The Platform: A Dancer's Perspective

I am a New Orleans-based dancer and decided to take the hour and 20 minute drive out to Morgan City to check out The Platform. I am very glad I did. The club has been totally revamped since the new owners bought it about a year ago. They say they're trying to bring some class to the local strip club scene, and it shows. The remodeled interior feels clean and new throughout, with especially cool lights. Smoking is permitted at the bar, but it's not overly smoky inside because the club is well ventilated with high ceilings. Music skews toward classic rock, Motown and some current pop hits.

There's one main stage with a spinning pole. Dancers do a three-song rotation (bottoms off on the first song, top off on the second, thong only for the third) and then walk around the u-shaped bar, doing a little 10-15 second shimmy in front of each customer for a tip. If you've ever been to Visions in New Orleans East, it's kind of a similar set-up. The girls are very pretty and their looks are varied--white and black, ages 19 to late 30s, slim and curvy, tattooed and Barbie types. Very friendly, too. (Obviously, I'm biased, but this is the only club I've worked at where dancers went out of their way to introduce themselves and chat with me on my first shift. Usually they stick to themselves at first.)

The owners work to make The Platform a good, affordable experience in every way. Drinks are around $6 to $10. Cover is $7. Lap dances are $20--no more, no less, as a sign on the lap dance area says. You buy a wristband for $10 that permits you to go in the lap dance area, and once you have that, every lap dance is $20. The rules are no nipples in mouth, no touching under the thong. They are friction lap dances. There's no VIP area or champagne rooms--it's just lap dances.