Vanilla Bar Meet and Greets

[MtnSwing]

This is a question for those of you that do regular bar meet and greets. We're interested in starting up something similar. How did you get started? What advice do you have for those of us getting started? How do you get the word out? What (if anything) do you tell the bar management? Do you do them weekly, monthly, quarterly, etc? Any advice is appreciated.

Mr.

[VegasLee]

We held monthly bar meets for over five years.

We started out by finding a local bar that was not afraid of "our type." Many of them do not want swingers in their bar in large groups. Here in Nevada their bar licenses are very expensive and they are watched over by the government. They don't want to take a chance on losing them. Believe it or not Vegas is NOT the Sin City people want to believe.

We had a couple of Yahoo groups for local Swingers. We started promoting the bar meets in those yahoo groups. We also found other local Yahoo groups and got permission from the owners of those groups to promote the Bar Meets in their groups. The first meet has about a dozen people at it. In about six months we had an average of 100 people at our Bar Meets. 65% of the people where regulars that came to all the bar meets, the other half would be new people checking it out.

The Bar owner was happy, Swings like to drink so we made for a good night for his bar. The other people in the bar where entertained by us.

We found a bar that was not really busy on a Friday night. The busy bars did not want our crowd. Picking a slower bar keeps us from being mixed with to many "others" that are not part of our group and also is incentive for the bar owner to want us there.

We found this was the first step for many that ended up coming to the Swing Club we host at. It gave them away to check out the people without stepping right into a club.

Laura and I would pay to have some snacks at the bar during the bar meets. We would also do our best to get around to anyone that looked like they belonged there to talk to them and introduce them to others.

You will get new people that will stand on the other side of the bar, watch everything then go post in Yahoo groups that no one was friendly to them. You just have to ignore them. You will also find people that no matter how nice a bar is or what bar you pick they will complain about it. You can not make everyone happy. You will find that most of the upscale nice bars won't want a large group of Swingers hanging out in it. Most of those are busy bars and large groups of Swingers do not mix well with "regular" people. Others get offended. You want to be careful of that. You do not want to offend the bars regular customers or the bar will not want you there.

No matter how hard you try, some swingers are going to take things a bit further then they should in public, seems to be their nature. They forget there are others around that don't want to see their wifes tits. You will have to do your best to keep things in line or you will lose your bar.

Bar meets can be fun. Over time they can turn into a lot of work trying to keep a big part of the group happy.

Good luck to you. It is a great way to meet people.

[MtnSwing]

Thanks so much for your advice. It really helps. we currently live in a small town but we're planning on moving to Calgary in the fall and it would be fun to try to set up meets there. We are regulars at one of the local clubs but it would be great to be able to meet people in vanilla settings as well.

Mr.

[JustAskJulie]

If you are expecting a large group, I definately would NOT do it without telling the bar management what to expect and getting their ok. If the bar will be open to the public, MAKE SURE that those attending (in your group) understand that there will be non-swingers there and they should be discreet. And at the same time understand that there will always be one or two that don't know how to be discreet once they get a drink or two in them.

If you have a large enough group, I would talk to the management about taking over the bar once a month or so (depending on how often your group can support). Doing this, look for a smaller bar that doesn't typically do a lot of business on the night you want to take the place over. By promising them a certain number of people you should be able to work a deal. The bar gets a good thing by getting traffic and drinks sold that they wouldn't otherwise get, and you get a good deal by getting a private location.

[MtnSwing]

Thanks Julie. That's great advice.

Mr.