I've been in here a couple...

I've been in here a couple of times in the last month and wanted to do a report since there have been some changes. The club is under new ownership, and while this has produced some improvements, not all is well. First, the clowns are gone in the remodeling, and the name is changing to "The Den." There are new couches and chairs, which is very welcome. The old website is gone without even a forwarding address (very bad!), and the new one is www.den1.com (very hard to find googling if you don't read it off their sign in front). Prices for dances and drinks is about the same (dancer drinks went down from $7 to $6, is the one positive change I noticed). They now serve food, although I haven't seen a menu and haven't seen anyone order any. The dance price structure (good) and the awkward ticket system (bad) are both still in place (the ticket system may help management get their share of dances, but I'm sure they lose money overall as dancers barely solicit private dances and your average local is too shy to buy the ticket). The only long-term employee still around, dancer or otherwise, is the DJ who isn't very good, leaving dead air sometimes and talking too much in between songs; most DJs aren't very good at strip clubs, so whatever. Also I've seen what another person reported -- a clock 15 minutes fast resulting in last call for dances and alcohol barely past 1 AM.

Dancers turn over a lot at any club, but the last six months has seen a major turnover, with essentially a whole new set of dancers. And while individual dancers aren't bad, the club has only had 6 or 7 on weekend nights recently. That's potentially a huge problem. The place has three stages. Last year on a Saturday night all three would be used. Now, on a recent Saturday night, there was only one. If you want to sit stageside and tip, there aren't enough spaces to be able to do so. Dancers are not making money.

I'm giving club a "4" rating right now. It's nearly an "8" when everything is working well. I'm worried at the current trend, however. As the only decent club in the area without going to Denver, I hope the Den survives and gets past the immediate issues. The bottom line is that dancers need to make money to stay at a club, and I guess this isn't happening reliably enough. The clientelle is perhaps one issue, but there are things the club could do to help out, too.