginning, in Oceanside, it was at the pier recreation center. It's right off the ocean and the pier. And it was a nice size group, maybe 10 people. I mean, it was better than two.

And although I've taught classes to two people, too. But after I finished the class, they were like, what is this? Oh, my God. This is so much fun, I've got to tell all my friends. And they did. When we come back in just a moment, how Judy started teaching so much that she almost had to stop for good. And how that obstacle actually. helped her take the business to the next level. Stay with us. I'm Guy Raz and you're listening to

How I Built This from NPR. Hey, welcome back to How I Built This from NPR. I'm Guy Raz. So it's the early 1970s and Judy Shepard Massett is teaching her dance classes in the San Diego area. So I know you guys moved to Oceanside because your husband had family there, but what's incredible about that area is, obviously it's where Camp Pendleton is. And it had this massive population of human beings, right? In the military, many of whom or most of whom were men because it's a marine base, right? Yeah, but they had families and girlfriends and wives. Right. And wives.

And is that who started to come to the classes? Yes. The local people and some that were involved in military. Now, what happened was I got all these requests. for classes. And as these requests for classes came in, there were more and more, I just kept saying, okay, yeah, I can teach that and trying to figure out the schedules, you know. But I would have a hundred people in the class. And would you have like a, like a Folgers can of coffee, emptied, of course, where people would just like shove five bucks into it? I did have that, not at the Y, but

Right. When I did Parks and Recreation in Carlsbad, they collected the money. But then it got to be so big, it just ballooned. And, you know, just tons of people. And then I noticed I wasn't getting paid. And I went into the director of Parks and Rec. And I said, you know, I haven't been paid in. couple of months and I really could use the money. And he said, well, I know, but it's quite a bit of money. And I have to turn this in to get it approved at the city council. And it's just kind of embarrassing that here you are, you know, this little exercise class and you're making all this money. Wow. What was his problem, though? I don't know. I think it was his fear that people would think I was making too much money and that, you know, I'm not, I wasn't a doctor or a lawyer or, you know, I was teaching fitness. And it didn't deserve, I didn't deserve to be paid like that.

And it was just people paying five bucks a class or something like that. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Well, not a class, a month for eight classes. Wow. So what did you say to it? Well, I said, really? Do you think that I don't have training in this? Do you think these people are all coming for no reason? Because there's a reason why they're coming.

And the reason is me. And I'm doing a good job for you. So I said, I need that check. And I need it today by 4 o'clock because if I don't have it, I don't know if you know this or not, but my brother-in-law is the publisher of the local paper. And I think that might be a really good story he would be interested in. And he goes, oh, well, you wouldn't do that. I said, well, no, I won't do it if I get my check at 4.

And, well, we'll see. I don't know. It's short notice. I said, no, no, no, it's not short notice. I was supposed to have it two months ago. So you see what you can do. And I just turned around and walked out. I was so mad. And I went back at four and the secretary was there and she handed me an envelope and I opened it up and inside was the check. So what happened out of that was eventually this guy quit and there was another guy. that came in. And so I talked to him and I said, why don't you let me collect the money? And then I will pay you your percentage. And I will keep books and I will do, you know, the whole thing. And he said, that would be much easier for us and you. I said, yeah, everybody wins. So you started to collect the payments. Yeah. Yeah. And that's what they would do. They would put their money in a can and sign their name on a piece of paper, and there it was. And I'm just curious back then, because I imagine it wasn't like, today music rights, it's very complicated, you've got to pay a million people.

Imagine back then you just kind of played music right in the 70s, and you didn't have to worry about that as much. No, I didn't know that was something you needed to worry about. You know, I found out later, but yeah. All right. Well, Eric Clapton or Led Zeppelin, if you're listening, you know, in the 70s. just please please just forgive Judy for playing your music. Please do because I did use quite a bit of Eric Clapton, so there you go. All right. Meantime, the name Jazzercise, I guess, kind of pops up around 1974.

How does that name? Because before then, you were just teaching dance for fitness or whatever. Yeah. And how did the name Jazzercise come about? Well, I had a customer in the La Jolla Y. where I was teaching. And she said to me one day, you need a name for this. And I said, well, what have you got in mind?

And she said, why don't you call it jazzercise? Because it's exercise, but it's also jazz dance. And I think, wow, yeah. Like immediately you thought, I love it. That's great. That's perfect. Yeah, I did. I liked it right away, but I had to think about it a little bit more.

And then I liked it even more. it kind of says it all. And then my husband said to me, are you going to use that name? And I said, yeah, I think I will. And he said, well, you know, you might think about copyrighting it. So I asked in my classes in Carl's bed, I said, does anybody here know anything about, you know, copywriting anything? IP law. Any IP lawyer's name? Yeah. And this one woman came up to me. She said, I work for my husband, who's an attorney, and my dad is a copyright attorney in Washington, D.C. for Westinghouse. So I think I could help you. She looked it up, and she and I filled out the form, sent him in, and we got the name.

And were you, I mean, I know that you were never that interested in money, but was it, was it, was it, were you making enough money to actually sustain your life at that point from just. teaching classes? We were. We were. Now, there were times when Jack took occasional jobs. One Christmas, he was a Santa. Another time he worked in a bakery, because he just wasn't that interested in going back into news. He'd had job offers, but he just, you know, he liked taking care of Shana and he liked seeing me do what I was doing. He was very supportive. And so, yeah, we were getting along. We weren't lavishly, you know, living, but it was, you know, it was fine. Meantime, you were, you got to a point where, because this is like pre sort of, I mean, there were microphones and PA systems in the 70s, but not like there are now where you could just

wear one on your hip and, or, you know, it was like Bluetooth wire. And they were expensive. So I think you were like, imagining you were shouting things out. Like, you know, now to the left. Right. And in the back, to the right. Okay, stretch it out. And you had to like pump people up, right?

This is like, like you watch Peloton today and they've all got like, you know, wireless mics around their, you know, their whatever, the mic mask or whatever they use. You were just shouting this stuff out, right? That's exactly what I was doing, yes. By 19, around 1977, I was teaching about 30 classes a week. What? Yeah. You know. How did you do that?

Well, my body was okay, but my voice, by the end of the week, by Friday, I was whispering. I had no voice. Wow, yeah. So I went to the doctor. The doctor said, Okay, you have nodules on your vocal cords. I can help you with them. First of all, you have to stay silent for five days and let the swelling go down.

He said, then you've got to figure out you've got to do something differently with what you're doing. He said, maybe you need to quit teaching so many classes. and, you know, I was devastated because that's scary. He said, if I didn't do something differently, I would lose my voice permanently. Wow. So I stopped talking for five days. Actually, Jack kept the notepad that I used to communicate, you know, like get me a glass of Dr. Pepper or whatever. Yeah.

And so during those five days, I had time to think. And I thought, maybe I could train some people to help me if I picked women who had been with me in my classes for a while and who had dance backgrounds or physical education backgrounds. So I trained five women, gave them the choreography notes, got the music for them. about a week later, I got all these calls from other customers saying, Oh, Judy, thank you so much for training these instructors,

because we knew you were going to cancel our class and we just didn't want that. And now you've got help. And they were great and thank you. And wow, that was such a relief, you know, off my shoulders. Hmm. But what about your voice? I mean, how were you going to keep from losing it again? Well, in the meantime, I went in search for a microphone for myself, and let me tell you, guys, it was a search. I went through every kind of mic there was. I had lovelier mics that hooked around my neck, but it was so big that it would bounce on my chest. And when I got done teaching a big old bruise, Finally, I found one that was a lovelier mic that was smaller and had kind of a big old battery pack, but I could get a belt, clip it onto the belt, and then stick the lovelier on my leotard.

And that worked pretty darn well. And it amplified my voice and my nodules went down. And as I trained instructors, they all got microphones like that. So I really believe I was certainly the pioneer of all that. Yeah. So all those Peloton instructors can thank you, Judy. You're welcome, Peloton instructors. So, I mean, this is a big turning point that now you realize that you don't have to do everything.

You can actually have other people do it. Yeah. Was a part of you just worried that even if you were going to train people to teach these now jazzercise classes, that they wouldn't be able to do it to the quality and level that you expected of yourself? Well, there were two sides of that. First is, yes, I was worried about that. And the second thing was, I was worried that they'd be too good and then nobody would like me anymore. Yeah, yeah. You know, my performer ego kind of came to light there, but it worked out.

And then as I got more requests for more classes, for new classes, the requests were coming from all over. People were coming from everywhere. So now I was bringing people. We would come to my little Reddit house in Vista, California. and train. And I had a lot of women who were either in the military or they were spouses, significant other, you know, and they got deployed or they had to move, and they wanted to keep teaching.

And they said, well, you know, can we? And I said, well, I guess so. let's try it, but it's really hard to interpret the written choreography into the real thing. But guess what came out on the market about that same time? Home recorders and video cameras. Yeah. And my husband and a background in broadcasting. So he said, well, I'll videotape you.

and then the instructors, whoever it is, we can send them the tape, and then they'll be able to see the real live thing. Wow. And it was brilliant. We were able to expand on a more national basis because of that. Because eventually we didn't have just two video recorders. Our living room in our little rented house in Vista was filled with recorders. Wow.

So that became... Just copying... copying, copying tapes and sending them out. Yeah. Wow, which, of course, meant that jazzers could go anywhere in the country, right? Like anywhere, anybody who had a video player. Right. And, you know, we had these military people moving out.

And then other people, for example, there was one of the gals who was in my class and she wanted to become an instructor. Her husband was the quarterback for the Cleveland Browns. Wow. So she went to a hospital. And then, of course, as she taught people in her class wanted to be instructors. And she said to me, Judy, can I train some of the, they all happen to be wives of the Browns. And I said, sure.

Okay. Let's break this down a little bit. When you first had these women who wanted to teach jazzercise in Cleveland, how did you structure it? How did you make sure that, you know, you, you know, because it wouldn't be fair if they just took. your idea and then just charge people and made money from it. Well, when I trained those first instructors, we worked out a commission process that they would pay me a certain percentage for the choreography and the instruction and the training, and then the rest of it they could keep.

And then when people started moving to other parts of the country, the instructors continue to pay a percentage back to jazzercise. Right. Because you were sending them videotapes of new choreographed material. And by the way, these instructors, just to be clear, they were not like going and getting a brick-and-mortar studio that said jazzercise. They were teaching jazzercise at like community centers, just like you were doing it, like YMCA's and rec centers, right?

Yeah, and a lot of them, even in church basements. and some churches had gymnasiums, so that worked for them. And by the way, that's still the model to this day. It is, but we have a lot more brick and mortar now. Yeah, right. Well, and of course, eventually I stopped going out and had my own brick and mortar place as well. But now I realized I had to have some help with this organization. It was just growing like crazy.

And so the woman who had to help me with the copyright, I asked her, would you be able to come and kind of be my manager for all of this? And she said, oh, my God, I'd love to. I don't want to work for my husband anymore. And I want to get my MBA. So she said, I can do that and work for you. And her name was Margaret Stanton. And she was with me for over 20 years.

Wow. And became my C-O-O. I mean, so cool. And by the way, before we go on, voice feeling okay? So far, so good. Okay, great. I read that in 1979, this is essentially 11, 10, 11 years after you started to teach what would become jazzercise, you finally incorporated the company.

Like, it was not an incorporated business until 1979. Right. So I have to imagine by that point you thought, all right, this is a business, this is what I do now. Yeah. Well, I had to. I mean, it was growing. I brought in another woman who kind of helped me with marketing. Then I had to get an accountant, of course, and an attorney. And I actually asked a couple of people to be workshop trainers for me. So the new instructors would come to the workshop, and I wouldn't have to train them, but these designated women that I trusted were then the trainers. That was a great thing to be able to have them do that. But then all of these instructors, they're all independent contractors.

So, you know, we're getting, there's like a thousand of them now, and they're all over hither. thither. And my accountant and my attorney, they said, you know, you're going to have to make a decision here because you're asking more from them than just being an independent contractor. So you don't fit into that niche and you're going to get into trouble if you don't make some changes. And I said, okay, give me my options. And they said, well, you can make them in employees, or you can make them a franchisee. And this is like 1980, around 80, 81, and I said, okay, well, I know what employees are, and I don't want to do that because all these women feel like it's their business.

You know, they know they're tied into me, but they have a lot of options, and it's their own business and I don't want to take that away from them. So they said, well, then franchising is the way to go. But, you know, at the time, franchising wasn't what it is today. Back then, it was Burger King or McDonald's. Yeah. You know, we didn't quite fit into every little niche, but we fit into enough. So we turned it around and we made it into a franchise and I didn't lose one instructor. that I can remember. Everybody understood it, you know. And how did you set that up,

that they would basically pay a franchise fee up front and then a percentage fee every month or something like that? Correct. Yeah. They would have a low franchise fee, which really paid for their training. Yeah. And then they would have a continuing franchise fee,

which would be monthly, based on the amount of money that they took in. And, you know, that worked well. And in fact, in the 80s, there were two big franchises, us and Domino's pizza, which is kind of ironic because it's sort of like, well, Domino's kind of kept us in business. And then we would get people fed and they could go eat their pizza, you know. So it was a trait. Yeah. From what I understand, the model that you put out was very unorthodox and really interesting.

I mean, I guess at the time, initially, the cost to start a Jazzercise franchise was 500 bucks, which is very doable. Right. But then there was a 30% commission rate that would go back to Jazzercise. So that enabled somebody to kind of start up quickly, recover their startup costs pretty quickly. then they're off to the races, I guess. Exactly. And even today, our startup fee is only $1,250, $1,250. But so you had that expense and your wardrobe,

and, you know, it's a little bit more involved than that. We have better sound systems. For people who have brick and mortar, it's going to be more expensive. But they have control of that as far as, if they do have a brick and mortar, if they don't build it themselves and they rent it, it's, you know, their rent and their build out and all that. Did you go out to seek any money to, I mean, did you need money? Was it just entirely self-funded? Did you go out and look for loans or to investors or anything like that? Well, we were doing fine. We never really had to do that. And there was one time that, um,

Margaret, my COO, said, well, you know, I think we should try to get a line of credit just in case something big comes up and we need money for it. And so we had been banking with this one bank in Carlsbad and their corporate headquarters were in L.A. So we go to L.A. We have all of our papers, all of our ducks in a row to show them how well we're doing and everything. And so the gentleman looks through everything. And I could tell he wasn't impressed. And he looked at me and he said, well, looks like you're doing really well in the Southern California area and a few other places.

But he said, you know, I just don't see this as being something. that will grow. And, you know, it's an exercise thing, and I just don't know if that's really going to catch on. Wow. And that was it. Yeah. And out the door we went, well, you know, here we are a guy 51 years later and still thriving, and that bank went out of business like seven years after I had talked to that guy. So I don't know. Who's the smart one here?

When we come back in just a moment, how in those very early days of fitness marketing, Judy stumbled on the idea that there was money in merch. Stay with us. I'm Guy Raz, and you're listening to How I Built This from NPR. Hey, welcome back to How I Built This from NPR. I'm Guy Raz. So it's the early 1980s, and Jazzercise is starting to Framble. and it's starting to make money.

And Judy is starting to make a name for herself. I had written a book in the late 70s with another woman who happened to be in my class. So we wrote this book with pictures of how to do different exercises and, you know, a little history of dance and all of that. And the publisher was Bannon Books, which was quite a large publisher. And my husband said, well, what are they going to do to market the book? And I said, well, I don't know what they're going to do to promote it. But the Dinah Shore show was a big hit.

Huge. There's a national talk like chat show, right? Yes. And I had this one woman who was helping me a lot with marketing, who was gregarious and good. And she just kind of kept after him. And after a few months, absolutely, they called me and off. I went, did the show, and it was very successful. The book sold over 400,000 copies.

Wow. Which is, at the time, I didn't know if that was good or bad. It didn't sound like it was very good to me. That's insane. That's insane today. I know. I know. But anyway, I, you know, okay.

So then the interesting thing was I went on the show, but I thought, before I went on, I thought, you know, I need to wear something that says jazzercise on it. And I had an instructor who was also an artist and a good friend. And I said, Connie, can you design like a logo? And we'll put it on the front of the leotard. And she designed this cute jazzercise and had a couple of little exercise dancer figures on it. And I wore it on the show.

Well, when I taught class the next day, everybody came up to me. Where can we get those leotards? We want those, you know. And what about a T-shirt? And I was like, oh, my gosh. So I went to Connie, and I said, hey, do you want to go into business with me a little bit? We'll make some T-shirts and some leotards and sell them in class and see what happens. So that's what we did.

And we sold out in two days. Wow. And that was the beginning of Jazzercise Apparel, which is a big part of our business today. Judy, was there in any way a connection between the women's rights movement that really kind of began to take shape in the 70s around the Equal Rights Amendment and the rise of jazzercise? Was there any kind of conscious or unconscious connection that you felt recognized? Well, you know, I was always an advocate for women's rights ever since my Northwestern days. But I have always tried to keep jazzercise apolitical, a religious, you know, all of those things. But on my own, I was always vocal about women.

women's rights. And I was always proud that I was helping women become business people and to build a business that they could use and hopefully thrive with. So in my own way, even though we were not, you know, standing on our soapbox preaching women's rights, we were doing it in a subtle way. And we still do today, of course. You know, really, my earliest memory of jazzercise was when I was a kid, this is in the early, early 80s, maybe 81 or 82, watching my mom put that VHS tape in the VHS machine. I always remember the theme song. It was like the San Diego Zoo and there was the elephants and there was on the beach and it was jazz. And it was jazz.

Let's go jazzercising. I'll never forget that. And I remember my mom, who's now 75 and an incredible shape and has been a yoga practitioner. She was always experimenting with what was coming out and trying these different fitness programs. And jazz exercise is a big part of that. But as you became bigger and as this became, I mean, I think by 1983, from what I understand, you were, it was like a $40 million company. This was a major enterprise, right?

Yeah. Around that time, you start to see celebrities. Jane Fonda starts to get into this business. I remember Olivia Newton-John, let's get physical, right? And wearing the leg warmers and all that stuff. Like, that was a thing. Yeah. It started to become a fashion trend.

What did you think about that? What did you think about the celebrity kind of entry into this space that really was pretty much you at that point? Yeah. Well, it never really bothered me because I felt. like the people who were celebrities, and of course we have Richard Simmons as well, you know, all getting into it. It just gave people more awareness.

And then they could pick what they wanted to do. But I don't consider myself a celebrity. I am the founder of this program and this company. And we have many, many, many people who are representative of the program in our instructors, whereas the people who are celebrities are pretty much just that. You know, they were just one person.

We were thousands of people. And, you know, there were times when, you know, I've met Jane and all those other people and we've gotten awards, all of us together. And, you know, it's always very friendly and it's always been just fine. So the 80s really just boom. I mean, I think you went from, you know, in 19801 or something,

$2 million in revenue to 1983, $40 million, just massive rapid growth. Yeah. And then the 90s happen. Yeah. And a few things happen in the 90s. For one, yoga starts to become more popular and Pilates. And from what I understand, the 90s would turn out to be. one of the hard, if not the hardest decade for jazzercise. What happened?

Yeah, it was. It was a hard decade. You know, we'd been around for a long time. And we were having instructors retire. And when they retired, their classes weren't, you know, replaced. And there weren't enough people who were becoming new instructors, essentially. Right. Right. So we weren't able to hold on to some of those customers.

But one of the things that we did is we put together a new structure to help us with that problem called a Jazzercise Associate, which is an instructor who doesn't run a business, who only teaches for instructors who own their own Jazzercise business. So now, if an owner decided to retire, usually there was. was an associate who could take over and keep the customers and keep the classes. That worked really well. Right. You know, this is, I mean, this is going to be a sort of a slightly annoying thing for you to hear. There is a perception among certain people who know about soul cycle, let's say, or who go to, you know, yoga classes or Pilates or do Pelotan or even Zumba. That jazzercise, like, you know, every once in a while, people say, oh, is that still around? Still around.

Yeah. And how do you feel when you hear that? Does that frustrate you? Well, sure, it's a little frustrating, but I certainly accept it and understand why people might think that way. The thing about it is we're really thriving right now in a time when a lot of other people. businesses are not, and a lot of other fitness businesses are not thriving. I think it's when people say, oh, is jazzercise still around? Or are they still, you know, doing what my mom used to do? Well, I say to them, stop and think for a minute. Would we still be around if we were doing the same

things. Of course not. The reason where the only fitness company that started way back when that's still thriving is because we've made good choices. We have changed through the decades. We've never stayed the same. I know that there are like 8,500 jazzercise franchises around the world. Do you know off the top of your head how many brick and order, jazzer size locations there are? Yeah, I think there's about a thousand. Wow, around the world. So that's, yeah, there may be more because things change, you know.

And it's still just $1,200 bucks to start a franchise. Yeah, $1,250. Right, $1, $1,50. And then you pay a 20% fee or every month or whatever from receipts. And in the COVID era, how have you guys been able to weather this? because you depend on instructors selling classes and then paying you a share of those classes. Now it's mostly, much of that is happening remotely.

I have to imagine it has been a challenging year. Yeah, it's been challenging, but we're really doing quite well. We were able to pivot almost overnight. the minute our classes shut down, we were able to bring our customers all over the world onto our Jazzercise on-demand app so that they wouldn't have to miss class because they could do them online. And with this app, they can do them at 3 in the morning or whatever works for you. So that really kept a lot of our customers with us.

Now, granted, sure, we've lost some. But as time has evolved, we not only have those kinds of classes available. We also helped our instructors be able to live stream their own classes to their own customers. So they've been able to keep them. One of the interesting things that I came across, because I confess, I have never taken a job. exercise class. I've seen the videos of my mom. I remember the, but I've never been to one. Well, those are old. So you need to go. I do. I do. I need to do it. But from what I've read and seen, the classes actually attract a significantly more diverse, you know, like a group of clients than

like a soul cycle or yoga class. And I guess part of the reason that people say or believe that it is is because the price point is actually fairly reasonable, right? Like, how much does an average jazz or size class cost? Well, each franchise is different depending on the area that they're in and so forth. But the average would be maybe around $79 a month. And you could just take as many classes as you want. Right. Right.

Which is cheaper than many, like, you know, yoga studios and stuff. Yeah. Yeah. So there's a lot of options. and the diversity is what we love. And we always say to our franchisees, when you look out at your customers, you should be seeing all kinds of different people,

all kinds of body shapes, all kinds of colors and ages. And because somebody who is older, 65, can do the class right along a somebody who's 25. And, you know, you make friends with a 25-year-old or a 25-year-old goes to coffee with, you know, 35-year-olds and everybody enjoys it. You know, Judy, I'm wondering, as your business grew, right, from a little dance class at a rec center into a now-a-one-dollar business, did you like becoming a CEO? Did you like running a business? Because, I mean, you always wanted to be a professional dancer, right? So did that side of it come naturally to you?

Was that something that you came to embrace? You know, it was fun. I mean, I think it did come naturally to me, even though my mother used to say when I was growing up, because she was such a great business person. but she always would say, oh, Judy, you'll never be a business person because she just don't have a head for figures. But let me tell you, the secret, I think, to anybody's success is having people around you who lift you up. People who are passionate about your passion, but who have their own passion that they bring to the party.

And I have been extremely lucky in being able to have those kinds of people around me all the time. They're smart, and I want them to be smarter than I am. I think that's one of my gifts to find people like that. And let them help me because goodness knows I don't know everything. Well, it's also a smart strategy because you can't scale, one person. And also, if you want to build a legacy company, right, you want to build something that doesn't need that person. That's exactly right. And I've got to tell you, if something happened to me tomorrow, this company would go on. It would be wonderful.

When you think about your journey and all you accomplished and the influence you've had, How much of that would you attribute to luck and how much would you attribute to just hard work and, you know, skill and intelligence? Yeah, I think it's 50-50. For me, that's really what I feel. I think, you know, timing has been right in so many instances, which we talked about. But then, you know, the timing can be right and it can be sitting right out there in front of you. but if you don't take advantage of it and you don't have the awareness

that this is something you've got to do and you're going to have to work your dairy air off to make it happen, then it ain't going to happen. Judy, you were intending to be a dancer. That was your dream and then maybe a Broadway performer. It was never your plan to become a fitness pioneer.

Like when people talk about fitness pioneers of the 20th century, they're talking about Jack Lillane. They're talking about Richard Simmons. They're talking about Judy Shepard Massett. And I'm sure I'm forgetting a few others. But, I mean, you really created a movement. I mean, when you reflect on that, that you are, like, historically an important figure in the history of American fitness. Is that just crazy, that thought? Yeah. It is. I. I find it still hard to believe. I'm very honored by it, and I respect it, and I feel responsible.

But, yeah, it's still often difficult for me to believe because, you know, at heart, and this might sound sappy, but at heart, I still feel like I'm that little Iowa girl, you know, growing up in the Midwest. having that hard work ethic and get up in the morning and do what you can and make a difference. So if I can say that I've made a difference in somebody's life and more people than I would have thought, I will die happy. I will. That's Judy Shepard, Masset, founder of Jazzercise. By the way, Judy's daughter, Shanna, is now pre-year-old.

president of the company, but Judy is still the CEO, and she is still teaching and still dancing. In fact, some of the women who first signed up for those early classes in the 1970s are still taking classes with Judy today. And once a week, they all get together for coffee. And even though she's one of the iconic fitness gurus in America, Judy swears by Dr. Pepper, especially cherry flavor. Hey, thanks so much for listening to the show this week. You can subscribe wherever you get your podcasts. You can also write to us at H-I-B-T-NPR.org.

And if you want to follow us on Twitter, we're at How I Built This or at Guy Raz. And my Instagram is at guy.org. Our show was produced this week by Jed Anderson with music composed by Rumtine Arablewe. Thanks also to Julia Carney, Farah Safari, Dareth Gales, J.C. Howard, Neva Grant, and Jeff Rogers. Our brand new intern is Janet Lee. I'm Guy Raz, and you've been listening to How I Built This. This is NPR.