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Ok, opening a nightclub is probably a little different than opening a mom & pop shop, but this probably gives some idea of what the process is like.
Stuff - October 18, 2010
Stuff - October 18, 2010
Building a mystery: One nightlife player sheds light on the clandestine process of opening a club
by Scott Kearnan | October 18, 2010
If all goes according to plan, George Aboujaoude is going to host one hell of a Halloween party this year. And when's he's looking for a costume, we have a suggestion: Superman. After all, he already possesses at least one important superpower.
"It's like I have X-ray vision," says Aboujaoude, motioning to the four walls that surround him inside Bijou, the Theater District nightclub he's planning to open by October's end. He glances around, surveying the top floor of the three-level building, where in just over one month he hopes to see hundreds of revelers dancing under flashing lights, saddling up to one of several bars, and dining on utensil-free eats in the second floor's restaurant area. Right now, the only thing to see is a big, barren room, empty of everything save sawdust on the floor and scattered construction materials. But Aboujaoude's vision runs much deeper: "I can see through all these walls," he explains. "I know where every pipe is. I can picture the electrical wiring."
The owner's intimate knowledge of his club's anatomy is impressive, but his familiarity with every nook and cranny is emblematic of how immersed in detail club owners become - and how much labor, from the obvious to the surprising, goes into opening a new nightspot. (It's not all fun, games, and Adderall, kids.) When the doors open, few of us see the prior hard work when standing in the glow of neon lights. We take the finished project for granted - we come, we see, we conquer cocktails. And we bitch like backseat drivers: about how long it's taking for a long-awaited club to open, how freaking secretive the owners are being ("Guilty as charged!" says the nightlife reporter), or how stupid some design decision or another seems to be. Aboujaoude won't fault our ignorance: even though he's been involved in the nightlife scene for years, he only acquired his X-ray vision recently.
"I've promoted at many different clubs around the city, but in doing that I would walk inside a club that was already made for me," explains Aboujaoude, former director of marketing for the nightlife impresarios in the Lyons Group during Lansdowne Street's peak party years. "I have so much more respect for this part of it now, knowing what goes into it from the start to the end result. It's been like watching a car go down the assembly line."
Yet it's been a slow ride since he launched plans for Bijou, one filled with starts, stops, and stalls. Three years and $1.5 million dollars later, the motor is finally ready to rev - but not before Aboujaoude loans us his X-ray specs, explains that assembly-line progression, and shares what we need to know to see the club world through a different set of eyes. The process of opening a club is ordinarily shrouded in secrecy, but here's a case-study primer on how ambitious nightlife kingpins spill their blood, tears, and sweat on the dance floor.
Let there be strobe lights.
The process begins, of course, with some stroke of inspiration. A fellow nightlife lord approached Aboujaoude three years ago with the idea of opening a club inside 51 Stuart Street, a shuttered building in the Theater District that once housed the Europa and Buzz nightclubs. But opening a club is an expensive prospect. "There were always people bidding on the space," explains Aboujaoude. He and his pal would have needed to raise some serious cash to make this idea a reality.
Aboujaoude hesitated to get involved. He had just opened his Newbury Street restaurant Cafeteria and wanted to focus his attention on building that brand first. But as time went on and Cafeteria settled into its groove, he pursued the club idea more actively and - as club kingpins usually do - filled his court of investors with friends and fellow nightlife vets (in this case, Kevin Fitzpatrick and Mete Aslan). The threesome constitute Bijou's active partners, with Aboujaoude serving as principal. Bijou's dream team was assembled, and the lease was finalized in November of '08.
But the people who invest in and operate a club are hardly the only stakeholders at the table. When you're trying to open a club in downtown Boston, there are thousands of other people with opinions - and theirs make all the difference.
Meet the neighbors.
He knocked on doors. He shook hands. He went to local meetings. Though he wasn't kissing babies or courting votes, Aboujaoude did have to launch what practically seemed like a political campaign to win over three neighborhood associations in the area. Residents on associations like these often have strong opinions about what they want in a neighborhood. And though some of them haven't been to a nightclub since the days of vaudeville, winning their favor is the key to opening. A letter of approval to City Hall is like a golden ticket, smoothing the way through permit and licensing processes that could take years - or worse, never happen at all - if angry locals decide to break up the party.
That's exactly what happened to another would-be club owner, who ditched his plan to open a downtown nightspot when the nearby residents raised hell. Speaking on condition of anonymity (yes, nightclub politics can seem as precarious as matters of national security), our Mr. X tells us that as soon as locals heard of his plans, they flooded his lawyer with hundreds of calls - complaining about everything from the club's prospective name to its operating hours. Neighborhood associations have valid concerns about nightclubs, from safety (no one wants boozy brawls breaking out outside their front door in the early morning) to noise pollution (ditto on yelling, sirens, and thumping bass). On the other hand, says Mr. X, it's unrealistic for a club owner to promise an early midnight closing time or guarantee that drunks won't exit en masse. (Partygoers would leave at a staggered pace, he suggests, if the city extended operating hours beyond 2 a.m.) When the business model no longer makes sense - and the headaches get too intense - club entrepreneurs ditch their plans. So Mr. X bid adieu to that project; he now plans to open a restaurant across town.
The potential backlash from nearby residents helps explain why nightclubs seem veiled in more secrecy than Area 51 (which would, incidentally, be an awesome name for a bar): owners must do a delicate dance, gauging which information to reveal publicly and when. Nearly across the street from Bijou, plans have long been underway to open a new club in the former Aria space. Reps for that project won't discuss its imminent opening - though that often only leads to more buzz from club goers clamoring for info. (For example, several sources have been buzzing about potential names - "Mai" at one point, "Library" at another - and speculating that it will cultivate an older crowd by levying super high cover charges on guests under 25.) Across the block, W Boston is planning a winter opening for its nightspot Descent - but again, folks inside the project won't talk nitty-gritty.
Aboujaoude says there are plenty of reasons why venues aren't more forthcoming: practical considerations, like purchasing web domains, explain in part why he kept Bijou's name secret for months. But most important, he says, is the need to show goodwill by taking things to the people before the press. "If you talk to the newspapers before the neighborhood association, they're not going to be happy," he says. These conversations aren't cheap: they require club owners to spend money on projects that may never break ground. There are legal fees, so lawyers can advise owners on how to talk with neighborhood associations and follow city procedures. And design renderings used to pitch the project might be scrapped and resubmitted numerous times.
"It's months and months of back and forth. They [neighborhood groups] would say ?Tweak it a little and come back,' " says Aboujaoude. Residents want to know everything, from menu items to cocktail prices (it helps them deduce the likely clientele), and club owners often make commitments to the associations. For example, Aboujaoude promised efforts to hire employees from within the neighborhood and assured residents - who tend to blame outsourced promoters for bringing in "bad crowds" - that he'll handle the club's parties and events in house.
Meanwhile, City Hall has its own set of questions - and bureaucratic processes you'd need a GPS to navigate. There's paperwork for everything, from the obvious (liquor licenses, which are limited in Boston but can be transferred between owners) to the seemingly redundant: DJ and live-music permits have their own separate applications. Even innocent details need a permission slip. "You need permits to have TVs," says Aboujaoude. "They need to know how many, and where."
It's for reasons like this that future clubs might sit, empty and waiting, for months before a single nail is hammered in place. But once the residents are sated, City Hall signs off, and everyone is assured that you won't be broadcasting loops of Debbie Does Dallas on 60-inch HD TVs, the hard hats can finally go on.
If you build it, they will come. Eventually.
In December 2008, demolition finally began on the old interior at 51 Stuart Street - but the start of construction doesn't necessarily signify smooth sailing ahead. As any new homeowner can attest, plenty of surprises can present themselves, and they're rarely of the exciting "Oh my God, it's One-Eyed Willy's buried treasure!" variety.
"The walls were separating," says Aboujaoude, recalling one nasty housewarming gift. He says the whole building was structurally unsound and needed more TLC than a weekend marathon of Flip This House. It took "tens of thousands of dollars" to bring in engineers to evaluate the structure - and every added cost haunts owners on the back end, too, since the fee for the City's building permit is based on a percentage of total construction costs. (Fun fact: when you stop by Bijou, look for metal stars on the outside of the building. Those mark the spots where massive steel poles drive through the structure, pulling in walls to hold the building together.)
"You get inside and all you want to do is start designing," says Aboujaoude. "But that's the happy ending. It's the ugly stuff first," like the installation of elaborate electrical wiring needed to power flashing lights and bustling kitchens, labyrinthine plumbing able to serve thousands of guests, and massive HVAC systems. (For perspective, Bijou's central air conditioning provides 60 tons of refrigeration; an average home gets about one to five tons. That's a lot of ductwork to snake around.) And there might be other expenses required to bring a building up to code: to meet standards of the Americans with Disabilities Act, Bijou spent over $100,000 just installing an elevator. (Bonus: that shaft of steel and cinderblock actually makes the building stronger.)
The engineering process can also alter design. "You have to work around the structure; the structure doesn't work around you," explains Aboujaoude. Glamorous club designs don't always anticipate structural limitations. For instance, "We wanted to wipe the pillars out and make it one big, grand room," explains Aboujaoude. But if it turns out that removing a wall would bring the roof crashing down, renderings get redrawn. And with multiple contractors at work (with their own sets of unions and rules, naturally), owners need to minimize the inevitable clusterfucks and stalled projects. So Aboujaoude wears a general contractor hat of sorts, organizing the logical sequence of construction work and ensuring one job is done before another can start.
Which brings us back to the beginning, and the current state of affairs. The room still looks unfinished, but with the infrastructure complete, the (comparatively) easy part has finally arrived. The lighting fixtures, including overhead Braille lights and illuminated bar panels, are ready to be installed. The furnishings built off-site, like low banquettes with private compartments to stow jackets and bags, are nearly ready to arrive. Around a corner, there's the sound of low banging as construction workers pound in the bathroom tiling. And before long, once the gold-toned curtains are draped throughout and the sexy mirrored columns reflect the moving bodies of preening party people, the space will look pretty damn close to the idealized images in architect Stephen Chung's renderings. No one, except the club's owner, will have that special ability to see the wires, pipes, nails - and paperwork - that hold the whole place together.
"What's been the most frustrating part?" Aboujaoude responds to the question with a laugh. "That we're not open yet!" Fair enough, but now that we understand the process, we'll provide a little more leeway for those long-promised club debuts. As for the Halloween bash? It's in our calendar. But in pencil.
Just in case.
