The company was founded in 2011 in NYC by Stephanie Harris and Paul Zunno. Stephanie is a dancer, choreographer and personal trainer and Paul is a songwriter, guitarist and singer.

About 5 years before starting the company, their first project was an acoustic rock concert with modern dance that toured throughout the US. They would do master classes at local colleges and studios and the students would perform as guests in the show.

During this project Stephanie came up with an idea to tie jump ropes to Paul's chair for dancers to dance with like a partner. It didn't make the show because the jump ropes pulled the chair all over the place. LOL.

Then, they decided to audition for So You Think You Can Dance to promote the concert. The judges loved the music, but felt the dancing was too lyrical for the rockin' music.

Stephanie agreed and decided to start over. She remembered a clip from a dance history class in college at the University of Minnesota of Hellzapoppin'. That was the type of energy she needed to match the music. To her surprise, the choreographer from the movie, Frankie Manning, was alive and taught classes in NYC. Unfortunately, he was in is 90's and had stopped teaching. He had been training a select group of dancers for years. So, she started taking private and group classes from his proteges to make sure she learned as much as possible.

What she discovered was that participants struggled learning while holding on to another person. There was a lot of clenched hands, bruised toes and awkward moments. Participants also took a long time to grasp musicality. Classes were expensive and only once a week. She noticed that people weren't progessing very quickly and there was a lot of people who didn't stick with it. They wanted to dance, but this set up wasn't working for them.

As a professional dancer, trained in ballet and modern dance, she was able to attend class daily in NYC using gear like ballet barres to practice and improve. With partner dance she wanted to practice in between classes in a similiar way. She asked around for what people did and no one had an answer except to hold onto a door knob. This made no sense because you can't practice anything useful with a door knob, including a proper grip.

Then, she remembered her jump rope idea.

It could be the perfect solution, but the grip was all wrong and the rope needed to have elasticity. It took a few tries at the back of a hardware store on the Upper East Side of NYC to get the handle shape, then countless attempts to finalize it at home. They tested every strength of bungee to get the resistance just right.

Since Stephanie wanted to dance to Paul's rock music she taught him how to dance. He quickly realize the songs would need a specific rhythm. So he got to work writing songs that groove just right.

Stephanie got to work developing a fitness class that got the most out of the gear while combining the most beneficial elements of dance and fitness. She needed a solution to help people understand musicality faster since the goal is a workout. So, she came up with putting clicks over the music as a guide and The Click Method was born.

They had the prototypes and a method. Now, to see if others liked the idea.

Most people they both knew would never go to dance studio. So, since she had a successful private training business with elite clients like the Creative Director of Coach, she decided to get a job at a private, corporate company with locations throughout NYC. She auditioned the class and they gave her 6 locations including: Goldman Sachs, Fox News, NY Presbyterian Hospital and Hearst.

It was a hit!

During the first class, Stephanie realized she couldn't teach people how to twist and turn while they were wearing sneakers. People were there to get in shape, not to get injured. Even if it was their favorite class, no one was going to go out an buy dance shoes. So, along with Paul they designed The DanceSocks!

The participants at her classes asked to keep The DanceSocks for their other classes.

So, they located a manufacturer in North Carolina who agreed to work with them to make The DanceSocks. They had turned away Sara Blakely from Spanx so they were more open to women coming in with ideas they didn't really understand.

The DanceSocks for Smooth Floors took over a year in development to get the fit and function just right. They launched in July of 2012 and have since become one of the most useful innovations in dance. The DanceSocks are used by all styles of dance and dance fitness.

They started to receive numerous requests from customers for a solution to dance on carpeted floors at the Zumba convention, at home and at corporate wellness centers. They teamed up with their manufacturer and over the course of 2 years developed The DanceSocks for Carpeted Floors.

In 2014, the company relocated the headquarters to California to source USA manufacturing for The DanceSwing handles and the 20 lbs steel shot bag with swivel.

They did it and now it is available to everyone!

Paul has created a dream team of musicians to make dance music that rocks.

Guitar & Vocals: Paul Zunno (Wilson Pickett)
Drummer: Kenney Aranoff (John Mellenamp)
Bass: Tony Franklin (The Firm)
B3 & Piano: Chuck Levell (The Rolling Stones)

Now we are working day and night to continually add fitness classes and new songs to the DanceSwing App to keep you on your toes.

Our elite, professional team is always available to help you on your journey to get fit through dance in a brand new exciting way. Our products are designed to keep you healthy and make you more athletic so you can live a more fulfilling, active life.

Want to join our team or have questions? Let us know below!