As restrictions ease, Go Dance plans June 1 re-opening
Go Dance has been providing a place in West Knox County for those wishing to learn ballroom dancing for 16 years.
With Phase 2 to start Thursday, May 28, Brandon Belcher, Go Dance’s marketing and communications coordinator, said June 1 was always a “soft target. We just finalized that (date) this week.
“If everything goes well … Phase 2 allows for gatherings of 50 people or more, travel restrictions are eased a little bit, so it would allow the studio to open and operate at a reduced level but still be open,” he explained.
Still, with students’ concerns in mind, Gordon will be using stricter Phase 1 guidelines.
“We’re taking extra precautions to make sure our students and staff are safe,” Belcher added.
Until then, Gordon said, “We stay engaged with our instructors.
“We have daily conversations with all of our employees, make sure they’re OK, checking on them financially, mentally,” he added. “And, we stay engaged with our active students through our Facebook page, text messaging and phone calls.”
The studio also has been offering free online classes three times a week.
“And I recently started a newsletter that goes out to everyone, and I follow up with them with e-mail about classes,” Belcher said.
Go Dance instructors teach all partnership-style ballroom and Latin dances, Gordon said. Those include waltzes, tangos, foxtrots, cha chas, rumbas, swings and even some country-Western dances.
“Our demographic has changed quite a bit over the years,” he added.
When he started teaching, the clientele usually was retirement-aged, but Gordon said, with the popularity of two dance movies and “Dancing With the Stars” TV show on ABC, which started in 2005, the student demographic shifted to young to middle-aged adults.
Gordon got into the dance business in 1991 “quite accidentally.”
After graduating from college with a bachelor’s degree in robotics, he got a three-month contract job with “an almost guarantee with the contract to go permanent,” he added.
However, at the end of the three months, Gordon was told the contract was not extended.
“I was out of work and my trail was cold,” he said.
While perusing the newspaper for work, Gordon came across an ad for a dance studio in Nashville and decided to give it a try.
“I fell in love with it right away,” he said. “I saw the potential in it to be a long-term career. It made me happy, so I never looked back.”
Gordon moved up from instructor to management before he transferred to Go Dance | Knoxville, which was started in 1984. He managed Go Dance for 10 years before he bought the business in 2004.
For more information, call 865-584-0009 or visit its website at www.GoDanceKnox.com
