I have few rules in life, but one of them is this: any time Jon Taffer is rescuing my former favorite bar for his TV show, I have to keep a running diary. I started watching early on my phone before the first airing on TV on Sunday night, but it stopped working about halfway through the episode. You'll notice the times from the beginning of the episode are from when I started watching on Wednesday or Thursday night, but I finished when the episode aired on TV on Sunday night. If you haven't seen the episode yet, don't read this if you plan on watching.
I will never forget the summer of 2005. I had turned 21 and three of my friends were working at the Artful Dodger in Huntington. John bartended on Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Saturdays. Vin and Sean worked as bar backs on Saturdays. I went every night that they worked there. Many of those nights I was driving so I didn't drink a lot, but I at least made an appearance. Then there were the nights I wasn't driving. Those were fun. John rarely charged me for my drinks. So many good times there that summer. Other summers were fun, but it's hard to top being 21 and having three of my friends working at a bar. I remember when I found out that the Dodger had been sold. I had just gotten back to my dorm after the Bush Push game and I saw on people's away messages that it was the last night of the Dodger. I was coming home for fall break the next morning. We had just lost a heartbreaking game and I was going to miss the last night of the Dodger by one day. It was a rough day. I went back to the Dodger a handful of times after that, but its steady decline had begun.
Here was my Yelp review from 2010:
"Back in the day, the Artful Dodger was my favorite bar. Much like Moe on the Simpsons once did, they made the mistake of getting rid of the dank (actually it was a new owner, but that doesn't work with my analogy). Now I go there and the bouncer rejects me without even checking my ID because I'm not dressed properly. No thanks. I'll go to Katie Mc's."
I've only written four Yelp reviews ever. It's the only bad review I've ever given (one star). Anyway, let's get to the show:
7:07- According to the introduction, the owner bought the bar in 2006. I thought it had changed hands more than once. It also claims that the bar did well for the first five years. I question that claim.
7:08- The name changed to Radio in 2011. I didn't even know. When we did 12 Bars of Christmas in 2012, I never even considered going to the Artful Dodger or whatever it was called by then.
7:10- They're talking about the underage crowd. The last time I tried to go there, I couldn't get in because I wasn't wearing long pants. Or something stupid like that. But now it seems like they'd let any scumbag in.
7:10- Jon Taffer doesn't embrace excuses; he embraces solutions.
7:11- Phil Wills is Jon's bartender tonight. Jon compares its outside appearance to an autobody shop. He's going somewhere with that.
7:12- Teen night was Thursday. How dumb was that idea?
7:13- The name was Radio, but it still said Artful Dodger on the outside. So dumb.
7:14- Jon's going to check out some other bars. He wants to steal some customers for recon. This is different.
7:14- Jon is impressed by Christopher's. Sure it's better than Artful Dodger, but that's a low bar to clear (pun intended). I hate Christopher's, but I'm willing to go there, which is more than I would say about whatever the Artful Dodger became.
7:16- Jon's sending in a bunch of people from other bars. Artful Dodger bartender Jen needs some work.
7:17- One of the customers suspects a rat was chewing on the furniture. Entirely possible. They also have fruit flies.
7:18- You're not going to believe this, but Jon Taffer is getting angry. He's storming in.
7:19- Bugs in a bottle. The crowd is getting angry.
7:26- Jon shuts the bar down.
7:27- Jon had his crew work all night to clean and sanitize the bar.
7:28- They had mosquitoes in the drain. Jon talks about the dangers of mosquitoes. Ned Flanders might disagree.
7:29- We get an explanation of the life cycle of fruit flies.
7:30- My phone is not cooperating right now.
7:37- We're back. The owner Mike is in debt over $100,000.
7:38- There's friction between the owner and the manager.
7:39- Phil and Jesse Barnes are brought in to start training the staff. By the way, the bar looks totally different than it did the last time I ever went to the Dodger. I miss that bar. It was so much fun.
7:41- Jen says she's never going to make a drink the way Phil does. Jon says, "The more you speak, the more of a fool you look like." Jen starts crying.
7:47- More phone issues.
7:56- We're finally back on my phone and so is Jen.
8:01- More phone issues. Baseball is starting soon so I'm going to put the diary on hold for now.
9:30- I'm back and they're training Jen.
9:31- Jon is doing an 18 and over night for the stress test. He says he would never do this himself, but he's going to let them do what they do.
9:32- Two black X's on the hands for people under 21 and pink wristbands for somebody over 21. Jon sends in somebody over 21 who is posing as an 18 year old. She wipes off the X's pretty easily.
9:33- Ten Bud Lights sold to a customer. They have no idea who's getting those drinks.
9:34- Jon's mole has had a drink for over 20 minutes and nobody notices.
9:35- We have some bad bartending going on.
9:36- Jon finally lets the owner know that his mole had been drinking as an allegedly underage girl. And we have some real underage people fighting and being crazy. There's a good reason I hadn't been there in a long time.
9:41- The Royals are up 7-2, but the Angels are threatening. A Royals-Orioles ALCS would be a lot of fun. A Giants-Cardinals NLCS would be miserable. The Dodgers need to win a game or two in St. Louis.
9:42- Jon has them shut down the bar. Jon calls the stress test "a dismal failure." Jon goes through the Huntington demographics with his experts. Jon tells them about his speakeasy idea.
9:44- Jon makes the owner and manager promise that they won't allow anybody under 21 in the bar ever again. When I was going to the Dodger, there definitely were under 21 people there, but they were my friends and they didn't act like morons. And they weren't there when the bar was busy.
9:46- Phil is teaching the bartenders some cocktails. I'm a beer guy. One drawback of the Dodger in its glory days was the beer selection. They only have a few beers on tap.
9:48- Jon unveils the new bar to the owners (which we will see after the commercial). How does this work? Don't they see it before Jon counts to three and has them turn around? Or are they led there blindfolded?
9:49- The Royals got out of the jam. They still lead by five in the bottom of the fifth.
9:52- The Bengals are down 14-3 against the Patriots. People love the Bengals right now. Yeah, I'm not convinced.
9:54- We get the first look at P's & Q's Autobody. "You weren't very good at the bar business so I built you an autobody shop." P's & Q's is a reference to pints and quarts. You drink beer in pints, but you don't drink anything in quarts. I'm confused.
9:55- Jon shows them the secret door. My brother and I went there a month and a half ago. The secret door was pretty cool.
9:57- Once the bar is redone, it's the least interesting part of the show for me. I love watching the bar be terrible and Jon getting angry. But the new bar is open for business.
9:59- Jon says goodbye to the owner and manager.
10:00- Sales are supposedly up 30% six weeks after the relaunch. I'll finish with my review of my visit back in August:
As big Bar Rescue fans and former fans of the Artful Dodger, my brother Sean and I had to check out P's & Q's Autobody. As I already said, the secret door was pretty cool. They really do up the speakeasy theme. We were there early on a Saturday night and it was not very crowded. They're definitely going to have to attract an older, wealthier crowd. Mixed drinks were expensive ($12.50 each). My brother had two and liked them. This is not going to be a place where college kids go when they come home. It's not a place that I'll go to very often. I had a beer on tap. There wasn't a wide selection, but it was fine (I think it was $7). I was interested to see if they'd do anything about food. The Dodger never had food, but Jon is always very big on having food at the bar on the show. It was interesting that there was no mention of food at all. I don't really know if there was anything he could have done. Like I said, I won't go there often, but I would go there for 12 Bars of Christmas if we brought that back for 2014. So I guess that's an improvement.
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