Celebrity fitness trainer, Beto Perez, stumbled upon the concept of Latin-inspired dance-fitness in his native Cali, Colombia in the mid-90s.

One day, he walked into his aerobics class and realized he had forgotten his aerobics music. Thinking quickly, he grabbed whatever tapes he had in his backpack. Betos tapes were comprised of songs he loved, the traditional Latin salsa and merengue music he listened to all his life. But it was a challenge to improvise a whole class on the spot using non-traditional aerobics music. Beto rose to the challenge and from this last-minute improvisation a revolutionary new concept in fitness was born the Zumba Fitness-Party! The class soon became the most popular class at his fitness facility.

Timeline1999After his success is Colombia, Beto brought the class to the United States, and in 2001 he was approached by entrepreneurs Alberto Perlman and Alberto Aghion to create a global company based on his fitness philosophy. The three young entrepreneurs trademarked the word Zumba fitness and set a goal to expand the brand all over the world.2002Perlman and Aghion secured a deal with a large infomercial company to launch the concept nationwide resulting in the sale of hundreds of thousands of videos in the U.S. market. The overwhelming response created a demand for more Zumba instructors, so Zumba Fitness created an instructor training program to satisfy the growing demand. The program was an instant success. By September 2006, there were thousands of Zumba instructors worldwide.2003Zumba Fitness teamed with the Kellogg Company to develop a fitness campaign for the Hispanic market. The Kellogg Company has since expanded the campaign to five additional countries. The Zumba program has been featured on millions of boxes of Kelloggs Special K cereal around the world.2004Zumba Fitness launched a successful infomercial campaign in Spanish for the U.S. Hispanic market and Latin America, increasing sales to millions of DVDs in over 30 countries.2005The explosive demand for Zumba instructors across the nation and abroad spurred the creation of the Zumba Academy, the educational division of Zumba Fitness. With top-notch leadership from a diversified team of professional choreographers, fitness experts and certified education specialists, the Zumba Academy has raised the bar and set a new standard in fitness programs, ensuring the highest level of integrity, quality and dedication to excellence, and exceeding industry standards.CelebrityFITNESS TRAINER, Alberto "Beto" Perez, stumbled upon the concept of Latin inspired fitness in his native country of Colombia (South America) in the mid 1990's. One day, he walked into his class and realized that he had forgotten hisaerobicsmusic, and his only option was to grab whatever tapes he had in his car. Betos tapes were comprised of the songs that he loved, the traditional Latin salsa and merengue music with which he had been raised. But it was a challenge to improvise a whole class on the spot using non-traditional aerobics music. Beto rose to the challenge and from this last-minute improvisation was born a revolutionaryFITNESS PROGRAM Zumba! The class soon became the most popular class at his fitness facility.In 1999, after his success in Colombia, Beto brought the class to the United States, where he was approached by entrepreneurs Alberto Perlman and Alberto Aghion to create a global company based on theZumba fitnessphilosophy. The three young entrepreneurs then set a goal to offer Zumba classes all over the world.In 2002, Perlman and Aghion secured a deal with a largeinfomercial companyto launch the conceptnationwideresulting in the sale of hundreds of thousands of videos to the US market. The overwhelming response created a demand formoreZumba instructors, and Zumba created anINSTRUCTOR TRAININGprogram. The program was an instant success. By September 2006, there were over 2000 Zumba instructors worldwide.In 2003, Zumba teamed with Kellogg's to develop a fitness campaign for the Hispanic market. Kellogg's has since expanded the campaign to five additional countries and has consistently renewed the relationship with Zumba every year. Zumba has been featured in over 1.5 million boxes of Special K cereal around the world.The following year, in 2004, Zumba launched a successful infomercial campaign in Spanish for the US Hispanic market and Latin America, increasing sales to more than 2.5 million DVDs in over 30 countries.Zumba Fitness has become one of the fastest-growing, dance-based fitness crazes in the country, with people of all ages falling in love with its infectious music, easy-to-followdance moves, and body-beautifying benefits.

Zumba Fitness' three founders--Alberto Perlman, Alberto Aghion, and Alberto "Beto" Perez--talk about turning a passion for dance into a rapidly-growing business.What happens when three Colombian expats in Miami put their heads together to launch a new business? In the case of the three Albertosdot.comentrepreneurAlberto Perlman, his childhood friend Alberto Aghion, and dancer and choreographer Alberto Beto Perezthe result is a vast fitness empire sweeping gyms from Manhattan to Milwaukee: Zumba Fitness. Conventional workout classes may seem like, or even be described openly as, boot camp sessions; Zumba feels like a dance party that just happens to have fitness side effects. The startup that kicked off with 200 of Beto Perezs fiercest fans shown dancing on a beach in a video filmed on a shoestring budgetmorethan a decade ago is today a global phenomenon that has spread from Miami to Mumbai, Cape Town to Beijingand even the Pentagon, home to the bootcamp approach to fitness. The companys growth has been just as explosive. The privately held company doesnt disclose details of its finances, but it is now a business empire with an estimated valuation of $500 million, 250 direct employees, tens of thousands of licensed instructors, and courses offered in 150 different countries.Zumba is the kind of phenomenon that could only have gotten its start in todays Miami, where so many Latin American trends and traditions in food, music, and art mix and mingle with their US counterparts to create something altogether novel. Miami, explains Perlman (the companys CEO andmarketingand business development expert), helped us with the image and is part of our brand. It offers South Beach coolness with classic Latin American and Colombian flavor, mixing them into something unique and distinctive.The impetus for the phenomenon belongs to Perez, who crafted his dance-basedworkoutroutine while still working as a choreographer (clients included Shakira) and dance and fitness instructor in Bogot back in the 1990s. I wanted more. My country felt too small, and I wanted to challenge myself, Perez explains today. Four trips to Miami reinforced his conviction that this was the place where he couldtesthis new approach to fitness, discovered almost by accident in the early 90s when he forgot his usual aerobics music tape at home and instead popped a mix tape of classical Colombian dance musiccumbia, salsa, merengue, and moreinto the player. It was a hit in his hometown, and Perezs voyages of discovery to Miami made him realize that nothing like it existed in the United States. I think that Miami was waiting for me; what I did wasnt there, so there would be a space for me, he says.It didnt hurt that Perez found ready-made fans among the Colombian expats who had begun to relocate to Miami in the late 1990s or to establish second homes there and in the surrounding communities, such as Aventura and Key Biscayne. One of these was Perlmans mother; when her sonsInternetincubator flamed out during the dot.com crash, she suggested that he find a way to create a new business with Beto Perez. I had been complaining about how I was 23 years old, broke, and unemployable, and she said, Maybe you could start a gym or something. But when Perlman dropped in to watch one of Perezs classes at a Miami gym, he realized that there was potential for something much bigger. I was watching people enjoying a workout instead of feeling that they had to be there, and none looked at their watch the whole time!Back then, in 2001, Miami may have been a hot dance and entertainment scene, but it wasnt viewed as a logical place to start a new fitness business. Not only was the fitness world not an obvious one for a Latino businessman, Perlman says, but the hubs of that industry were Los Angeles and New York, both cities where trainers could attract the kind of celebrity following that would allow them to build a brand name. The AlbertosPerlman brought in Aghion, his best friend since the age of 5, as president and COOtook a different approach to growth, focusing on Betos Miami clubs and infomercials, as well as the Midwest. Thanks to that first video, filmed on a Miami beach, they teamed up with an Ohio company to produce a collection of tapes and DVDs, marketed via infomercial, and suddenly found themselves fielding calls from people all over the country eager to take classes and become Zumba instructors. Where middle-class mainstream Americans in Kansas City and Milwaukee went, celebrities like Jennifer Lopez,Natalie Portman, and Victoria Beckham have followed. The trios efforts have put Miami on the map as the next fitness industry hub.Initially, the Albertos had thought to profit principally from selling the dance fitness videos. When their cell phone service couldnt handle the volume of all the calls, the trio decided to branch out into teaching and training; five times the number of attendees they had expected showed up at their first session at a Miami hotel in 2003. That modelrelying on fans to proselytize and to generate funds for the company by running their own businesseshas proved immensely successful for Zumba. To become licensed requires eight hours of formal instruction, at an average cost of about $250. But thats just the tip of the iceberg: The vast majority of newly fledged instructors continue to generate a stream of revenue for Zumba by signing up for ZIN, the Zumba Instructor Network. In exchange for $30 a month, they receive new choreography and new music (students get bored with the same routine, however much fun it is at first) as well as marketing support and links to job openings worldwide. Zumba also generates revenue from the sales of its accessories, clothing, and footwear (sales are expected to nearly double this year from 1.8 million units in 2012), its own CDs, and at-home workout DVDs, as well as from video games (more than 8 million of those sold to date).Perez, the companys chief creative officer, is also the brands global ambassador, showing up at the annual instructor convention or dashing off to visit Zumba classes in China, all the time trying to push the envelope in terms of choreography. It has to stay fresh, he says. We only succeed if our instructors succeed, and I feel the responsibility of providing them with the material to do so. Part of that creative process involves Perlmans push to identify and develop new Latin artists. Were like a radio station, he says. About 14 million people now take Zumba classes every week, so this is a great way to introduce up-and-coming artists to a potential audience. Perlman and Zumba team up with Latino musicians such as rapper Pitbull (born Armando Prez, the son of Cuban immigrants to Florida) to create music for Zumba classes; two CDs featuring original Zumba music as well as other music hits used in the routines and released in Europe in partnership with Universal Music Enterprises have just gone platinum in France.Perez, for his part, spends time flying up and down the Florida coast on his custom chopper (painted with an image of Batman on one side and the Joker on the other). But he insists, Im not a wild and crazy guy; my perfect weekend means going to the beach, a good restaurant, and a movie. He will sometimes just show up at the movie theater and pick something to see when he gets there. Ill watch anything and everything, he says. Perez pauses, suddenly reflecting on the possibilities. There are no limits to our dreams here in America, right? So maybe the next step is Zumba the movie.

Read more at http://oceandrive.com/personalities/articles/zumbas-founding-fathers#7CsruJzAscyp0lq5.99The four basic steps of Zumba are salsa, merengue, cumbia and reggaeton, notes Adelicia Villagaray, a certified Zumba instructor in Baltimore, Maryland, who studied Zumba with Perez. Merengue resembles marching in place, with arms and hips swaying to the beat. For salsa, step out to the left, switching your weight to your left leg. Return to the starting position and repeat on the right. For cumbia, stand slightly sideways, tapping first your right and then your left foot forward. With basic reggaeton, step to the right, bringing your left foot to touch your right, then reverse this motion to your left.OK now to the moves:Zumba is all aboutvariationson simple steps.Check out this videowith Tania Amthor where she goes over the basics

5 basic Salsa Steps 3 Merengue steps 3 Hip Hop/ Reggaeton Steps 2 Cumbia Steps 1 Samba StepThe large majority of everysongis a combination of these steps.

As always, look for thepattern. Every time the verse comes, we do the verse move. Every time thechoruscomes, we do the chorus move. There's no "right" way to dance so REMEMBER- IF YOU'RE MOVING, YOU'RE DOING IT RIGHT!