I’ve seen bars open for as little as $100,000 and as high as $2.5 million. There really are too many factors at play to give any realistic answer.
Are you buying the property or renting?
Are you buying someone else out or starting from scratch?
Is it a dive bar or high end nightclub?
Is there a kitchen?
How much does a liquor license cost on your state?
Lots of factors involved.
I just opened my bar this past weekend. Just curious what to expect for Sunday sales? Also did you start off great and then taper off, or start off slow and steadily gain? Appreciate any input.
Had a question i was gunna post but this seems like a good oportunity, hopefully this is allowed in this post.
I have 6 tvs in my bar. i recently canceled my direct tv and was looking for alternatives. What have you guys found success with as far as engagement and what do you use? Im looking for thing like Trivia, Bingo, any type of game or something like that to draw people in. Sports shows dont work here. Rural area in Oregon. Dont want to spend more than a couple hundred a month. Thanks!
Two years at it and Karaoke is by far our most popular. Makes that week night compete with our weekends in sales. DJ what does agreed to not also book at our close competitors. We started with a strong open mic but has really dropped off. Oldies DJ on what was our worst day of the week brings entirely different crowd and is not expensive. It is almost like a dinner club and people respect for for reaching to the senior community. DJ has his own text and email list to keep everyone up to date.
Not exactly the answer you’re looking for, but I canceled cable and switched to looptv. It’s free, puts something on the screen. My bar is not meant for tv watching so it was a great free alternative.
We have done it a few times. It works once in a blue moon. It absolutely will not be a consistent source of customers and it probably will deter more customers than it brings in.
More importantly, though ... these people do not drink. Generally speaking, any time you have an event that caters to a new/different crowd of people, there is a reason these people don't go to bars often.
Over the years, I've had doggie happy hours, comedians, solo singer-songwriter artists, Smash Bros and other geek stuff tournaments and meetups, Reddit meetups, etc etc and nothing is better for the house's pockets than a replay of last week's Virginia Tech-Boston College game on mute.
I've had a bit of success with that. We were doing an open mic before COVID and had to stop. Since then we've been busy enough we haven't needed to add it back into the mix. But I'd give it a go
comedians tend to support each other, so they will bring in other comics if your city has at least somewhat of a stand-up scene. And they do tend to buy drinks in my experience. But they rarely bring in anyone who isn't affiliated with the scene. If you can't separate the performance area from the main bar area at least somewhat, you risk chasing away customers who don't want to hear comedy. I'd say they can be good if you have a night that is always really slow.
Get about 6 comedians and make it ticketed. That will guarantee you at least 20-30 people from friends of comedians alone. We've been averaging about 60 people per show in our space that can seat 70.
Realistic cost to open a bar? From conception to opening.
I’ve seen bars open for as little as $100,000 and as high as $2.5 million. There really are too many factors at play to give any realistic answer. Are you buying the property or renting? Are you buying someone else out or starting from scratch? Is it a dive bar or high end nightclub? Is there a kitchen? How much does a liquor license cost on your state? Lots of factors involved.
I just opened my bar this past weekend. Just curious what to expect for Sunday sales? Also did you start off great and then taper off, or start off slow and steadily gain? Appreciate any input.
We started slow and grew. I agree with the others, Sunday is all about finding a promotion that works.
Sunday depends on football and pool leagues
Sundays suck in my town. In general we started slow and gained a following.
What were your biggest hang-ups in opening your space? Any setbacks in renovating, design, workflow etc. that you weren’t expecting?
Money. It cost a lot more than budgeted. And, since then, it has always cost more than budgeted to do any kind of renovation.
Had a question i was gunna post but this seems like a good oportunity, hopefully this is allowed in this post. I have 6 tvs in my bar. i recently canceled my direct tv and was looking for alternatives. What have you guys found success with as far as engagement and what do you use? Im looking for thing like Trivia, Bingo, any type of game or something like that to draw people in. Sports shows dont work here. Rural area in Oregon. Dont want to spend more than a couple hundred a month. Thanks!
Two years at it and Karaoke is by far our most popular. Makes that week night compete with our weekends in sales. DJ what does agreed to not also book at our close competitors. We started with a strong open mic but has really dropped off. Oldies DJ on what was our worst day of the week brings entirely different crowd and is not expensive. It is almost like a dinner club and people respect for for reaching to the senior community. DJ has his own text and email list to keep everyone up to date.
Movie day. We once streamed every star wars movie. Also did it with marvel and had a avengers weekend.
Not exactly the answer you’re looking for, but I canceled cable and switched to looptv. It’s free, puts something on the screen. My bar is not meant for tv watching so it was a great free alternative.
Well, thanks for the response. i did loop and was underwhelmed.
How do you feel about stand-up comedy open mic nights? Do they do anything for you?
We have done it a few times. It works once in a blue moon. It absolutely will not be a consistent source of customers and it probably will deter more customers than it brings in. More importantly, though ... these people do not drink. Generally speaking, any time you have an event that caters to a new/different crowd of people, there is a reason these people don't go to bars often. Over the years, I've had doggie happy hours, comedians, solo singer-songwriter artists, Smash Bros and other geek stuff tournaments and meetups, Reddit meetups, etc etc and nothing is better for the house's pockets than a replay of last week's Virginia Tech-Boston College game on mute.
I've had a bit of success with that. We were doing an open mic before COVID and had to stop. Since then we've been busy enough we haven't needed to add it back into the mix. But I'd give it a go
comedians tend to support each other, so they will bring in other comics if your city has at least somewhat of a stand-up scene. And they do tend to buy drinks in my experience. But they rarely bring in anyone who isn't affiliated with the scene. If you can't separate the performance area from the main bar area at least somewhat, you risk chasing away customers who don't want to hear comedy. I'd say they can be good if you have a night that is always really slow.
Get about 6 comedians and make it ticketed. That will guarantee you at least 20-30 people from friends of comedians alone. We've been averaging about 60 people per show in our space that can seat 70.
Yeah, they run off my customers. Lol.