A casual night at a local bar turned into something much bigger than anyone expected. What began as eight friends messing around with country swing has exploded into Monument Country Dance Club, now packing venues three nights a week and building the tightest community Grand Junction has seen in years.
From Eight Friends to Sold-Out Nights
Tyler Thorp never planned to run a business. He just loved to dance.
In early 2023, he and a handful of buddies started showing up at Mama Ree’s Cowboy Bar on the same night. They danced. People watched. Then people joined.
Eight turned into twenty. Twenty turned into fifty. Within months they had to move to bigger spaces.
Today the club hosts lessons Thursday at Quincy Bar (10:30 p.m.) and Friday and Saturday at Mama Ree’s (7:30 to 9:00 p.m.). Every single class is now at capacity. On busy weekends they turn people away at the door.
Thorp still sounds shocked when he talks about it.
“I went from teaching eight friends for free to running a company that employs ten instructors and serves hundreds of people every week,” he says. “This is my full-time job now. I get paid to dance. How crazy is that?”
A Safe Place for Every Age in Town
Walk into a Monument class and you’ll see little kids in cowboy boots next to college students next to grandparents. It’s common to spot a ten-year-old learning Boot Scootin’ Boogie right beside a sixty-five-year-old mastering an advanced swing pattern.
That’s deliberate.
Grand Junction has almost nothing for people under twenty-one after dark. Most bars are strictly twenty-one and up. Monument made the decision early: everyone is welcome.
“We have families who come together,” Thorp says. “Parents drop off their teenagers, knowing they’re in a safe, alcohol-free environment until ten o’clock when the bar crowd shows up. It’s honestly beautiful.”
Colorado Mesa University students show up in droves. The Rowdy Wranglers campus country dance team has become a regular partner. This summer the club even taught the Grand Junction Jackalopes baseball players a routine they performed before a game.
The Social Media Rocket Fuel
The growth isn’t just happening in person.
In the past twelve months alone, Monument Country Dance Club gained more than 40,000 Instagram followers and 60,000 on TikTok. Their videos regularly hit hundreds of thousands of views.
One clip of Thorp teaching a toddler the Cupid Shuffle has over 2.1 million views and counting.
That online reach brings new faces through the door every single week. People drive from Montrose, Delta, even Moab just to take a class after seeing the videos.
“It’s wild,” Thorp laughs. “Someone will walk in and say ‘I drove two hours because of your TikTok’ and I’m like… okay, cool, let’s dance.”
More Than Just Steps: Real Friendships and Healing
Ask any regular why they keep coming back and they’ll tell you the same thing: the people.
In a town where it’s easy to feel isolated, Monument has become family.
Members celebrate birthdays together. They carpool to classes. When someone goes through a breakup or loses a loved one, the group shows up with meals and hugs and invitations to come dance it out.
“I’ve watched shy people who barely spoke their first night become some of our best instructors,” Thorp says quietly. “I’ve seen marriages start on our dance floor. I’ve seen people get through depression because they finally had somewhere to go and people who cared. That’s the part that gets me.”
One member, a veteran who rarely left his house after returning from deployment, now teaches the beginner class every Friday. He says dancing saved him.
What’s Next for Monument
The growth shows no signs of slowing.
Thorp just signed leases for private studio space, meaning lessons will soon run seven days a week. They’re launching official instructor training programs. Out-of-state workshops are already booked through 2025.
Most importantly, they’re determined to keep the soul of what started with eight friends in a bar.
“No matter how big this gets,” Thorp promises, “it’s always going to be about community first. The day it stops feeling like family is the day we’ve failed.”
On any given weekend in Grand Junction, you can walk into Mama Ree’s or Quincy Bar and see it for yourself: hundreds of people of every age, laughing, spinning, and two-stepping their way into something that feels a lot like home.
Eight friends started something magical. Grand Junction is never letting it go.
What started as a hobby has become the heartbeat of our town. Have you been to a Monument class yet? Drop your favorite moment in the comments below, or tag a friend who needs to experience this community. Let’s keep the dance floor growing.
