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To lead his classes, Zanker wants no regular teachers. "I hated my teachers in high school! I hated my teachers in college!" he shouts. To Zanker they committed the worst of sins: "They were boring!" Instead, he recruits lay professionals—or at least zealots—in the subjects offered. When he wanted to set up a course in direct-mail marketing, which he suspected might also help him promote the business, "instead of paying the consultant the ten grand he wanted for the day, we called up and said, 'Why don't you teach?'" Zanker says high-priced help frequently succumbs to the opportunity of showing off to a captive audience for modest stipends (from a flat $100 to 30% of the total class fees). Among those who have been lured: a helicopter-company president, a real estate developer, an estates attorney and a U.S. national-team boxer. Zanker claims he can get on the phone in any city and recruit a catalog full of teachers within 48 hours.
Of the Annex's computer-stored list of 10,000 possible courses, many have been suggested by volunteers who want to play teacher. In 1980 someone tried to promote a class on cross-dressing, at which even the freewheeling Annex hesitated. Into the computer files it went, to come out in 1985 when Boy George was at his peak. Some 40 people signed up. "Who are we to judge what is crazy or not?" shrugs Zanker. Last month in a New York City class, three dozen students sat raptly as a fiftyish couple disclosed the Sexual Secrets of the Orient, which featured a unison exercise requiring all present to stick out their tongues and move them in various directions, including figure eights.
Zanker cheerfully concedes that such sexy studies, plus the simple chance of making new acquaintances, constitute much of the Annex's appeal; the "meet market," he calls it. Some 55% of his students are singles. But he points out that in today's economy and self-promotional climate, courses like Accounting and How to Market Your Ideas for Millions with Dr. Fad are outpacing all others in popularity.
While Annex vendors in whiteface help keep enrollment booming by handing out catalogs on street corners, Zanker plans further expansions of his empire. This week four new directors are in training before launching new Annexes in San Francisco, Denver, Phoenix and Boston. Next year the first overseas Annex will open in London, where Zanker may lead with How to Find a Lover. "They don't have anything like that over there," he says. Next on his horizon: Japan. "Anybody can be your market!" Zanker exults. "It can work anywhere!"