Speaker 1: It's Friday June. I'm oscar A Mirrors from the Daily
Speaker 1: Dive podcast in Los Angeles, and this is reopening America.
Speaker 1: We've shifted into a new phase in the coronavirus pandemic.
Speaker 1: We're social distancing, washing her hands, wearing those face masks,
Speaker 1: and we're reopening the country. I'll still give you updates
Speaker 1: on any new information about the virus and vaccine development,
Speaker 1: but will also be focusing on how we are reopening America.
Speaker 1: Everything that makes a dive bar great makes them especially
Speaker 1: vulnerable to COVID nineteen. Dark interiors and busy atmospheres might
Speaker 1: lend itself to a good time, but it makes it
Speaker 1: hard to social distance and keep the air clean. The
Speaker 1: big question is our patrons ready to go back? Nick
Speaker 1: Man called Batetel, reporter at Eater, joins us for more.
Speaker 1: Thanks for joining us, Nick, thanks for having me as
Speaker 1: the country starts to open up. One of my favorite
Speaker 1: types of places to go to, the dive bar, is
Speaker 1: particularly vulnerable to COVID nineteen. You know, we've done stories
Speaker 1: about how how transmission happens. They happen in especially places
Speaker 1: with poor ventilation, let's say, person of person contact for
Speaker 1: extended periods of time, and those are some of the
Speaker 1: things that you get at a dive bar, some of
Speaker 1: the things that you make me even better really, you know,
Speaker 1: you like these dark places that you know, when they're
Speaker 1: filled to the gills, there's just action happening and drinks flowing,
Speaker 1: lots of good people watching. These are some things that
Speaker 1: really make the dive bars special. But it's also that
Speaker 1: thing that makes them vulnerable to COVID nineteen, Nick tell
Speaker 1: us a little bit about it. You spoke to a
Speaker 1: few bar owners and their experience throughout all of this.
Speaker 1: So I spoke to a number of bartenders bar owners
Speaker 1: all over the country, and the situation really differs in
Speaker 1: each city, but there were definitely some overlapping factors. So
Speaker 1: people really love going to rowdy dive bars because they
Speaker 1: are small and they're notoriously dirty, and even if that
Speaker 1: stereotype isn't exactly true for most places, it still gives
Speaker 1: them a reputation that maybe makes customers a little bit
Speaker 1: wary about going in the COVID era, you know, they
Speaker 1: tend to do a lot of business at the bar
Speaker 1: as opposed to table, so it's kind of harder to
Speaker 1: socially distance there. They deal in cash, which has become
Speaker 1: really taboo. They do things that are normally really cute
Speaker 1: and fun, like they serve communal snacks, and obviously that
Speaker 1: can't happen now. So these businesses are really struggling, even
Speaker 1: in comparison to other restaurants and bars around them, who
Speaker 1: maybe can pivot to provide to go cocktails due to
Speaker 1: loosen regulations in some cities, dive bars can't really do
Speaker 1: that either because they don't serve mixed drinks or they're
Speaker 1: not known for that, and unless a customer is going
Speaker 1: to go out of their way to throw a few
Speaker 1: dollars to a dive bar, they're probably not going to
Speaker 1: order a beer to go. So there are not a
Speaker 1: lot of options for these owners, even the ones who
Speaker 1: are sort of trying to work with the regulations in
Speaker 1: their cities, because customers just aren't coming for that. So
Speaker 1: let's talk about some of those regulations. Because as things
Speaker 1: started to open up, one of the rules in a
Speaker 1: lot of places was you had to serve food if
Speaker 1: you were going to also serve drinks. So right away
Speaker 1: a lot of these drinks only bars were at a
Speaker 1: disadvantage and they were making partnerships with restaurants or something
Speaker 1: else so that they could do both again. It kind
Speaker 1: of comes down to the city because regulations are differing
Speaker 1: everywhere and they're changing all the time, which is making
Speaker 1: it really hard for some of these owners. But yeah,
Speaker 1: Susan Carnell, who owns The Living Room in l A,
Speaker 1: partnered with a soul food restaurant next door or was
Speaker 1: planning to as a few weeks ago to set up
Speaker 1: in their parking lot and serve food and drinks, and
Speaker 1: then just recently l A announced she no longer has
Speaker 1: to do that, so now she's refiguring. And Mark Connell,
Speaker 1: who owns Botanica in New York, was getting around a
Speaker 1: rule that required to go drinks there to be accompanied
Speaker 1: by food, so he was just throwing in a bag
Speaker 1: of trips just to get around that arbitrary rule. So
Speaker 1: it takes a lot of pivoting and a lot of
Speaker 1: creativity from some of these owners to get around these
Speaker 1: crazy rules. What about bartenders, I know a lot of
Speaker 1: business owners. Bar owners are concerned for their staff obviously
Speaker 1: as well. They want them to be safe, but they
Speaker 1: also want them to make money. And if people aren't
Speaker 1: really turning out, it's a difficult thing to really go
Speaker 1: back to. Some owners have gotten loans, A lot of
Speaker 1: them have gotten PPT loans, which have to go for
Speaker 1: the most part two employees, even though that's shifting as well.
Speaker 1: So some of them have been able to bring back
Speaker 1: staff in some capacity. But that also relies on the
Speaker 1: willingness of the bartenders to come back at all. And
Speaker 1: in some cases that's not a problem. In New York,
Speaker 1: for example, Mark said is bartenders at Britannica would be
Speaker 1: happy to come back. You know, they are done being quarantine.
Speaker 1: They want to work. But out in l A at
Speaker 1: the living room, the situation is totally different. You know,
Speaker 1: the staffers are really cautious. Beyond this, you spoke about
Speaker 1: the business loans and all that costs are going up everywhere.
Speaker 1: So some of the great things about dive bars are
Speaker 1: some of the really cheap drink specials. And you talk
Speaker 1: about a place in Philadelphia that had a shot in
Speaker 1: a beer combo for four dollars. I think in Los Angeles,
Speaker 1: where I'm from, one of the fun places I used
Speaker 1: to go to back in the day, the Gold Room,
Speaker 1: they would do a same thing, a shot of tequila
Speaker 1: and a beer combo for four dollars, and these prices
Speaker 1: aren't necessarily sustainable that much anymore, depending on what the
Speaker 1: comeback is like. Yeah, a lot of these businesses were
Speaker 1: already struggling to survive in major city. The dive bars
Speaker 1: have been disappearing for years, and this is really just
Speaker 1: exacerbating that. So Bob and Barbara is a great bar
Speaker 1: in Philadelphia has been known forever for serving the special.
Speaker 1: Elsewhere it is known as the Citywide Special, which is
Speaker 1: a shot in a beer. It's usually a PBR and
Speaker 1: a shot at Gymdam and that right, So that drink
Speaker 1: has been creeping up already from three dollars to three
Speaker 1: fifty to four dollars. And I talked to Jack Prince,
Speaker 1: who's owned the bar for twenty five years, and he
Speaker 1: doesn't know what he's going to price it if and
Speaker 1: when the bar opens. He doesn't know how he's going
Speaker 1: to be able to make, you know, his bottom line
Speaker 1: work and still offer a hoordable drinks that people know
Speaker 1: the bar for. I want to read the quote that
Speaker 1: you put from Princes at the very endy article talking
Speaker 1: about the situation for dive bars, and he said, you know,
Speaker 1: if this is the end, Wow, that sucks, but hopefully
Speaker 1: we will live on. And that's just got to be
Speaker 1: the sentiment that a lot of bar owners, business owners
Speaker 1: more broadly, obviously two restaurants and things like that, but
Speaker 1: that's just got to be the sentiment that a lot
Speaker 1: of people have with the way these shutdowns have impacted businesses.
Speaker 1: Dive bars are pillars of their communities, you know, they're
Speaker 1: places that from the foundation for a lot of people
Speaker 1: to come together, and they are struggling. They were struggling.
Speaker 1: They will continue to struggle, and they will continue to
Speaker 1: work to survive, to keep providing the scene and the
Speaker 1: drinks that people fill up work, but it's going to
Speaker 1: be hard. And you speak about it throughout the article
Speaker 1: how dive bars have had to update themselves, renovate to
Speaker 1: attract more people, but they also want to cater to
Speaker 1: the locals, the people in their community that really prop
Speaker 1: up that business. And this is why I love, you know,
Speaker 1: my own local dive bars. The same thing. You like
Speaker 1: to be a regular somewhere, do you like to go
Speaker 1: and socialize and know the people there, And as Prince said,
Speaker 1: it would suck if that was to go away. This
Speaker 1: is really typified by the living room right here in
Speaker 1: Los Angeles, and that Susan, the bar owner. They're was
Speaker 1: talking about how she does care to a couple of
Speaker 1: different crowds. You know, during the daytime she gets her regulars,
Speaker 1: and at night, you know, it's a more diverse, gentrified
Speaker 1: crowd basically, and those daytime regulars are older folks because
Speaker 1: of the community of their older black folks. There people
Speaker 1: that go way back with her, who show up for her.
Speaker 1: They're her friends, and they're worried there may be not
Speaker 1: coming back. As much as they want to support, you know,
Speaker 1: a friendly business, they're just not going to come out.
Speaker 1: Nick Man called the tell reporter at Eater, thank you
Speaker 1: very much for joining us. Thanks again, I'm Oscar Ramirez
Speaker 1: and this is reopening America. Don't forget that. For today's
Speaker 1: big news stories, you can check me out on the
Speaker 1: Daily Dive podcast every Monday to Fridays. So follow us
Speaker 1: on I Heart Radio or wherever you get your podcast.