The Supremes were following Ella Fitzgerald, Lena Horne, Sammy Davis Jr., Sarah Vaughan, Nat King Cole and Sam Cooke, among the first African-American entertainers to appear at the Copa, and playing the club was seen by Motown CEO Berry Gordy as an in-roads into the conservative white middle-America market.

Gordy and the Motown staff, including vocal director Maurice King and choreographer Cholly Atkins, invested significant amounts of time and money into preparing the Supremes for their Copa debut.

Florence Ballard was angered that her only solo number, "People", was dropped from the show while Ross herself complained about the group's staging and bristled under Gordy's criticisms of their performances.

After the success of their initial Copa engagement, Mary Wilson noted that the Supremes were "welcome to play any club in the world"[3] The group would play engagements at the Copa for the next seven years, and eventually earned $20,000 a week for these performances, fees on the level of popular performers such as Sammy Davis Jr. and Dean Martin.

Berry Gordy and Motown's head engineer Lawrence Horn are credited as the producers, and the orchestra was arranged and conducted by Gil Askey.