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Boston Bans Bottle Service
It's Thursday at 4:00 pm, which means the weekend has
officially begun in college towns across the country. But bad news
is coming down the pike for hearty partiers in Boston: A
ban on bottle service in bars.
Letters are going out to unsuspecting bar and club owners at this very moment, informing them that bottle service violates Boston's existing ban on serving more than 2 drinks at a time to a customer.
The hilariously dismissive money quote from Boston Licensing Board Chairman Daniel Pokaski:
“We’re not New York and we’re not South Beach,” he said. “The city of Boston has a lot more to offer than just getting people inebriated. If all they can offer their clientele is just swilling down alcohol, then perhaps they shouldn’t be in the business.”
Not so long ago, Boston's esteemed politicians professed themselves shocked (shocked!) that people go to baseball games to booze it up.
Guy Montag|4.24.08 @ 4:20PM|#
ban on serving more than 2 drinks at a time to a
customer
If they did not remove the irish from Boston, how did they avoid an
uprising?
ed|4.24.08 @ 4:20PM|#
"We're not New York and we're not South Beach"
Sounds like he's striving for Portland.
Other Matt|4.24.08 @ 4:22PM|#
Stupid liberal Democrat nanny staters.
Aw, come on now, joe lives there, and he's not a..uh...sorry, never
mind.
fyodor|4.24.08 @ 4:22PM|#
If all they can offer their clientele is what they want, then they, uh, well, um, I...I get kinda lost here....
|4.24.08 @ 4:32PM|#
I now understand Massachusetts. Everything done there--everything--is to avoid the remotest chance of being attacked by large reptiles.
|4.24.08 @ 4:35PM|#
What is "Bottle Service"?
The service - a staple in exclusive nightclubs from Miami to
Manhattan to Las Vegas - allows big spenders to have private VIP
tables in exchange for purchasing a bottle of high-end booze,
usually for $300 or more. Servers bring buckets of ice, tumblers
and non-alcoholic mixers to make cocktails.
So, something I'll never want, but still something a bar should be
able to offer. In fact such an upscale perk seems to be exactly the
kind of offering that goes beyond just swilling booze.
The most annoying bar/booze law I've ever encountered, was that a
tax seal had to be broken on every sale. So the bartender had to
open and empty a minibottle for every shot poured.
|4.24.08 @ 4:36PM|#
Every time I start to think that "Boston Legal" is too goofy to be set in Boston, something like this story comes along to set me straight. Where are Denny Crane and Alan Shore when we need them to stand up for bar and club owners in Beantown? Scriptwriters, your work is half done on this one. It's a slam-dunk. Get typing!
|4.24.08 @ 4:36PM|#
Maybe if they were not so drunk all the time they would stop electing such idiots.
tarran|4.24.08 @ 4:38PM|#
Guys, this is Massachusetts: a state that has a long history of
backward and oppressive government.
It was in Massachusetts that compulsory, state financed public
schools were first introduced to the U.S. The motivation: to ensure
that children were indoctrinated with the right form of
Christianity.
It was Massachusetts that for many decades outlawed any celebration
of Christmas.
It was Massachusetts that continued segregating public housing well
into the 1980's.
It was Massachusetts that executed Quakers.
It was Massachusetts where the police forced grocery stores to stay
closed on Thanksgiving.
Whether burning witches or preventing developers from building
houses that poor people can actually afford, the state and its
supporters positively delight in shutting down peaceful
activity.
Many of my fellow citizens like to believe that they live in an
enlightened state. The reality is that it is a backward place, and
that when you dig past the veneer of gentility and liberality
exposes practically medieval views on freedom and the rights of
man.
|4.24.08 @ 4:39PM|#
Sounds like he's striving for Portland.
Portland Oregon?
It has been my experience that you have to try pretty hard to get
within a hundred miles of the place without getting drunk.
Peter|4.24.08 @ 4:42PM|#
It almost sounds torn from the pages of an (early) National
Lampoon script:
Chairman Pokaski: "I don't know about YOU Sir, but I certainly
don't go to a bar to get soused up on hooch, that I might loose my
virtue to carnality with some pretty tavern-maid!"
Citizen: "The bad news Chairman, she'd probably be ugly. The good
news, you'd be drunk anyway!"
|4.24.08 @ 4:42PM|#
Guys, this is Massachusetts: a state that has a long history
of backward and oppressive government.
Well it is not all that bad...on the side of liberty if your name
happens to Kennedy you can legally rape and/or kill women. That is
something right?
|4.24.08 @ 4:52PM|#
"The city of Boston has a lot more to offer than just
getting people inebriated. If all they can offer their clientele is
just swilling down alcohol, then perhaps they shouldn't be in the
business."
Don't Boston bars offer pool, pinball, watching the home team lose,
getting turned down by skanky women and the other traditional bar
amusements?
|4.24.08 @ 4:57PM|#
In a way, he is right. If the bars were not enticing the Bostonians with bottle service, the folks would instead be at the Boston Symphony. Getting drunk.
tarran|4.24.08 @ 5:00PM|#
Well it is not all that bad...on the side of liberty if your name happens to Kennedy you can legally rape and/or kill women. That is something right?
snark mode on
That, and you get lots of buildings and streets named after you.
The greater the number of statues, the more nervous the
tyrant.
Actually, it's not all that bad. You can still drive a car with a
bumper sticker that says: "My gun has killed fewer people
than Ted Kennedy's car" without getting hassled too badly
by the local police.
snark mode off
Other Matt|4.24.08 @ 5:05PM|#
Many of my fellow citizens like to believe that they live in
an enlightened state. The reality is that it is a backward place,
and that when you dig past the veneer of gentility and liberality
exposes practically medieval views on freedom and the rights of
man.
And on top of all that joe lives there? Damn.
|4.24.08 @ 5:12PM|#
"bottle service violates Boston's existing ban on serving
more than 2 drinks at a time to a customer.... 'The city of Boston
has a lot more to offer than just getting people
inebriated.'"
The whole point behind bottle service isn't to get as inebriated as
possible. It's to reserve the table. And in fact, at $300 a bottle
for Grey Goose or Veuve, there is a massive incentive to make it
last as long as possible.
Could Pokaski be more out of touch with reality?
Invisible Finger|4.24.08 @ 5:20PM|#
The city of Boston has a lot more to offer
than...
New York or South Beach?? What bullshit. If given a choice to be
dropped for a day in either New York, South Beach, or Boston, no
sane person would pick Boston. Alcohol does for ugly cities what
alcohol does for ugly girls.
Joel|4.24.08 @ 5:21PM|#
Could Pokaski be more out of touch with reality?
Well, I suppose it could turn out he's wrong about Boston not being
New York or South Beach...
But it seems unlikely. Certainly neither of those places would
admit it.
a joe stand-in|4.24.08 @ 5:35PM|#
Stupid liberal Democrat nanny staters.
Aw, come on now, joe lives there, and he's not a..uh...sorry, never
mind.
Hey! I'm not stupid!
Rhywun|4.24.08 @ 5:53PM|#
It's a good thing all those freedom-loving states in flyover country have no nanny laws whatsoever.
|4.24.08 @ 5:57PM|#
Drinking isn't good for us, the law is meant to protect us, anything that reduces drinking is inherintly a good thing, I'm all for it.
|4.24.08 @ 6:09PM|#
It's a good thing all those freedom-loving states in flyover
country have no nanny laws whatsoever.
No smoking in bars? Hell in Michigan you can smoke in just about
every sit down restaurant. We are not "freedon crushing nanny state
bullshit" free, but it appears we have less of that nonsense than
many places.
|4.24.08 @ 6:11PM|#
I had to go to Boston once to visit a girlfriend's adamantly non-drinking brother. Turns out that after you walk that damn red line once, you are pretty much done in Boston if you can't have beer.
|4.24.08 @ 6:23PM|#
the boston licensing board shines in its inept stupidity even
among great massachusetts government agencies like the boston
police department (cost $ 2 million+ on aqua teen hunger force
toys) and the massachusetts turnpike authority (cost $16 billion+
and 1 consumer fatality so far).
in my college years, the BLB spent an awesome amount of time and
taxpayer money persecuting MIT fraternities for handing out keg
beer to local undergrads, evicting active students with 1 day's
notice, preventing even 21+ adults from drinking in their own
rooms/houses, etc.
firing these morons and using their salaries to help subsidize
rehab for alcoholics seems at least a million times more
effective
|4.24.08 @ 6:51PM|#
I totally thought the lede on this post was going somewhere
else.
It's Thursday at 4:00 pm, which means the weekend has
officially begun in college towns across the country. it's
time for the City of Boston to embarrass itself in front of the
nation
miche|4.24.08 @ 6:52PM|#
I hate, hate, hate bottle service in most cases. A club in Plano, TX gets
somewhere in the 'hood of $150 per bottle of vodka (+ tips) to
reserve a seat. That seems reasonable next to the menus of European
or Las Vegas clubs but there's no reason to pay that much in
Texas.
Yet, as much as I hate and avoid bottle service (except when in
cities mentioned), I hate more some nanny making it illegal. Of
course, I never went to that Plano club after Plano made smoking
illegal on patios.
BakedPenguin|4.24.08 @ 6:58PM|#
Don't Boston bars offer pool, pinball, watching the home team lose...
Yeah, but in Boston, the the team usually wins.
Ali|4.24.08 @ 7:06PM|#
Stupid massholes. Can't we push them all into the
ocean?
Hey, not all of the people in Mass are worthy of pushing into the
ocean. There libertarians here, you know. All three of us do not
deserve pushing in the ocean.
|4.24.08 @ 7:21PM|#
Oh wait, I do have one response for JD - it's been a while since Boston bars have shown the home team losing.
|4.24.08 @ 7:26PM|#
Oh wait, I do have one response for JD - it's been a while
since Boston bars have shown the home team losing.
Yeah, Feb. 3rd was it? ;)
Unless you count the Bruins game 7 disappearance...
Ali|4.24.08 @ 7:33PM|#
Brian- Save your breath on Eryk. Its a Mass thing. I call it denial. And sports tribalism. Of the worst kind.
|4.24.08 @ 7:35PM|#
If Mass is full of Massholes, what do you call all those
friggin' CowHampshire people that drive here for work (and who,
therefore, pay Mass State income tax)? Other than stupid, that
is.
Eryk: I don't know you so I guess I'm Libertarian #4.
Timmy Mac|4.25.08 @ 8:54AM|#
How can you talk about liquor laws here in Massachusetts when Pennsylvania's crazy-ass beer-buying regulations still exist?
|4.25.08 @ 9:40AM|#
Why do libertarians have to push every state into maximum liberty? We have 50 states, people are free to move to South Beach or New York or Hartford, CT if they like that kind of thing. If this were a national law, yeah it would be a big deal, but when individual states pass restrictive laws - more diversity. Personally I'm fine with the fact that Boston drinking culture discourages show-offs and the kind of assholes who populate South Beach. And as a New Hampshire native, I'm well aware that NH will never have a bottle service law - not least of all because we don't have a single swanky night club in the entire state and possibly the ugliest girls in the Union.
|4.25.08 @ 10:42AM|#
Why do libertarians have to push every state into maximum liberty?
You mean, why do Libertarians *WANT* to push every state into
maximum liberty?
Libertarians haven't been 1% successful at pushing anything! The
U.S. is becoming a police state, and even worse a puritanical
theocratic police state! And when right-wing Christians want to ban
the devil booze, and libertarains complain, we then have leftists
like joe defending the right-wing Christianity morality police as
some sort of progressive social democracy.
lunchstealer|4.25.08 @ 10:50AM|#
Is worse than the liberal stronghold of South Carolina, where, technically, bottle service is no problem, because all drinks in bars must be served out of one-drink minibottles?
LiberalsSuck|4.25.08 @ 10:53AM|#
Why do libertarians have to push every state into maximum
liberty?
Why do liberals have to push every state into maximum tyranny?
|4.25.08 @ 11:49AM|#
lunchstealer,
mini bottlers are no longer mandatory here in SC, a lot of places
still use them of course but they have the option of switching to
free pour.
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