re: Dead Poet opens today... Former spot of Shady's, Tops, The Levee, and The Bandit

Taking a second glance I see that they're murals now. They do look like Longshore though.

It looks nice, I'm just not sure the demographic is there to support it. It seems there are hardly any 25 to 35 year old professionals in Baton Rouge that don't have families. College kids may go there some, but not enough to keep it going.

Im not rooting against it but its a risky as hell proposition in my opinion.

Pretty much the entire overpass area, bulldog, and olive or twist is that age and doing fine.

He's been established in the area for awhile. I think he has a relatively good feel for these things. I would say he also has a crowd that will frequent his place simply because of who he is. I being one of them.

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Again, I hope he does well, it would be nice to have a spot like that around campus. Another concern is could this be a damned if you do, damned if you don't type deal? You can get the older college kids or the young professional crowd, but it seems one would kind of push out the other. If it was frequented by a lot of the college crowd would that influence you going there? Maybe not, I'm asking.

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I think thats a fair point... Just a generalization, but BR has 3 areas for nightlife: Downtown, mid-city/overpass, and Tigerland. All of them attract a very different crowd.

Bars are weird in that having a bunch of competition around them can help. Patrons like to bar hop. This place would basically be a standalone in the campus area. It can be done: Bulldog, Hayride Scandal (which this guy obviously is involved in), but it seems to be more tough that way... I don't go to Tigerland because I don't want to be around a bunch of drunk college kids. This place will die the moment it becomes a place for just college students because then nobody else will want to go. And generally college students aren't looking to spend $10 on a cocktail, just $5 on a whiskey-coke

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Not really. It's easy walking distance from both Mellow Mushroom and Bogies.

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I think you are misunderstanding what he's saying.

I'm not sure I do. People like to be able to bar hop, but they don't just want to bar hop between a bunch of bars that are all of the same type. What made downtown successful for a time was the fact that there were not just lots of bars in a small area, but lots of different kinds of bars. You could go from bar to bar and hear a cover band, original music, drink cheep beer, drink craft beer, drink expensive cocktails, shoot pool, hang out on couches, sit on a patio, have daquiries, watch a ball game, bump & grind, have an intimate conversation, sing karaoke, etc. You had a strip of different bars all offering different kinds of experiences in one area.

Right now, the only places on the south side are typical cheep drink college bars playing hip hop (JL's, Bogies, Fred's, Reggae's, Mike's), one cheep drink college bar with bands (The Box, or whatever it is now), and one place that serves pizza (Mellow). There's a lot of bars one can walk between, but not a lot of different kinds of experiences between them other than the fact that Fred's and Bogies each have patios.

Adding another bar that's of a different type (craft beer, nice cocktails, live original music, good bar food) might be kinda nice. Remember, their competition for that kind of venue isn't Fred's or Bogies. Their competition is The Varsity, The Spanish Moon, Mid City Ballroom, Pop Shop Records, and the bars out on Perkins. They don't have anything like them by campus other than The Varsity on the north side. If they can get enough artsy musician types and college-aged girls that want to a little classier atmosphere for a girl's night without driving way off campus, they might not fail.

Still a long-shot, though. Northgate Tavern/The Library tried to do what these guys are doing 5-10 years ago and failed miserably.

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If it was frequented by a lot of the college crowd would that influence you going there? Maybe not, I'm asking.

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I'd say nah. I think it is 21+ so while they may want some students, they're not getting Reggie's crowd. And as long as they're 21+, I don't think college students really bother anyone. Look at how mixed Ivars, Bulldog, etc. is.

I'd think we will also see sororities/fraternities rent the place out for mixers occsaionally. I see them rent out Varsity and whatnot a good bit.

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I'd say nah. I think it is 21+ so while they may want some students, they're not getting Reggie's crowd. And as long as they're 21+, I don't think college students really bother anyone. Look at how mixed Ivars, Bulldog, etc. is.

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Fred's and Bogies are both 21+ for guys and 20+ for girls to my knowledge and you see how they are. I'm really not trying to be a Debbie downer, I'm just not sure there is much odlf a college crowd that wants $10 cocktails and I'm not sure there's enough market for another place like Olive or Twist or whatever for this place to steal.

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Fred's and Bogies are both 21+ for guys and 20+ for girls to my knowledge and you see how they are.

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Since when?

Bogies was 18+ my entire college years, which ended not that long ago.

Fred's is 19+ girls, 20+ guys.

I'm dumb. I read Bogies and pictured Reggies.