What do you get when you mix an entrepreneur with zero dance experience, a specialty studio in NBC’s portfolio, Venice-based Snap Inc.’s technology, and Jennifer Lopez’s production company in Westwood?
A very L.A. story about a breakout brand that’s grown big enough to enter the fray of reality dance competitions with a new show on NBC.
It started old-school style, far from Hollywood. David Gonzalez created World of Dance in 2008 with a one-off live competition in Pomona, on the eastern edge of Los Angeles County. That single event eventually led to a digital platform with more than 5 million subscribers, with close to half of them on a dedicated YouTube channel.
The company continued to grow as a lifestyle brand with its TV debut on NBC a couple of weeks ago, when it edged into a field that already has two established franchises: “So You Think You Can Dance” and “America’s Best Dance Crew.”
World of Dance is based in Fullerton, but it counts on Universal Television Alternative Studio in Universal City as the key to its newest venture. The recently formed studio – intended to produce unscripted and alternative programming for parent company NBC Entertainment and other networks – debuted “World of Dance” in a primetime slot on May 30.
LinkedIn approach
Universal Television Alternative Studio reached out to World of Dance last year through LinkedIn, said Matthew Everitt, chief executive of World of Dance. He believes the TV interest is based on his business becoming the default destination for dancers to showcase their work in live events and online after they compete on shows such as “America’s Best Dance Crew” and “So You Think You Can Dance.”
Lopez – who started her career as a dancer and now owns Nuyorican Productions – is executive producer and one of three judges on the “World of Dance” show.
More than 9 million viewers watched the first episode, according to Nielsen data, and trade press called it the most-watched summer alternative series debut on broadcast TV in nine years.
Audience voting is not part of the TV show this season, but a separate competition is being produced exclusively in conjunction with Snapchat. (See related story, page 1.) Sixteen of the show’s contestants will compete in the secondary competition, developed exclusively for Snapchat, Everitt said. There will be eight rounds for this competition, with the same judges, who will narrow the field to four finalists. Snapchat users will vote for the winner for this separate competition.
Car culture
Gonzalez started the first World of Dance event after being involved in building event and lifestyle brands for 20 years, most notably as the marketing director of Irvine-based Hot Import Nights for seven years. That company produces a series of events held throughout the United States where owners of customized import cars enter them into competitions. The events combine a nightclublike atmosphere with a car show.
Gonzalez came to the conclusion that dance and media would be a powerful combination. Dance is best experienced as a “visual art, not a static picture,” he said. He left Hot Import Nights and took a chance with the show at Fairplex in Pomona.
“Our first event came together at the right place and the right time, when social media networks were taking off,” said Gonzalez, who serves as president of World of Dance.
He expected about 5,000 attendees, and 8,000 people showed up, he said. The event was unique because it united the various genres of hip-hop dance communities and competitions that typically keep to themselves, such as choreography; break dancing; and krumping, a street dance characterized by free, expressive, exaggerated, and highly energetic movement.
“It blew our mind because the dance community had never been united in this way,” Gonzalez said.
The goal was to bring all the dance styles together under one roof with urban and pop music, which he describes as music under the umbrella of contemporary hit radio.
Gonzalez then took the one-off events to San Francisco and New York. In its second year, World of Dance obtained its first sponsor, Beverly Hills-based Paul Mitchell, which became the presenting sponsor of World of Dance. Paul Mitchell, and other sponsors, received more than 200 million impressions from World of Dance’s YouTube channel last year.
A turning point came in 2012 as the number of subscribers to the YouTube channel started to rise meteorically, CEO Everitt said. He attributed that to the way World of Dance posted its performances on the channel, calling it “front row.”
The busines posted all the video from its dance competitions for free. Most other dance competitions at the time sold performance videos to the participants, he explained.
“It was the secret sauce to building this brand,” Everitt said.
He added that many major dance competitions now film their videos from the same front-row perspective and publish them online for free.
Living up to name
World of Dance was producing eight events a year by 2010, when it changed the name of the events to World of Dance Tour. It then added one-off events in Canada and Europe as part of the tour. Initially, the company owned, operated, and produced all of its events. Gonzalez and his team eventually decided to license the international events – there are now nearly 50 annually spread over 30 or so countries around the world, Everitt said.
He pointed to merchandise as another moneymaker for World of Dance. Competitors and attendees at the worldwide events can purchase hats, T-shirts, and hoodies bearing the signature logo. This summer, the company is planning to launch its first line of high-end apparel specifically for dance performance. This line will include athletic gear, made by and for dancers, that stretch and wick appropriately.
Another expansion is “World of Dance Live,” a noncompetitive series with dance talent from TV or social media, some of whom have millions of subscribers.
World of Dance has already been doing live noncompetitive shows for five years at Universal City Walk in Universal City, drawing record-breaking crowds, he said.
Now it hopes to package 10 to 15 dance acts to market for live performance at malls, performing arts centers, and the like. It would provide an afterlife to the talent from the TV show, Everitt said, adding that the idea is to produce dozens of live events around the country as the TV season draws to a close.
Dierdre Newman is a reporter at the Orange County Business Journal.
