Struggling KC area bar "RGs Lounge" gets "Bar Rescue" visit
 

http://www.kansascity.com/2013/12/12...s-tvs-bar.html


A bar near the Truman Sports Complex has gotten a reality TV makeover, thanks to Spike TV’s “Bar Rescue” show.


The series stars “renowned bar and nightlife expert” Jon Taffer, who with his crew swoops into a struggling bar, fixes its problems and gives it a new name and concept. In the case of RG’s Lounge, at 9100 E. 35th St. in Independence, the place gets renovated and is reportedly given the new moniker “BarCode.”

That, we suppose, is the good news. The bad news is that in a preview of the episode (airing at 9 p.m. Sunday on Spike), RG’s beyond-grimy kitchen does not exactly invite business. It looks like the last place you want preparing your food.

We’ll just assume that Taffer and “Bar Rescue” did a deep cleaning.

The preview clip is also noteworthy for the number of bleeps, as Taffer and a cook scream and curse at each other over the condition of the kitchen. The dispute devolves into a shoving match.

Spike TV sums up the episode, “Twin vs. Twin,” this way: “Jon is met by lights, sirens and handcuffs before he even enters the door of this Kansas City bar. Sibling rivalry between two identical twins with identically huge egos” — that’d be Randy and Rick Houser — “present Taffer with one of his toughest rescues yet.”

Sunday’s episode is the second of three filmed in our area. An episode titled “Brawlin’ Babes,” shot at the former Long Shots in Grain Valley, premiered last Sunday. Catch a rerun of that one at 8 Sunday night, part of a “Bar Rescue” marathon on Spike. Long Shots has been renamed Badlands.

When we checked in with RG’s, we learned that a “Bar Rescue” watch party starts at 7 p.m. Sunday. The public is invited.

Read more here: http://www.kansascity.com/2013/12/12...#storylink=cpy

Watching it right now... HOLY SHEEIT... what a bunch of dirty ****nuts.

The kitchen camera in the first five minutes? OMG... serving the straight up hammered black chick braying like a mule? OMG.

I LOVE JOHN TAFFER, that guy knows how to run a bar.

That black Chick gave Chiefs fans a good look. Jesus.

it was a good show.

Now that cook is mouthing and pushing Taffer, dude needs an elbow to the face first... and a firing second.

That dirty bacon baking tray with old, black grease running down it?... L.O.L... "it may not be perfect, but its clean!"

Having extensive knowledge of two of these "rescues".. I can say without any doubt that they are 95% made up bullshit.

It would have taken me every ounce of strength not to crack him in the face if he said that to me.

The brothers aren't twins??

that longshots place looked like a hole, a GV bar, lol

Please tell me how so, i watch these ALL the time and also know when some amateur is acting for the camera (ie; trying to fool the camera with a script) and i do not see what you're saying at all... these bars are anywhere from 250k to over a million in debt, not sure how you fake that. I get the reluctance to believe "reality" shows, but this isn't one of those.

All of the sudden, i'm coming around to the cook... dude needs a cleaning program that he will stick to and a system for pickup and delivery the waitresses will stick to, and he'll be ok... you see his attitude ALL the time on this show... no one likes to hear a stranger come into your work and tell you what a dirty piece of shit you are, but oftentimes once they think about it, they come around.

Went to RG's once- they played disco through a shitty sound system, they were rude and the place smelled like an armpit.

Thought they closed a long time ago?

Amateurs CANNOT cry on cue the way sooo many of these bar owners do, AustinChief.

They can by take 15.

It isn't exactly "scripted" (that I know of) but they manufacture the conflicts and the "bad guys" and quite a bit of what goes on.

I can only comment definitively on the two bars in Austin (The Brixton and Headhunters) but I know all the people involved in both of those and there was almost nothing "real" about either. The only realistic thing was the Headhunters episode showing the owner to be a complete douche.

Hell, in the Brixton episode they talked about Sara and Tim (the owners) wanting to have a baby and then at the end they put up text saying she was pregnant. #1 they have zero plans at the moment to have kids #2 she did NOT get pregnant.

Sorry to be a buzzkill but it's mostly make believe.

Nope, i don't buy that... the emotion in so many of these episodes is quite genuine. I've been a professional actor and had to cry on cue twice in one night, its an incredibly hard thing to do.

At any rate, i consider myself a pretty good judge of sincerity, and too many of these people are literally on the balls of their ass, imo.

I can see heightening the drama a bit being true, that's pretty standard, but he wont even take these shows on unless they're atleast around 200k in debt... so there undoubtedly some very real dysfunction going on. Just looking at some of the kitchens they show will tell you that, you just cant build up that kind of grime and nastiness in the few months before you know the cameras are showing up.

supposedly these guys are coming to a local topeka sports bar too

The Brixton makeover was complete bullshit.

Not sure i've seen the Brixton episode, was that the hipster bar in Austin owned by the husband and wife team, and the husband was driving everyone off with the snarky attitude?

The place kinda looked like a normal house, not a bar?

Yes. And he "set them up" with a food truck and renamed the bar "Rocket 66" or something stupid like that. They basically did it to get a free remodel and changed the name back to the Brixton almost immediately.

I could cry on queue right now for a $200,000 home makeover. I could even act like a dick and make up a story about my marriage being on the fritz. Of course, my financials are all the way nice so I probably wouldn't make it past a screening.

Yeah, the name kinda rang a bell, i bet atleast a few of these places really just want the killer remodel and then go back to what they were... but i'm pretty sure they have to be atleast 200k in debt for him to take them on.

I don't even really care if they dramatize small parts of it, the things he does for these places are awesome, he really helps them understand their market... the median income in the area, how many similar competitors they have for their old business model, how many people drive down their street each day without noticing them because of poor signage or ugly building, why you need to cater to women etc.

To me, the genuine emotion most owners and employees show by the end of it all really sell this show to me, i don't usually feel i'm being duped.

Pretty sure this show is somewhat hammed up tonprovide confrontation for the audience. And I.dont know.how u could like this Taffer dude. Hes a grade A dbag. IRL cussing at ppl calling them names does not.produce results

I like the show as well, and I think he's totally badass on the analytics and number crunching side of things as well as the general ability to get a well oiled machine up and running. Where I think he often misses (and it's no fault of his because he's coming into markets he doesn't always know and looking at it from an outsider's, non-invested perspective) is the soul/passion part of things (such as renaming the Brixton to Rocket Room 6). Of course, that ability to look at things from a dispassionate business perspective is also what makes him extremely successful at what he does.

I also think that they sometimes make the kitchen much nastier than it actually is, but I also have no doubt that many kitchens look like that.

which one? Toad?

On this one and a few others i definitely agree about not changing the name, and once in a while he wont change the name at all, or maybe just tweak it a bit... some places just have to much historical cache wrapped up in the name.

I guess my final take is that i'd work for this guy eight days a week, because i know he's going to make me money.

He only cusses at them to humble and rattle them a bit, make them understand how stupid they're being, it usually works too.

Its the old drill sergeant routine, he tears them down in front of everyone, then they have a one on one sitdown where he softens up and sells them on his idea.

Yep

I went to a bar in Las Vegas (the Sand Dollar - now Bar 702) with a friend (musician) that lives there to see a blues jam with some great LV musicians just before it was redone on the show. While it was somewhat of a dive (as a musician I've spent a lot of time in dive bars ;) ) it was nothing like they portrayed it in the show. It was just an older bar off the strip, but pretty much like typical bars you find in any city. I had no idea at the time it was going to be on the show (never even heard of the show at the time), and really nothing about the place stood out as unusual.

Obviously it was a lot nicer after the redo, but they basically just took an old slightly run down bar and renovated it. The drama was all for show.

That said, I don't have any problem with the show. I watch it all the time. No one wants to watch actual boring reality.

My friend still plays there weekly.


Take a look at the Wikipedia entry for the old Sand Dollar.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sand_Dollar_Blues_Room

The venue has been described as "genuine and authentic in a world of neon and plastic"[citation needed] and is a popular site for both locals and tourists[citation needed] that has hosted blues legends such as BB King, George Thorogood, and Jeff Healey. Celebrities often stop in to hear the live blues jams. Rock legend Ted Nugent recently performed an impromptu guitar duet with blues great Joe Bonamassa in front of a VH1 film crew. Billionaire founder of Electronic Arts Trip Hawkins hosted a bachelor party there. Pop star Taylor Dayne is among its recent guests, where she asked to perform a song for the crowd.

Doesn't really sound that bad.

i like that show. i thought they were doing some bar in Grain Valley though.

They just opened a few years ago didn't they? I'm assuming they sucked (never been) but didn't think it would be that bad so soon.

Moving out of that shithole area would be a good start

They don't suck, which is why I was surprised they were being considered.

I find it amazing that the city doesn't try to build up the area around the stadiums. If some effort were put into it, it could be every but the destination that Legends is now.

There's too many of those places now.

that would have been better, the whisky tango?

I always find that place funny as the name literally means white trash. A long time ago we pulled a good prank on them.

Are we supposed to guess what the prank was?

Tell us the prank we are sitting on pins and needles.

Oh jesus, you actually think reality tv is real?



Here is some info about one of the episodes:
http://k23detectives.com/2012/09/23/...ern-bar-resue/

If the area could have been developed it would have happened by now. Sports complex is essentially in an industrial park in developers terms. Not a retail destination.

Next time I see you, I cannot say publicly.

Validity of the claims aside, a lot of that "debunking" is nothing of the kind. Pointing to decent food and service after the show has been there doesn't make the show wrong, for instance.

Did you actually read that link? Half of the show was staged, edited, or flat out made up.

So this blogger went there after the fact? after the owner had been handed her ass on a silver platter about how bad her food and service was? not buying it, so yeah, she smartened up after getting a dose of business "reality".

"I talked to the staff (who really need their jobs) and they said it was all peachy, the owner and her joke husband, embarrassed on national tv as absolute flakes now refute any and all allegations"... yeah, go figure.

"His theory on why a pirate bar cant survive" uh huh... who called who for help, again?

Mike accent WAS an act, that's why he started talking American English after they confronted him about it... jeeez, what a load of horseshit this blog is... I wont read past that point, Tracy's trashy ass probably blew the guy for a favorable write-up.

Yeah, she agreed to have national tv say that she's deeeeeep in debt and lives in her moms basement for no reason, uh huh... and even if she lied about moms basement, that show looked into her books to make sure it was even worth doing, so they could trumpet themselves.

That blog proves Jack and Squat.

I bet you think strippers like you, politicians are honest, and magicians really cut people in half.

He turned that place into a state of the art MONEY MACHINE, and she left the place in tears about it because it killed her stupid pirate fantasy... that's pretty much all there is to it.

But she learned a few business tricks from him , got a brand new modern bar and decided to try and hang on... good for her.

That's the reality.

Hmmm.

Been there before. Seemed ok to me but we were just there for beers and live music. And that was quite some time ago (I think).

I read the link. You seem not to have read my post.

The Pirate one was really bad. First, the people running it were idiots who seemed to have escaped from a Renaissance Fair or Comicon and seemed to have no business running a bar. That being said, it seemed like John really went out of his way to **** with them because he hated the type of people they were. I mean, having people like that run some kind of business executive themed bar? Really? It's almost like he was trying to thumb his nose at them and be funny with the theme he chose for the bar. That's more of the tone deaf, business only decision without considering passion and soul stuff that I talked about him doing. With that one, thigh, it almost seemed malicious or an attempt to be ironic/funny.

I could. not. agree more.

To expect those people to buy into "corporate" couldn't have been a simple mistake, it had to have been purposeful, it was easily the biggest WTF moment since i've been watching, it was almost like the city said "help us get these guys the **** outta here"... having said that, why not just buy in after seeing the beautiful new bar that was created to cater to the immediate, money making clientele?

They could fly around America hitting up pirate/renaissance festivals if they had stuck to the program imo, its not that i don't get being an outsider with a dream... at all... but daaang, take the money and run, be who you are anywhere but that bar.

According to the blog post (taken with a grain of salt) those self dispensing beer machines are illegal in their city/state, so They had to remove them.

Did you read the link? If we are to take the butt hurt pirates claim as true then we also must take into account the Murphy's rescuee as accurate well. Except the Murphy's employee debunked the others claims by citing sources and facts, the pirates defender had a laundry list of opinions dressed up as facts.

My favorite was the guy in Phoenix, next to ASU, who turned a killer space into a metal bar. There isn't a more non-money spending clientele than metalheads. Yeah, yeah, you got some beard metal guys who are into craft brews, but for the most part metalheads come to the show with a case of beer in their trunk, are in the parking lot getting high between sets, and looking for a $2 Hamms if they are forced to buy something inside. I mean, at least hip hop/dj clientele pretend to know about tequila and cognac and will drop some $$$.

imho location and atmosphere suck. the patio has an 8' block wall all the way around it, it's like being in a prison yard. food is okay. service poor. the fact that many link them to recent credit card fraud doesn't help I'm sure.

the guy who opened it drained his dad's 401k to open it. I believe he recently sold it. not sure who runs it now.

I didn't see that one. I will say that I went to a joint called Angel's Trumpet in that same area, and it had a very metal vibe and clientele. It was like a bar full of Reapers. Craft beers, awesome good, and intelligent metal head vibes.

I'm sure they exist. From my experience in KC, most "rock bars" start off strong and then have to go in a more hip hop/DJ direction with fewer rock/metal shows simply because they can't make any money off them (can't get any chicks to show up). The rock bars around here with craft taps still keep tallboys on hand for the metal shows. Most shows I go to, we stand around outside between sets drinking beer someone brought. I spend very little inside. I do blow my cash wad at the merch tables though.

It's a lttle sad though, because people (myself included) complain about the lack of consistent punk/metal venues, but that's why, they don't make money for the most part.

Well, in fairness, this place wasn't a venue. Just a bar/restaurant that had a metal vibe and clientele.

Yeah, I should've differentiated between metal people going to shows and people who like metal that are going out for drinks.

I love the show.
But it's clear parts of it are "fake," when the "hidden cameras are moving with the characters and picking up production-quality sound in an ostensibly crowded bar.