CONFIDENCE BOOST
Studio owner Nicole Phillips takes dance workouts to new aerobic heights
Does the “inner you” want to swing on a pole? If so, Nicole Phillips has the perfect place to try that acrobatic exercise. As well as Zumba, hip-hop or aerobic dance workouts.
The 38-year-old former investment banker has operated her Inner Me Studios for nearly 10 years — first in a small space in Montrose, then southwest Houston. Now she’s gone big, moving to a 10,000-square foot building in Third Ward to house her growing fitness studio.
The building, which Phillips says was the underground headquarters for the local civil rights movement, has five large studios for pole dancing, belly dancing, Zumba, yoga, step aerobics, hip-hop dancing and cycling.
There’s a photo wall resembling a Vogue magazine cover for selfies and a boutique that offers an assortment of fitness gear, including her own Inner Me athletic brand. The building offers multiple changing areas, five showers and a large parking lot. There’s also ample space for private parties.
“My clients said they would come if I moved to Third Ward, and they have,” Phillips said. “It was so much effort to get here, but I just kept going,”
Phillips purchased the building in 2016 and opened the new space in April.
“I would drive past this building on my way home so many times. The owners, who were black lawyers, didn’t want to sell to developers,” she said. “I was the only black person who came along and wanted to have my own business. I’m the sole owner. I don’t have investors, so this is all me.”
Phillips completely renovated the circa 1955 building, adding floor-to-ceiling mirrors, windows and high ceilings. She removed the old tile and molding. It now has a modern, loft feel. Inside her office is the large door that once was on the building’s safe.
The Houston native started her fitness business after she was laid off from a private-equity job in Philadelphia in 2009. She had been introduced to pole dancing just a few weeks prior — she fell in love with the workout.
“My girlfriend had been pole dancing in New York,” she said. “She came to visit me after breaking up with her boyfriend. So, to cheer her up, we went to a pole studio. I wasn’t a workout person at all. The most I did was step aerobics, but I wanted to learn the moves.”
She had to start at the bottom because she had no core strength, she said.
“I had to work three times as hard to get there because it didn’t come easy. I wasn’t flexible and had no upper-body strength. I opened the studio when I was 28 and didn’t get my first split until 33. It was easy for me to teach because I understand the challenges of not having the core strength or flexibility you need.”
While attending Clark Atlanta University in Georgia, Phillips had worked as a bartender at a strip club; she had always admired the athleticism of the strippers.
But Phillips notes the difference between what she teaches and what strippers do.
“Pole dancing in class is all pole. It’s about how strong you are and how flexible you are. It’s more acrobatic than sexual and erotic. There’s much less twerking in our classes.”
After moving back to Houston, Phillips opened Inner Me Studio on Richmond after noticing there weren’t many affordable poledancing classes in town.
“There was such a stigma about pole dancing then,” she said. “People would say, ‘That’s for strippers.’ You could definitely feel the difference here in the South. It was much more accepted on the East Coast.”
Inner Me is intimate, Phillips says, so you can be as sexy or as clumsy as you want without any shame.
To build her roster of instructors, she turned to Melodrama Boutique owner and friend Jackie Adams, who introduced her to
“Pole dancing in class is all pole. It’s about how strong you are and how flexible you are. It’s more acrobatic than sexual and erotic.”
Nicole Phillips, Inner Me Studios owner
Roslyn Bazzelle, a lawyer who founded PiYoLet fitness and taught yoga classes, and Mikekeith Ward, who would lead the stiletto-dance classes.
The game changer came when Phillips offered a Groupon discount on classes and 700 people signed up.
“I wasn’t prepared for that many people to take our classes,” she said. “We were only offering pole dancing at the time, but it helped me grow as a business owner and helped me focus on customer service. I got my first negative review on Yelp after that, and I fought hard not to let that happen again.”
Jennifer Lopez’s new movie, “Hustlers,” is prompting a boost in business at pole-dancing studios nationwide. On Instagram, Lopez posted that pole dancing was “one of the hardest things I’ve ever done physically.”
For the Houston movie premiere, Inner Me instructors did a demonstration at Edwards Grand Palace Cinema.
“The stigma about pole dancing is much better now,” Phillips said. “They are trying to get pole in the Olympics. Once people see it on TV and see celebrities doing it, they are less likely to cast judgment.”
She counts doctors, nurses and students among her pole-dancing clients, she said.
Shelby Lewis, who attends University of Houston, took her first class at the studio in January. She was looking to take Zumba classes but she discovered her love for other dances, too.
“I’ve always wanted to be a dancer, but because of my body type — I’m a naturally bigger person — I sort of ruled that out. I never really thought it was something in the cards for me,” she said.
Lewis signed up for chair dancing, hip-hop and stiletto-heel pole-dancing, and now she takes classes three to four times a week.
“After the second or third class, I realized the instructors are there to really boost your confidence. I was getting the steps quicker and faster, and I actually looked really good doing it,” she said.
And if she misses a step, there is no judgment. “It’s such a stressfree environment, and everyone is cheering you on,” Lewis said.
For Phillips, owning the business means listening to her customers — even when she doesn’t agree. She added Zumba classes to the roster despite her reservations.
“I thought they would just want pole and cardio. But they told me, ‘We want to twerk, do Zumba and twerk again.’ ”
Inner Me also offers themedmusic classes — which include almost anything by Beyoncé. Bachelorette and girls’ night parties are a big hit; they cost about $35 per person. Monthly memberships to Inner Me start at $89.
“When women come here, it’s to feel inspired and to become more confident. That’s what we offer.”