Today we’d like to introduce you to Tessa & Dustin Sturm.
Hi Tessa & Dustin, it’s an honor to have you on the platform. Thanks for taking the time to share your story with us – to start maybe you can share some of your backstory with our readers?
It all started November 2, 2016. Dustin and I were both living in Los Angeles, CA working in the Film & TV industry. My girlfriends and I heard about this bar in Hollywood that had a country night every Wednesday so of course we had to check it out. When I walked into Tinhorn Flats, I saw this tall handsome cowboy who was dancing with all the ladies. I thought for sure he was a player. Towards the end of the night he asked me to dance and he literally swept me off my feet. We started dancing together every week. When we danced, it was as if everyone in the room disappeared and it was just the two of us. Turns out he was NOT a player. He was a good ‘ol boy with good family values, born and raised on a farm in Texas.
We started getting hired together to dance at different events and came up with the idea to start our own business called Stompin’ Grounds about a month into becoming officially dating February 4th, 2017. We competed together, we were dancers in music videos, official dancers at the Stagecoach Country Music Festival, DJ’d on stage at Coastal Country Jam, and were featured at other country music festivals in California. On our 1-year anniversary weekend, we went to a George Strait concert in Vegas, where Dustin asked me to marry him. I said YES!!! Shortly after we made the decision to move to Nashville to settle down, get married, and start a family closer to our families. My family is 5 hours away in Pound, VA and Dustin’s family is in Sealy, TX. We wanted to be somewhere where our business could do well, where we could get back to our southern roots and visit our families more often. Nashville seemed like the perfect place for us and for our business of teaching line dancing, partner dancing, DJing, etc. Our business started out kinda slow here in July 2018, while Dustin worked at Boot Barn. We did a four weeks long event at The Nashville Palace and we taught line dance lessons for free at FGL House.
We got married on November 10, 2018 and shortly after, on Valentine’s Day 2019, we found out we were going to have a baby. We continued to dance through my pregnancy and started getting more corporate, private events and a music video. We had our son, Wyatt Lockwood Sturm, on November 2, 2019 (Our anniversary of the day we met, my dad’s birthday, and my mom’s anniversary of being cancer free). It was a very special day for all of us!! By January 2020, we found out about AirBNB Experiences and Trip Advisor Experiences and created the ultimate Nashville Line Dancing Experience. That took our business to an entirely different level. One of the owners of a couple of honkytonks downtown (Whiskey Bent Saloon and Bootleggers Inn) took us under his wing and allowed us to use his space for our classes during the day. He has been such a huge blessing to our family and to our business. January through March 2020 was packed full of line dance lessons, choreographing a dance for another music video, and getting hired by The George Jones to teach line dancing and DJ twice a week. This put us in a place financially where we could finally get ahead and Dustin no longer had to work at Boot Barn to provide for our family. We could finally focus on Stompin’ Grounds full-time. March 16th, we were told we were on stay at home orders and had to cancel our classes.
Needless to say, we lost a lot of money that we had to refund for months of lessons that were booked in advance through the summer. Dancing was not allowed in Nashville and so our business was shut down for the entire year. We did what we could to transition things to online classes and offer some private lessons out of our garage to survive, but that did not prove to be financially sufficient to pay our bills. We ended up having the opportunity to film a covid wedding in April, which began our new venture, Southern Pictures. We started Southern Pictures to find other ways to make money. We had one wedding in July and had a few more weddings in the Fall. Some we DJ’d with Stompin Grounds and the others we did videography. We were blessed to survive the year! Haha. This year we started back up with some line dance classes but haven’t had too much success yet. We are finally getting more people booked this weekend, but not nearly as many as before Covid hit. It has been a very difficult last year or so for Stompin’ Grounds. We are grateful to make it this far and we are hopeful for what’s to come!! Now that Wyatt is 18 months old, he is teaching everyone his dance moves. He is our youngest instructor and proving to steal everyone’s hearts!
I’m sure you wouldn’t say it’s been obstacle free, but so far would you say the journey have been a fairly smooth road?
Definitely NOT a smooth road! Haha, Our struggles have been finding steady income and a location to teach our classes downtown. Obviously, COVID was a huge roadblock for us as well. Now we are struggling to get back to where we were at the beginning of last year.
Can you tell our readers more about what you do and what you think sets you apart from others?
We are self-employed business owners.
We specialize in entertainment! We teach Line Dancing & Couples Dancing, DJ/MC, and perform for our clients.
We are most proud of working together and helping people understand that you don’t have to be perfect to dance. We have taught people from all around the world, and we feel very blessed about that.
What separates us? There is no one like us! We work as a team, there is no gloating, just pure honest fun and we strive to make sure everyone is having fun. We show our clients what they can achieve if they keep dancing. We break down the dances so if you have a will to learn, you can. We film our clients so they can watch themselves doing the dance, practice the dances from home and have a keepsake from Nashville!
What matters most to you? Why?
Faith & Family matters the most.
We couldn’t do this without God’s help! Period! We have an amazing family supporting us and we strive to teach our son values. Family sticks together, and we love GOD. Through the toughest of times including Covid, our faith has been the guiding light to get us to where we are now.
Pricing:
- $30-$35 per person
Contact Info:
- Email: stompingrounds.us@gmail.com
- Website: www.stompingrounds.us
- Instagram: www.instagram.com/stompingrounds.us
- Facebook: www.facebook.com/stompingrounds.us
- Twitter: https://twitter.com/sgcountry1
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCQ3fHC_g_0SRlXTy7_cao4A
Image Credits
Southern Pictures www.southernpictures.us
