Stop: Corona Time
Where is Shut Up & Dance after lockdown?
Offering our classes online has always been a goal of ours, and we’ve always known they’d be a challenge to pull off when it came to paying for the music (you need a sync license for video content, and it can be thousands of dollars for just one song). We put it on the “Five Year Plan” list. Plus, why would we need to prioritise virtual classes when we get so much joy and value from our existing community?!
Our focus has always been on our people – what do they want and need? The answer has always been (and always will be): A space to shut up and dance. Get the moves wrong. Touch yourself. Strut. Pull your best facial expressions. Hair flick. Laugh. Pelvic salute. All without mirrors and definitely no videos or photos. A space for anyone and everyone to channel their inner Britney/John Travolta without judgement.
When we were planning how to continue classes during lockdown, we were talking in circles. The music licensing and logistical challenges we’d been faced with in the past were still there so we made the call to simply put them on Instagram Live for free. We’re experts in pop videos, 90’s music and cheesy dance moves – so we thought we’ll just keep doing what we know by dancing, and curating pandemic-free content and playlists each week. It just felt like the right move - to keep it simple and do what we know - while everything was so uncertain.
It was a pretty bold move for us though; suddenly our classes weren’t so mysterious, we weren’t able to manage the atmosphere, AND people weren’t only filming themselves, they were proactively sharing videos of themselves too. So essentially, our approach and everything we thought was unique to our business was turned upside down.
However, we also previously thought our community was awesome. We were wrong. It’s fucking awesome. We’ve had unconditional support from our incredible community, with up to 250 people tuning into our classes, purchasing merchandise and spreading genuine, thrilling word about our business.
We’ve received super sweaty, super sexy, super off-beat and super clumsy videos from people doing our classes from their living rooms, with their kids, their dogs and their partners. It’s been really refreshing to see that our people still don’t give a f*** about anything other than being the best version of themselves. It’s so exciting. And, we’ve found new people who’ve cautiously joined our Instagram Live only to realise its the gym membership they’ve always been looking for!
But it’s also been an uncomfortable pivot - many of our usual participants had to create an instagram account, our instructors had to learn how to teach a class without the usual energy and obviously we’ve had zero cashflow. It was definitely not how we imagined our online launch.
Nevertheless, we’re really glad we listened to our gut, and we’re feeling a little more prepared to deliver our virtual classes behind a paywall with our new, official live streaming platform (in a matter of days, we hope!). We want to continue to serve the community; our existing participants, our new participants and those that are struggling financially too with a Pay It Forward scheme.
While we’ll always stay true to our no photo, no video, no mirror policy, we’re now looking the whole virtual fitness thing in a different light. The tone of our FaceTime meetings range from sassy and excited to anxious and flustered; it’s been overwhelming, stressful, blurry and inspiring all at once, so we’re just taking every day as it comes, and cannot wait for the day that we can high five again.