Alma Dance School is a professional ballet training academy founded in 2014 for young dancers potentially interested in pursuing professional careers in dance.  The school’s founders, Cuban dancers Guillermo Leyva and Vilma Machin, trained with Alicia and Ferdinand Alonso, and have been principal dancers with a number of world class ballet companies, including the Ballet Nacional de Cuba, the Joffrey Ballet, the Lyric Opera Ballet, and the Ballet Royal de Wallonie, Belgium. 

Although Guillermo and Vilma were highly accomplished artists, they were just starting out as business owners, and in Summer 2015 faced numerous challenges with their new dance school.   In order to tackle these, Guillermo and Vilma sought out assistance to learn the basic business disciplines, processes and systems to sustain the long term viability and growth of their ballet academy.  

The TMA Chicago Pro Bono Committee, Rebecca Fruchtman Co-Chair, jumped in to help, partnering with TMA Chicago member and pro bono volunteer David Bernal of Growth Decisions Inc. and The Kellogg School of Management and other TMA member volunteers, including Paul Melville of Grant Thornton.  David, Paul, Rebecca and others contributed dozens of hours to provide Alma Dance with near term and longer range planning.  In the short term, David assisted with the planning and marketing of Alma Dance’s marquee event, The Nutcracker, including a budget and break-even analysis, and the creation of an impressive 22 page program guide for the event.  The financial future of the dance school literally hung in the balance for this one event.  Guillermo and Vilma were ambitious for the production, wanting to use professional dancers flown in from Mexico and elsewhere for certain principal roles and expensive costumes and sets.  Unless the performances were well attended, David’s projections showed that the school would be in the red for months.  The result of the budgeting and carefully orchestrated marketing campaign went beyond the Pro Bono Committee’s wildest expectations.  The performances happened on December 5 and 6, 2015 to a sold out crowd each night in a 400 seat auditorium. The crowd excitement was palpable because the performances were so beautiful and captivating.  At intermissions little girls were twirling and dancing in the aisles.  David’s team also created a new and compelling logo for the school and overhauled Alma Dance’s website (www.almadanceschool.com) to achieve a more polished and professional look and feel, facilitating faster updating. Longer term planning consisted of evaluation of the school’s current budget and day to day operational challenges and growth capabilities, culminating in a detailed business plan for future growth and transformation.  

By year end 2015 and beyond, Guillermo and Vilma were re-energized and exuberant, buoyed by the huge financial and marketing success of The Nutcracker and the exciting growth plans and targets for their school.  The performance generated all kinds of new interest and attention from the local community, the media, and best of all, inquiries from prospective new students.  The evidence speaks for itself.  Enrollment currently stands at 58 students.