Learning the Steps of Success

A couple’s passion for dance turned into a family business that has touched the lives of countless children. Bob Kimble operated a dance school in Belleville, NJ, specializing in teaching children’s dance. One day, he sold 45-records to parents for their kids’ dance recitals; he quickly sold out of the 100 records. Bob and his wife Gertrude Kimble founded Kimbo Dance Records in 1954, with three signature dance titles: “Bunny Rabbit Blues,” “I’m Ready for the Show Tonight” and “Little Tap Shoes.”

The Kimbles established Kimbo Educational in 1960 in order to reach the educational market. Their first official educational releases were “Sing-A-Long with Kimbo Kids” and “Kimbo Karnival.”

Bob and Gertrude’s legacy lives on through Kimbo Educational, which now offers more than 300 titles across educational and dance music. Kimbo Educational’s music has earned several honors across the decades, including the Parents’ Choice Award, iParenting Media Award, Oppenheim Toy Portfolio Gold Seal Award and Early Childhood News Directors’ Choice Award.

The company has progressed with the times, moving from records to CDs and digital formats for wholesale and retail. Kimbo Educational has a large international presence, spanning across the U.S., Canada, Australia, Japan and Signapore.

“While Kimbo is evolving, our heart remains the same,” said Jim Kimble, who currently oversees the company with his brother, Jeff. “My parents, Bob and Gert, built this company on the belief that music and movement are the most powerful tools we have to help children grow, and that mission is just as vital today as it was in 1954.”

Jim sat down with us to highlight the importance of learning through music and how Kimbo Educational fills a special niche in the educational market.

What is the difference between your children’s and dance music?

While both divisions focus on the power of movement, they serve distinct environments. Our children’s music is crafted for early childhood classrooms, gyms and home play, focusing on “music and movement” to reinforce academic concepts. In contrast, our dance music division is a specialized resource for formal dance instruction. Since 1954, we have provided high-quality music specifically tailored for technical disciplines, including ballet, tap, jazz, hip-hop and pre-ballet.

What ages are your albums geared toward? What skills/lessons do they instill?

Learning through music has always been our top priority. With a library of more than 300 titles designed for infants through grade 8, Kimbo provides a playful yet purposeful way to instill essential academic and physical skills. Our music is carefully crafted to support language development, literacy, math and more, while our ‘brain-based’ movement activities help children master both gross and fine motor skills. By blending singable songs with these intentional teaching goals, we make early childhood education both memorable and motivating.

How do you develop your music?

To ensure every track meets essential educational standards, we collaborate closely with early childhood specialists, physical education experts and professional choreographers. This collaborative approach ensures our music isn’t just fun to listen to, but serves as a reliable, vetted tool for meaningful developmental growth.

What is your bestselling product? What do you ascribe to its popularity?

Our Bean Bag Activities CD is a consistent bestseller, cherished by educators for its incredible versatility in the classroom. We attribute its success to how seamlessly it blends rhythmic coordination with cognitive listening skills. By providing clear, musical cues that guide children through balance and tossing exercises, we turn a simple physical tool into a powerful lesson in focus and self-regulation, making it an essential resource for developing both motor skills and concentration.

What’s your newest product?

We are currently focused on modernizing our legacy by transitioning our extensive catalog into digital formats. Our newest “products” are the high-quality digital downloads for our most beloved titles. This transition ensures that today’s educators and parents can access our seven decades of musical heritage instantly, bringing award-winning resources into the modern, tech-enabled classroom or living room with ease.

What are the benefits of learning through music and movement?

Music and movement act as a powerful catalyst for whole-child development. Beyond just physical fitness, this approach supports cognitive brain-based learning, improves emotional regulation and helps children retain academic information by anchoring those concepts in rhythm, singing and physical action.

Why do you believe Kimbo Educational belongs in independent school supply stores?

Whether in the classroom or the living room, Kimbo products serve as essential “tools of the trade” for teachers and parents who value the joy of discovery and high-quality educational results. By offering our line, independent stores provide both teachers and parents with vetted, purposeful music that uses the power of singing and play to go far beyond simple entertainment. From helping educators meet rigorous classroom standards to helping homeschoolers turn their daily routines into vibrant spaces for playful learning, our music makes it easy to support a child’s development through engaging, melodic activities that spark a lasting love for learning.

What resources do you have for retailers interested in selling your products?

As a small, family-run company, we pride ourselves on being accessible and genuinely easy to work with. We’ve designed our wholesale partnership to be straightforward for every authorized Kimbo dealer, offering a tiered discount system that starts at 40 percent to help their business grow. To make managing and selecting our titles easier, we provide our dealer order form, a practical PDF listing our full range of CDs and digital downloads. We also offer helpful resources like product images, sound samples and clear descriptions to make adding Kimbo to their shop or website as simple as possible. We’re here to ensure our collaboration is smooth, successful and always centered on getting great music into the hands of teachers and parents.

What’s next for Kimbo Educational? What are you looking forward to?

We are excited to continue our journey into the digital landscape by focusing on accessibility and modernization. By ensuring our seven decades of musical heritage are compatible with today’s technology, we look forward to remaining a trusted companion for the next generation of educators and parents, helping them find their rhythm and inspire their children through the timeless power of music and movement.

What are you most proud of about working at Kimbo Educational?

I am most proud of the fact that after 70 years, Kimbo remains a family-run company that prioritizes learning through music rather than simple entertainment. It is a privilege to steward a library of over three hundred titles built on the lifelong dedication of Bob and Gert, knowing that every song we offer is carefully crafted to help a child develop language skills or master a motor skill. While we are navigating a tender time of transition following my mother’s passing, I take great pride in ensuring that the active, musical world my parents championed in 1954 is still accessible on a smartphone or a CD today. For me, it’s about more than just selling music; it’s about keeping a mission alive that helps children find their rhythm and their confidence through movement.