On this episode of the “VinePair Podcast,” hosts Adam Teeter, Joanna Sciarrino, and Zach Geballe discuss whether pop-up bars actually do much for drinks lovers, and if not, why so many famous (or aspiring) bars go down that path. Sure, you can take a drink around the world, but can you take the experience of a beloved, iconic cocktail bar? Tune in for more.
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Adam Teeter: From VinePair’s New York City headquarters, I’m Adam Teeter.
Joanna Sciarrino: And I’m Joanna Sciarrino.
Zach Geballe: And in Seattle, Washington, I’m Zach Geballe.
A: And this is the “VinePair Podcast.” So what’s going on guys? How are we doing?
J: We’re doing good. Yeah.
Z: Yeah. I’m in the throes of a plumbing quasi-emergency in my house, but other than that we’re good.
A: Did you plug the toilet?
Z: No, no. I wish it was something that simple. That’s not an emergency.
A: What happened?
Z: That’s just a regular occurrence in this house. No, we unfortunately had an issue with our toilet leaking and we discovered it after it had leaked into the floor. So we’re dealing with that.
A: The funny thing is, I guess, someone else in our office recently had, I think, the very common New York experience of a bathroom emergency, where the person above you has a leak.
J: The ceiling…
A: And then the ceiling caves in.
Z: Yeah.
A: I had that twice in my apartment in the East Village and once already in Brooklyn.
J: I’ve had it once.
Z: Oh, no.
J: In my apartment.
A: Yeah. It’s always like, what happened here? And they’re like, “Oh, just patch that up.”
J: Yeah. It’s because the pipes in this entire city are old.
A: Old.
J: It’s really old.
A: Old.
Z: It’s a problem with having people live over you, right? You’re subject in so many ways to what they may or may not do.
A: Yeah, exactly. “Just toss that down the toilet. It’s fine, you can.”
Z: “Whatever.” Well, and it’s coupled with, as Joanna mentioned, that there’s a lot of old plumbing and this is an old house. It’s a 100-year-old house, so…
J: Oh my goodness.
Z: Not a shock. Not a shock. It’s true, there were people in Seattle 100 years ago. I know neither of you believe it, but it’s true.
A: How did they protect themselves from all the rain?
Z: Well, sh*tty plumbing as it turns out. So I’ve been drinking lots to deal with this stress.
A: Yeah. Sorry man, that sucks.
Z: Yeah, no, it’s okay.
A: So what have you been drinking then?
J: So yeah.
Z: This is why you get homeowner’s insurance. I’ve been drinking a fair bit of red wine. As Adam alluded to, we fully entered the rainy season here in Seattle. Actually, it came later than normal this year. But we are there and a couple of things. Along with my red wine, I’ve been making a lot of fall/winter foods. Made some really tasty braised short ribs the other day.
A: I saw that. I saw that on IG.
Z: I had the ’07 Vina Tondonia from Lopez de Heredia. Beautiful old Rioja.
A: Nice, I saw that too.
Z: Yeah. Well, I do post my wine for sure and food sometimes, depending on how interesting it is. The kids’ mac and cheese doesn’t get posted so often. And then…
A: Mm. You should go highbrow, get some truffles in there.
Z: That’s true, yes. I’m not sure if Saul’s ready for white truffle mac and cheese, but on the other hand, who’s to say he’s not?
J: I think he is.
A: I think he is.
Z: Yeah, he probably is.
A: I think you’re advancing that palate.
Z: Actually, what I’m not ready for is that being the only thing he’ll accept once he gets used to it.
A: Yeah, give it out.
Z: Yeah. And then the other couple things, had a bottle of 2016 Kabinett Riesling from JJ Prum, great producer from the Mosel from the Veltliner Southerner Vineyard. One of my favorite, just consistent, year in, year out bottlings, really tasty. Had that with some dim sum that we got takeout because that was the day that, maybe quite literally, sh*t hit the fan. And so I was like, “I can’t deal with cooking.” So we got some takeout and that was a nice bottle to go with that. And then also been playing around. Kaitlin has been really in the mood for sort of White Negroni riffs, so been doing a lot of that. Playing with, I think I’ve mentioned on the podcast before, there’s a local amaro producer called Fast Penny Spirits to make what they call their America. No, I’m going to get this wrong. It’s like American plus amaro. It’s like Americano or something, but that’s not right, either. Sorry guys, I’m butchering it on air. But they make a white amaro of sorts. So she really likes that as a component in something that is analogous to a White Negroni. And I kind of messed her up in a good way by using some blanco tequila in it instead of gin one time. She was like, “Oh, this is interesting.” So kind of a fun riff. Works well in that. I’m not as big a fan of using tequila in a classic Negroni formulation. It can work but I don’t like it quite as much. But in this White Negroni format actually it really plays nicely. That’s where I’ve been. How about you, Joanna?
J: Nice. I’ve had some really delicious Italian wines lately. Lots of red wine as well.
Z: Some Nebs? Some Nebs?
J: No Nebs.
Z: Oh, no.
J: Oh, yeah. But these aren’t the ones I’m going to talk about.
Z: Okay.
J: There were some Nebs. I’m so sorry. First, I wanted to talk about the Renato Ratti.
A: Barolo.
J: Barolo.
Z: That’s Nebs! What are we talking about?
A: That’s Nebs!
J: That’s the one I wanted to talk about primarily. And Etna Rosso from Tornatore, that was really delicious as well. The Barolo was like amazing.
Z: Next level.
J: I think that was one of the best wines I’ve had this year.
Z: Where did you have it?
A: At the office.
J: We had it at the office, yeah. Very, very luckily was able to check that out and I hope to drink more of it in the future. Also, I had a really delicious Grignolino last night from a producer called La Miraja.
Z: Cool.
J: That was really good. It was chilled. It was at a new local neighborhood restaurant that we went to celebrate Evan’s birthday.
A: I had a question for you about that, by the way. First of all, you have two pictures of Evan, one at the beginning of the meal and one at the end of the meal. He’s holding a Martini. Was that Martini the same Martini the whole time?
J: No. No.
A: Okay. I was like, “I don’t think that there’s just been one Martini the whole dinner.” But you could’ve pulled that off. You could’ve told me yes.
J: No, no. Let me tell you how Evan decided to drink for his birthday.
A: For his birthday. Yes, please.
J: He started with a Negroni. And then he had a Martini, then he had a glass of red wine, and then he had another Martini.
A: It’s his birthday.
J: Yeah.
A: The best.
Z: I did think the Martini plus crème brûlée combo was interesting.
A: I was like, “I can’t tell if this is the same Martini or not. Must investigate.”
J: I was like, “Okay. Interesting, interesting.”
A: I love it.
J: And then he had Scotch when we got home.
A: Yes! It’s his birthday.
J: Yeah.
A: I love it.
J: Yeah. That was good. Lots of great wine. What about you, Adam?
A: So first off, I have a question for you both because we were talking a little about the mac and cheese truffles. How do you guys feel about all these high-low things we see, especially on social? There’s a few somms who tried to popularize going — I will never do this cause I think it’s the biggest waste of time — but going to McDonald’s and getting the Filet-O-Fish and then dumping the caviar on top of the Filet-O-Fish and then eating it with a bottle of Champagne or something. And I’m like, “This is so dumb.” But I see tons of people doing it. I’m curious, is that just because social goes crazy? I don’t really get the whole high-low thing. I actually don’t think I would ever get white truffles and shave them over Kraft instant mac and cheese. I just don’t see the point of that.
J: Yeah. I mean I get the social media appeal of something like that because it seems just so wacky to do something like that. And I think that those types of things really play well on social media. But I don’t know, I guess for me the quality of the low thing would really detract from whatever you’re putting on top of it.
Z: Well, I think that this is another way of conspicuously consuming this thing in a way that feels irreverent but is actually I think an even bigger f*ck you. If you’re going to eat caviar, f*cking do it the right way. Don’t f*ck around with Bugles or whatever. That’s some bullsh*t to me. Or dumping on a Filet-O-Fish. It’s like, “This thing is so mundane to me that I’ll put it on whatever, who cares?” That to me is distasteful in a specific way. Yeah, part of it’s probably that it plays on social well. But it’s also, like I said, I think some high foods just accept that if you’re going to be the person on social media eating caviar, eat it with the f*cking blini or whatever. Do it the right way and don’t be an ass about it because yeah, as you were saying Joanna, it undeniably lessens the experience. And if you’re lessening white truffles on Kraft mac and cheese, if you’re lessening the experience of this incredibly expensive luxe ingredient, then I think you come off as an even bigger jackass than the person who’s like, “Here’s my beautifully made pasta with white truffles on it. I’m just doing this thing,” because it is special. It’s preserving the special nature of it.
A: Yeah, I think it makes you come off like a sh*thead.
J: Yeah,
Z: It reminds me, did either of you guys—
J: Wait, What did you do?
A: I went to the launch event for Tip Top‘s new Espresso Martini — canned Espresso Martini.
Z: Whoa.
A: And it was—
J: I was sorry to miss that. I love a Tip Top.
A: And I love a Tip Top and that was awesome. And it’s a really good Espresso Martini and I’m not a big fan but it’s a nice little size. They were doing it where they were dumping the Espresso Martini into a nice tiny little shaker filled with ice and then shaking it so it would get the really foamy head and then pouring it into the coupe.
J: Did they partner with a coffee maker?
A: Counter Culture.
J: Oh, it was a partnership. Okay.
A: Yeah, so it’s Counter Culture and them together. So it’s Counter Culture coffee. So the event was at Counter Culture here in New York.
J: It makes sense.
A: It’s smart. It’s the first one I’ve seen that’s done that. I’ve heard there’s some rumor, maybe someone’s doing one with another big coffee chain, but they’re the first that I saw and it was really cool. And then it’s like, I think I want to say, and I’m only just assuming this because when you left we got bags of coffee, Big Trouble. That Big Trouble might be the coffee that’s probably in it because that’s the coffee they use, that’s like their main espresso at Counter Culture. But yeah, it was really delicious. It was very strong in terms of caffeine. I was like, “Whoo, let’s go!” When we left I was like, “Let’s go hang out.” That’s why I don’t drink them. But I could see how it would be. I was talking to Neal, who’s the owner of Tip Top, one of the founders, and he was saying how one of their pushes is into concert venues. And you could see how this would do really well at concert venues because a lot of people at concert venues are choking down Red Bull and vodkas just because they want to get a little bit tipsy, but they also want to stay awake for the show and be more amped. And this is a much tastier version of that. So I could see these doing really well at concert venues across the country.
Z: Well, and Adam, you would know better than I would, but I think there’s also been a huge change I think in certain concert venues, in the same way we were talking about the VIP tailgating experience at sporting events. There are people who, if you’re spending a couple hundred dollars to go to a concert, you’re seeing a huge touring artist, you probably also want to spend money on quality drinks. You don’t want to choke down a Red Bull and vodka, and the venues, I’m not talking about your big outdoor festivals, but your big arenas and stadiums and stuff like that are going to have the capacity, potentially, to serve you an Espresso Martini if it’s canned or whatever. And people would, I think, prefer that not just because it tastes better but also because it feels more in line with the experience they want to have.
A: Yeah, no, I think you’re right. I think there’s a lot of opportunities there. And the other thing that I didn’t think about until we were chatting about it at the event last night as well is there are a lot of bars who, out of all of the canned RTDs, the thing that’s the most annoying for them to make is an Espresso Martini. And it’s getting ordered so often that yeah, sure, just have this behind the bar, crack the can into the shaker, shake it and give it to somebody and be like, “Yeah, here’s your Espresso Martini.” Especially if that’s not part of your normal cocktail program. It’s just such an easy thing. The person comes in and asks for it. Here’s the Espresso Martini we do. Super easy, as opposed to, I don’t know, a lot of bar programs that are going to have maybe the canned Old Fashioned behind the bar or a can or a bottled Negroni or things like that. They know they can make those. But having to have the coffee ready and all that stuff. This is just so simple. Anyways, what I want to talk about this week is something that a lot of people have been chatting about recently and that is, have we reached peak pop-up bar? What I mean by that is not the kitsch bars that you see around the holidays like Sippin’ Santa’s Surf Shack and things like that, but more, there’s been a massive, massive amount of pop-up bars in terms of bars from one city going to another city for a week and saying, “Oh, this is Dante Does London.” Or Katana Kitten does something in Los Angeles, or a bar from London comes over and does it here. You’re seeing it a lot more and one of the questions people are asking is, “What’s the point?” And are you actually getting the true bar experience when that happens? And what’s gained and what’s lost by this thing that seems to be being done more and more and more, but what’s the point? And I had a really interesting conversation at the Next Wave party with GN, who’s one of the owners of Double Chicken Please. I was asking him, “Oh, well now that you’ve won our award, you’ve won Top 50, all this other stuff, do you think you’ll do this more?” Because they haven’t really done it. He was actually saying, no, they don’t plan to do that. There seems to be backlash even from certain bar owners of like, “Well, I don’t know how we would establish our aesthetic somewhere else and how we would do that effectively.” And I guess for me, I thought about that too. If I was a consumer and I showed up at a bar that I’d tried really hard to get into, let’s say that I got into the Little Red Door in Paris and for whatever reason that week they were doing a pop-up with, I don’t know, Katana Kitten. I’d be so disappointed because I live in New York, I can go to Katana Kitten, it’s a great bar, but I don’t need to experience it in Paris when I want to experience this bar. I also don’t see how in those bars, you would get the same Katana Kitten vibe. Yeah, sure. You can play the soundtrack that they would play at Katana Kitten. You can have some of the glassware, but you’re still in the space that was designed to be this really great bar in Paris. I guess even for me, it’s one of these things where I don’t fully understand it and feel like the only way it truly works is if the bar is able to almost design a space to feel like their space where they are. Otherwise, can’t you just send the recipes and let somebody else make them?
J: Yeah, I guess that’s a good point. But I do feel like, especially, take Double Chicken Please, for example, say they pop up in Paris, a lot of the atmosphere and the aesthetic will be lost. You have to assume they have their Taptails in the front. The bar is split in a very specific way. But for somebody who lives in Paris who has heard so much about this winning bar and how unique it is to be able to get a cold Japanese noodle cocktail in Paris is a really cool opportunity. And that’s where I think the popularity of these takeovers has come from.
Z: I also think you can’t overstate the amount of sort of ego trip, I think, that goes along with it, or ego boost, I should say, maybe not ego trip. You’re the bartender, owner, proprietor, whatever of this bar and you’re now taking your show on the road. I think there’s a lot of people who are validated by that. Also, I think maybe the Paris to New York or London to New York comparison isn’t maybe the most apt. I think where you’re seeing a lot of this happening is in either other cities around North America that don’t have maybe the same density of great cocktail bars as New York City and/or other parts of the world where cocktail culture isn’t as established. Paris could perhaps fit in there, of course, but even more so you see it in other parts of Europe, in other parts of the world, frankly. There I think you can see more of the at least theoretical idea behind this, which is like, “Let’s bring this cool thing that we do to an audience that”… as Joanna was sort of pointing out, a lot of people, even if they one day choose to go to New York and they want to visit and they want to, and they’re big cocktail lovers and they’re going to go to six great cocktail bars on their trip, they’re not going to hit all of them. That’s a once-in-a, maybe not lifetime, but once-in-a-rare-while kind of experience. Funny, we were talking about concerts before and it’s like, why do musicians go on tour? Because they have fans all over the place. And yes, some of them do a Vegas residency now and they bring their fans to them and that’s a whole thing. But a lot of them still tour widely because it’s a way to hit every market or some markets where you might be popular, where you’re going to frankly make money. And I think for a lot of these people it’s probably, there’s an element of fun to it. The truth is that even running a great bar, I’m sure has its grind to it, its mundane elements. And so doing something where you’re taking yourself out of your normal environment, challenging yourself to translate what you do to a new space, a new city, a new continent perhaps, could be invigorating in a way that… Maybe it’s played out now. Maybe that was true five years ago and now because it’s become more and more common and/or with some bars, it seems to be their perpetual state of popping up somewhere. But I think on the other hand, I can understand why for a certain kind of practitioner and/or proprietor, it’s really appealing still.
A: Yeah, yeah. I mean, I guess the only time that I struggle with it is when it is these bars that are so specific in terms of their look and feel and experience and it feels kind of like, ah, I don’t know how you fully gain that experience somewhere else that really makes the place truly special. Yes, I get that probably 75 percent of it is the drinks, but 25 percent of it is that space. That’s where I could see a place like Double Chicken Please, that cares so much about the aesthetic, saying, “Yeah, if we ever did it would have to be in a raw space that we design, that we say, ‘Okay, cool, we’re going to come for a full week, but it’s going to feel like… The art on the walls, it’s going to feel like our vibe.’” The other thing that I’m really fascinated by as I started digging into why this is happening more and more is actually, a lot of bartenders have said it’s not happening so much to give consumers a great experience; it’s .to gain the bar more international attention for these rankings.
J: Right. Yep.
A: It’s because these judges for these awards we’ve talked about on this podcast before exist all over the world. The idea is if you can pop up in cities where they live and you can show that you’re part of this community, you get on their radar much faster. There’s a bar in the Lower East Side, I won’t name it, but you can probably figure out which one it is, who this is their specific tactic. It’s like they’re specifically doing this to help get on the radar, which is smart. I mean it’s a really quick way to do it. As long as you have the financial ability to travel around the world and go to bars and you have those relationships so you know that some of these top bars will already invite you. You can already say, “Hey, we’re getting attention in New York, but also we’re already in the club. This great bar, let’s say Bar Artesian in London, they already invited us. We’re doing a pop-up there.” Or again, “Limantour, they know us, they invite us, we’re doing a pop-up there.” These are bars that are already on the Top 50 list. So then it’s like, oh, okay, well maybe they’re already in the club. And it happens a lot faster than hoping you just get enough press and accolades that you wind up there on your own, which is potentially what happened with Double Chicken Please. They didn’t do any of the pop-ups before. They just were so well known. They were already on people’s radars. But I find that fascinating as well. It’s really not for the consumer, it’s not to give that experience to someone else who won’t have that opportunity.
J: But I also think it’s the relationships that I’m sure GN and Faye have with other bars around the world, too. But I do think that these bars on the list taking over another bar on the list reinforces why this is meaningful and then meaningful to consumers as well.
A: Yeah, true.
Z: Although there’s also the risk, of course, of it becoming, as it perhaps already is, this somewhat closed- off-to-the-outside network where the bars and people within this velvet rope that you might consider the Top 50-type lists. If the only people they’re bringing in to do pop-ups are other bars on that list or other bars that maybe are aspiring to be on that list, it does feel a little insular.
J: Yeah, it’s exclusive, right?
Z: I want to ask you guys a question, though, that I think we were touching on and I think is important to discuss here or to think about here is to what extent is the experience of going to a bar, maybe a famous cocktail bar, defined by the drinks you drink or the environment, the ambience, the setting? Because we’ve been talking about this and I think you’ve both said that one of the things that maybe doesn’t work with some of these pop-ups, or could at least be a challenge, is that, sure, you can bring the recipe over, you can get the exact drink prepared for you in this pop-up experience in another place, but that you can’t translate the experience of being in that bar. And what I wonder is, do most people give a sh*t? Is it enough for them to say, “I’m drinking the Waldorf Salad cocktail from Double Chicken Please, in this hypothetical pop-up that they’re not doing, and who cares where the f*ck I’m sitting for that?” I’m just curious. I don’t have an answer. I’m not even sure how I feel personally because I think about some of my favorite cocktail bars in Seattle and other places and it’s certainly true that the vibe of the place is a good component of what I like about the bar and that, but the drinks do obviously matter. So I don’t know. I’m wondering, do we feel like it’s in that sort of recipe, I guess it would be, of a great cocktail bar. How much of it is the stuff that can’t be transported?
A: I think that it’s a lot of it, for me, I think it’s a lot about the vibe, the service, the place. I mean, look, we’ve had this conversation on the podcast before. I mean, there’s a very famous bar in Rome that everyone talks about that I hated and so did my wife because of the smoking. That’s part of their ambience. They allow smoking in the space. It’s very small. For me, I don’t care how expertly they’re recreating classic cocktails. For me, I was like, “This is not pleasurable.” I don’t need to breathe in lots of nicotine. If they took those cocktails and brought them to New York, I would be like, “Wow, maybe they’re executing some great cocktails, but they’re winning an award for the overall experience.” I get, “Oh, we’re being so true to the speakeasy. They used to be able to smoke.” Okay, well you didn’t have speakeasies in Italy. I don’t know what we’re doing here, but I do think it matters. I think you also have bad experiences when you have rude service. There’s another bar that does not exist anymore in New York. But I never really liked it even though it had so many accolades because the few times I went I had horrible service. The people who were working at the time were very, very rude. Even though the person who owns it and the team, a lot of the team, were known as being very nice. I didn’t have great experiences and maybe that was the time I went, it was crowded, etc. Maybe they had been too overwhelmed with the amount of press they had gotten. But I think those are the types of things that do really matter. The music does matter, how loud it is, how soft it is, what kind of music they’re playing. I’m not going to go anywhere. I’m not going to have a really great time, if any place is still playing Kanye West. Don’t want to hear him, don’t want to hear that music and that hate anymore. Those types of things matter, I think a lot, and influence the drink in the same way. That kind of stuff influences your food, too, and the experience you have at a dinner. I think it’s the same thing. I think it’s overly simple to think that it could just be the drinks, because it also can never just be the food, right? The Michelin rewards these stars based on places that also crush service.
J: Yeah, but I do think that especially for in the instances where a drink is famous or has been written about, that’s when maybe the vibe and overall experience takes a backseat to actually having that drink and that you maybe have Sam Ross will come and make you a Paper Plane or Toby will come and make you — Toby would never ever do a takeover. We know that. But Toby would make you a Cosmopolitan. That’s a cool experience.
A: It is. But I guess my argument is for some of these drinks, and this is maybe another podcast, but for some of these drinks, can’t someone else who’s a great bartender just make the recipe and I can feel like I had a Penicillin and I didn’t need Sam Ross to make it.
Z: Yeah. And I think that comes back to the fundamental point here too, which is, weirdly, there is a degree — this is probably not totally fair, but whatever, I’ll just say it — there is an element of condescension to the whole notion of these takeovers and pop-ups, which is depending on where they’re taking over, and it’s one thing maybe if its another top 50 bar or something like that, then maybe it loses some of this. But we’ve seen some of these pop-ups, I’ve certainly seen them happen here in Seattle a couple times with perfectly fine bars that aren’t necessarily going to be on anyone’s list of great bars in the world. And there’s a little bit of, “Okay, step aside, let’s let the pros in.” And it’s like the truth is that with some few exceptions that are noteworthy, a lot of the drinks that we’re talking about and a lot of these bars are replicable by any talented bartender, as long as they have the recipe. I mean the skill in assembling some of these drinks is at a level where again, someone who’s got some experience and knows what they’re doing should be able to do it. A thing that used to happen and maybe still does happen in the bartending community, is a lot of putting drinks on menus that other people invented and crediting them and being like, “Hey, we recognize that this is a drink you might want to try that someone else came up with and we think it’s really good and we’re going to make it, we’re going to try and be faithful to it. We’re going to credit that person, but we’re going to make it. We’re going to bring that bit of their bar to you in whatever form we can.” To me, I think the thing where the famous bar descends from on high to grace some other locale with their greatness or whatever is… Maybe it’s exciting for people. Maybe it’s exciting for cocktail lovers in that community who feel a degree of giddiness. But to be completely honest, and this is not meant as an insult at any famous bartender, I don’t really feel like my life is incomplete because Toby has never made me a Cosmo. I’ve had many Cosmos. It’s a great drink. I don’t think it really matters to me who makes it as long as they know what they’re doing. And in fact, probably if I were ever at his bar, I would never order that drink. Because I think people listen to “Cocktail College,” you know his feelings on the drink and probably low on his list of priorities to make anyone that drink ever again.
A: Yeah. I mean, I also think that there’s something cool about going to the bar the person actually conceived of in their brain and having either a drink there that made them famous or something else. I guess the other thing, too, is that for a lot of these places that become super famous, I think it is almost all about the ambience because the person who created the drink for the most part is almost never behind the bar, right? It’s just like the chef, right? Jean-Georges is not back there, y’all. Sorry, he’s not. Bobby Flay for sure isn’t. I mean, who even knows what that guy’s doing anymore, but — oh, he’s just on Food Network.
J: Yeah, he does shows.
A: Yeah. Like Tom Colicchio? Dude is not there. It’s cool you got a reservation at Craft, sweet, but he’s not there anymore. He has a great trained team who’s doing the work and executing recipes he has influence in, but he might not even be creating most of the recipes anymore. A lot of these bar teams are more responsible for the recipes than the people that helped found the place. So then again, it just comes this idea of, could a pop-up be as simple as, “Let’s send our recipes to this great bar and let give them license to make those recipes for the next week”? I don’t know.
J: Well, I have a question for you guys. Would you rather go to a takeover of a bar in another city? Or that bar’s franchise in another city?
Z: Ooh.
J: Because that is theoretically the atmosphere, the vibe.
A: Applebee’s me, baby.
J: No!
Z: Well, this is kind of—
J: You know that’s not what I meant.
A: Just eatin’ good in the neighborhood. Sorry, drinkin’ good in the neighborhood. I had it.
Z: We’re synthesizing a couple of conversations we’ve had recently, to what extent are any of these pop-ups being looked at as establishing a beachhead, perhaps, right? If you have a really great response to your takeover or your pop-up in another city, does that give you more motivation to perhaps open a bar there? I mean, I don’t know the answer to that. I do think that one thing that’s maybe true about cocktail bars, even perhaps more so than restaurants, because certainly we’ve seen certain restaurateurs open versions of their famous restaurants in other cities. I do wonder, and this came up when we were talking about the franchising of cocktail bars, to what extent there is a little bit of territorialism. I think pushback comes pretty swiftly. I think it would be interesting to see what would happen if that model of opening satellite locations of famous cocktail bars became more commonplace. Because I think there would be a lot of pushback from the cocktail bars in that city that already exist, that are one-offs or local or whatever. Maybe Vegas is the place for it. It seems like a good place for franchising restaurants.
A: Oh, for sure.
Z: And bar concepts everywhere. But I think in a lot of other cities, there’d be a lot of pushback. I mean, I just know here in Seattle, we’ve had more with restaurants, but there’s been a lot of San Francisco- and Los Angeles-based restaurant companies that have tried to open here and largely failed, and maybe for a variety of reasons. But some of it is just, there’s a little bit of, like I said, territorialism. And I don’t think Seattle is unique in that regard.
A: Yeah, true. Well, I’d love to hear what everyone else thinks, who listens. Shoot us an email at [email protected]. Let us know your thoughts on pop-ups in general. Franchises, recipes, takeovers, everything. Really curious if you’re in the industry as well. Hit us up. Have you done these before? Would you be interested in doing them further? And Joanna and Zach will talk to you on Friday. Cool.
J: Have a great week.
Z: Sounds great.
Thanks so much for listening to the “VinePair Podcast.” If you love this show as much as we love making it, please leave us a rating or review on iTunes, Spotify, Stitcher or wherever it is you get your podcasts. It really helps everyone else discover the show.
Now for the credits. VinePair is produced and recorded in New York City and Seattle, Washington, by myself and Zach Geballe, who does all the editing and loves to get the credit. Also, I would love to give a special shout-out to my VinePair co-founder, Josh Malin, for helping make all of this possible, and also to Keith Beavers, VinePair’s tastings director, who is additionally a producer on the show. I also want to, of course, thank every other member of the VinePair team, who are instrumental in all of the ideas that go into making the show every week. Thanks so much for listening, and we’ll see you again.
Ed. note: This episode has been edited for length and clarity.
