The sign still today, online and at the Mallalieu Inn first stop in in North Hudson, could be the sign of the times, reflecting both ways: You can come on in and have a drink and not have to deal with a doorman. A block up the side street toward the St. Croix River, it’s a different story. (More on that further down).
As the rules for bars and the crowd and its nature came and went, the numbers of bouncers (and that could be plural and therefore bringing kudos for having enough staff on duty) employed by various clubs, if only on weekends, has ebbed and flowed. It is still present a bit despite the lifting of virtually all restrictions, because there still is remnants of That Minnesota Show, a bit like the lawless local days of the ‘70s – think Street Fighting Man, and not only the stellar Stones song.
The key players with this bouncer approach that seemed to be very effective in toning things down, are the clubs directly in downtown Hudson, mostly on the west side of the main drag that fittingly, is closest to Minnesota, and a couple in North Hudson. (Starr’s Bar in particular has been far more likely to add a second bartender to deal with on-and-off rule-driven overflow). Another creative strategy that provides a worker perk and still benefits all: A bouncer or doorman might not even have to be brought in from the outside, rather a cook or server who wants a few extra hours and knows the scene at his place of employment. And sorry ladies, this appears to be a guy’s realm.
But that was now, and the mandatory mask mandate never was really followed. Right off the bat, guys noticed that you could not drink a beer through a cloth mask, especially it is one of those grainy ones with “character.” At first there were the signs on the doors of virtually every bar and grill, or grill and bar, you can take your pick, but they were hardly ever enforced, even when there is this flood of people in the door, which you can understand if they end up being more than one person deep on occasion when bellying up to the bar for a drink. Eventually as the severity started to ween, even staffers flipped off their masks as they ran to serve customers and take orders that require much back-and-forth verbal communication, and all through this process, if someone came inside sporting such facewear, it was a dead ringer that they were from The Cities. Hey, boosts the Hudson economy, which has a central focus like few other cities that spills directly from the bar and grill scene, and related service and tourism and river recreation industries. Back a couple of springs ago, it was noted in the press that the Hudson economy was hit like virtually none other due to the at lack of diversification. We all needed a day-spring, and it came a few months ago via rule changes, as the signs that in some situations barred people from the hitting the bar, that were on almost all the doors, came down completely.
It had been that venues were almost discouraging the oncoming customer traffic, even if they had live music and you know there has to be a few hundred dollars to the band, to meet a 25 percent capacity rule. If you would be the one to go 30 percent, go home, as the joint might be risking sanction. Forget trying to hit them up for a cheap ad. The optimum, obviously, would be to have only a handful of the normal-size crowd of people and have them be big spenders.
And there were workers at such businesses who had contracted Covid at some point, and you might not have been aware of that fact. After all, nobody sent out a press release to do what, frighten away most patrons even further? It was mostly dealt with quietly, one could say on a need to know basis, although these workers who in most cases were under-the-weather for just a few days and then took off enough time to meet the quarantine requirement, would be up front with you after the fact, when they were back.
The bar scene has a fly in the ointment for spread of things like the virus, for a particular reason – the clog spaces in many a tavern where people almost brush against each other trying to amble through. Often it is at a spot where one room with a specific purpose leads to another with a differing service component, and what there is for a doorway would be workable in pre-virus days, but these days there is little such margin for error. Add a horseshoe-shaped area for bar service within that magic social distancing number and also the shoulder-to-shoulder-based spread of impact that follows, or even a bar-rail itself that edges up to a clog space, and things ebb further. Too many tables, even if small, don’t help. And you don’t want to mix in things like a popcorn machine (in often- cases taken down long ago) or an ATM, even if they are single units. One that is harder to help is the presence gaming machines, where a bar is legally allowed five and everyone takes full advantage. Three ways this battle has been won, other than just taking stuff down that could be seen as peripheral to the business, are to move the machines around creatively and in essence add space, have bouncers take their positions from which they survey the scene to several feet away and rely more on movement – with their hand signals over their heads to convey that The Kids Are All Right — that includes limited walks through the clog areas, and put the ATM machine outside the door!