I’ve been a longtime patron of the strip club scene. I live in the Northeast, but I’ve hit the Meccas like Vegas over the years. I also spent some time in Japan last year; I didn't actually visit any strip clubs there because their nightlife scene makes standard strip clubs look pretty tame by comparison. These days, I’ve mostly retired from stuffing dollars into G-strings. I met my girlfriend, so the heavy spending stopped. That said, I’m still friendly with a few dancers whose mortgages I basically helped pay off back in the day. Every once in a while, I still drop by to catch up with my old friends. We have a good enough rapport that we can chat without money changing hands—as long as I’m not eating into their valuable hustle time. Which brings me to my main point: Are strip clubs the proverbial canary in the coal mine for the economy? If so, I’m getting concerned about the US as a whole. Almost all the dancers, bartenders, and bouncers I know are genuinely spooked by how dead it’s been. Excluding the pandemic, my local club was steadily banging, even during day shifts. Usually, once the weather turns cool and the kids head back to school, foot traffic picks up. But I can’t remember the last time I saw this place with a half-empty parking lot on a Friday—yet on my last visit during prime lunch hours, it was practically deserted. One of my friends, who usually stays booked back-to-back all day, sat and talked with me for almost 30 minutes for free. These are sharp, young, fit women who have been doing this for years and know exactly how to bleed men's wallets dry. When I asked what they thought, they all said the same thing: people just aren't coming in, and the ones who do aren't spending like they used to. The head bartender, who’s been there for 16 years, told me she’s never seen it this bad. It made me wonder: If tits and ass can't get guys to open their wallets, what chance does standard retail have? Wanting a reality check, I took my girlfriend out to hit two other clubs in our urban area. They’ve always been second-tier spots, but seeing them live was pathetic—the few clients inside were just sitting there staring into space. Am I crazy here, or are you all seeing business as usual? I’d especially like to hear from major hubs like Montreal, Vegas, or Miami. Is this the moment we’ll look back on as the start of a broader recession? More importantly, can you actually use adult entertainment as a reliable leading economic indicator, or am I just falling for confirmation bias?
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