saltydog wrote:Went the same way as the much missed Annie in Vauxhall. Tried to go upmarket and lost its soul.
Err...didn't the Queen Anne close because Denise was murdered on holiday, and had planned to retire without a successor in any case?
saltydog wrote:The strip pub is sadly now pretty much dead and I cannot see a rebirth.
Strip pubs have suffered over the last decade for very similar reasons to other pubs, i.e. an economy still reeling from the 'credit crunch', and overheads that have increased far above the rate of inflation.
saltydog wrote:These days it's all wrapped in rules and regs.
They certainly don't help matters, but Hackney had SEV licensing prior to the Police and Crime Act 2009 - in fact, it used Hackney's licence model as a template for the whole of England and Wales.
Denise we going to retire after returning from the Holiday she was killed on! She had offers from two people I know of to buy her out and one to take a share to run it while Denise just used her name. I knew of those three though there may have been more. Denise was not going to sell though for various reasons.
buntycitron wrote:definite opportunity for someone brave
saltydog wrote:Not brave stupid. Reliant on truckers as little or no passing trade - why it put strippers on in the first place...The strip pub is sadly now pretty much dead and I cannot see a rebirth. ...
I know nothing about the potential for redevelopment, though its proximity to a motorway junction may help, but it doesn't present a "definite opportunity" as a strip venue. Though possibly a new owner could promote discrete and discreet stripping on a couple of evenings a week.
The place is too remote and though I wouldn't say "the strip pub is sadly now pretty much dead" it's fading away. The recent closures of several venues seem not to have led to increased business for those still surviving.
Just to go briefly off the topic of this particular venue, but confirming the "fading away" :I was vaguely thinking of returning to the WHHW today or even tomorrow. Just three dancers on both days, compared with double that number a few years back. Not worth the trek.
It absolutely didn’t rely on truckers. Frequently before the upmarket move it was standing room only, if you got a space in the car park, with actually quite a young crowd, easily reachable from Hemel, St Albans, Harpenden, Luton and Dunstable. The younger crowd frequently had more female punters than I’ve ever seen anywhere else. High door fees after the refit put people off for sure, especially the younger folks.
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Now a plant hire firm. Reclad in modern cladding, not the sauna style wood of it's 'upmarket' days, new tarmac on the car park, but all else visually the same.
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This is ( or rather was ) my nearest strip pub . I hardly ever went there as it was impossible to get to without driving - which means no alcohol - which defeats the object of going to any pub in the first place. I was not prepared to pay the £25 odd each way by taxi with no guarantee of a good time. I did try cycling once - but there are a couple of mountains in the way. It took forever and once I had got there the thought of cycling back killed any chance of enjoying myself.
The door fee was annoying - even at £3.
I think the economics of this pub were marginal at best even in the strip pub heyday of a decade and half ago in the early days of the Tease Agency. The owners reaction to falling trade of increasing prices only hastened its decline. A typical pub death spiral - a few punters and handful of the usual dancer suspects gives a moribund and desultory atmosphere which leads to even fewer punters and bored dancers which leads to etc. Location is everything.
Wagonhole wrote: ↑Tue Sep 21, 2021 8:39 amThe owners [sic] reaction to falling trade of increasing prices only hastened its decline. A typical pub death spiral - a few punters and handful of the usual dancer suspects gives a moribund and desultory atmosphere which leads to even fewer punters and bored dancers which leads to etc.
Unfortunately, this kind of approach has been all too common in the industry, regardless of location.
So - a bit more info. Tony, who owned the pub for years, was a borderline alcoholic, which I think impaired his judgement. And the place went slowly downhill, not helped by attempts to penny pinch. For example, instead of the juke box being free, the dancers had to put their own money in it. Having the place very dimly lit didn't help, nor did having the heating low in winter. Nor would he do the obvious to boost trade. There was a truckstop next door. They wanted £10 a week to put up a poster saying there was a strip pub within easy walking distance. Tony would not pay for it, despite one extra lorry driver through the door on one day of the week probably recouping the cost.
In the end he took a partner, who tried to move the place upmarket. The bar was ripped out and replaced and the outside of the pub timber clad. That had no impact on business, so prices started to get jacked, which just accelerated the decline. The new owner then put in private dance booths with (as I heard it) lockable doors. A lot of dancers then stopped working there, one describing the place to me as little better than a brothel, with the final dancers being solely those that did extras.
The place should have made money - there were a couple of hundred of lorries in the truckstop, and a car park with perhaps 50 spaces, so a fair few drivers dropped in on the way home. But Tony ran the place into the ground, and his new partner had no commercial nous, so the place went bankrupt.
