On 27 May 2011, we celebrated our first successful year of Jhooming with a special preview of the Just Jhoom! Dance-Fitness DVD and a first birthday party at the fabulous Surrey Sports Park.
So much has happened in the last 12 months – and here are some of the highlights that we would like to share with you.
27 May 2010 – at 11am Just Jhoom! was launched simultaneously at Cranleigh Arts Centre, online at www.justjhoom.co.uk and on Body In Balance TV.
In June 2010 we ran a competition on Facebook asking people to send us their interpretation of a Just Jhoom! dance to the Just Jhoom! theme song – we got entries from all over the world including one from Australia. Check out the winners on http://www.justjhoom.co.uk/node/31
In July 2010 we got accreditation from REPs for our main instructor training course – making the Just Jhoom! Fitness Certification Course the first of its kind in the world!
In August we got Wigwam PR on board, and with them our media presence has gone from strength to strength with features on BBC TV South Today, BBC Look North, BBC Asian Network Radio, BBC Surrey Radio, Colourful Radio, Body In Balance, Sky Sports, Fitpro, Pulse Magazine, Surrey Advertiser, Horsham Resident, Sportsister, Asian Woman Mag, Newcastle Journal, Farnham Herald, Gravesend News Shopper to name just a few!
In September we released our first training dates and began to get enquiries from London, Kent, Cornwall, Newcastle and Birmingham.
In October we ran our first Instructor course at the state-of-the-art Surrey Sports Park– and trained our first 11 instructors. Since then we have trained 55 instructors in all.
In November Hayley Crawford became our first fully fledged Just Jhoom! Instructor, doing the course and final assessment in a record 3 weeks, and Desrin Wickington starting the first Just Jhoom! class outside of Surrey in Kent.
In December we did a training session with Surrey Storm Netball team at Surrey Sports Park and subsequently were featured on SKY Sports.
In January 2011 we were invited to Newcastle to do an in-house training course for instructors up there – Just Jhoom! away for the week.
In February we shot the first ever Dance-Fitness DVD with Matt Wright from Freehand directing and producing it. Matt did all the negotiations with Yash Raj Films to ensure that this became the first DVD of its kind – the first ever to feature Bollywood music – and that too with the blessing of a huge Bollywood film production house like YRF. Please visit www.justjhoom.co.uk to order your copy!
In March we were at the Move It Dance and Vitality Shows and met so many wonderful people who were potential instructors or class Jhoomers.
In April we launched Just Jhoom! Holidays with Club Dance Holidays and you can now go on Just Jhoom! weekends where you spend all weekend Jhooming! Contact us for more info on how to book!
In May, we paid a visit to the fantastic Champneys Resorts and as a result our best instructors have been to invited to present Masterclasses at all the Champneys Resorts starting soon!
We started our birthday week with a visit from Ben Hammond from Free to Dance. Ben started his Funkathon – 131 days of dancing with 131,000 people with a Just Jhoom! session. Ben will be looking to break the world record for the longest uninterrupted dance – 131 hours – taking place from 11th to 16th October at The Scoop in London – where Just Jhoom! will be joining him. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FtyVrRVU7Mc
We ended the first year, and started the second with a fabulous, Jhooming celebration at Surrey Sports Park. 75 guests ate, drank and Jhoomed – making it a very special evening indeed!
And so to the future…..we have a lot of things in the pipeline, including new workshops, new merchandise and as ever new instructors starting classes all over the UK. Stick with us as we embark on our second Jhooming year!