“I was in Girls Gone Wild,” says a grinning 18-year-old blonde who goes by the stage name Star. She leans on the bar in a sheer top with a bright bikini beneath, taking drags from her Virginia Slim.
I didn't know what to expect when I strayed from the usual bars in downtown St. Pete, to the 300 block of 1st Ave. N., but it wasn’t this. Club Sinn stands just passed the old Kelly Hotel, and the Dianetics and Scientology Life Improvement Center in a retail space that looks like a mix between a pool hall and a tattoo parlor. Red x-mas lights line tinted windows, which feature vibrant animations of pool balls and a smiling devil face. A heavy beat pulses through the cloaked entrance, emitting flashes of smoky red light.
Star adjusts her high heels, which she's still getting used to, and tells me about her marriage at 16 and her recent divorce. When asked about her future, she’s uncertain and optimistic, as any 18-year-old.
“I’d like to be in Playboy. I just need to save up to get a pair of these,” she says grabbing her chest.
Star embodies the innocence and experience that went into creating Club Sinn; this young beauty is stepping optimistically into an industry that can be both unforgiving and highly profitable.
“If I was only 18 again,” laments the club owner, Heather Rardin, a slim, mid-thirties woman with curly brown hair who's filling in behind the bar. She stares nostalgically at a performer twirling around the stage pole like a refugee from Cirque Du Soleil. Part of Rardin's charm is how naive she can come across—seemingly oblivious to the fact that she's as attractive as any of her dancers, or as owner, she's doing much better career-wise than the performers.
It's with this same childlike enthusiasm that Rardin describes her motives behind opening the bikini bar. The idea came from the Seattle coffee company, Cowgirl Espresso, which increased profits 300 percent by outfitting baristas in bikinis. Rardin paired this idea with her seven years working at bars and managing Mermaids gentleman's club on St. Pete Beach, as well as her experience running a jewelry and mortgage company. As Rardin speaks, it's easy to envision all of her extravagant plans for the place. The wide open bar and vaulted ceilings could host immense dance parties. A vacant balcony area sits waiting to be used as a VIP lounge or a space for private parties. Huge empty walls loom over the stage, perfect for projecting movies or giant Wii tournaments. Leather couches would fit comfortably in the hollows beside the windows. A single pole erupts from a truncated, runway-style stage that would support lingerie shows and burlesque performances.
Her business plan is simple: “The money is in alcohol; the girls are just the entertainment to get people in.”
On the surface, the pairing of booze and bikinis seems like a fail-proof money maker. However, Club Sinn may be caught in an identity crisis. While there are no clubs of its kind in downtown, mainly because of strict legal codes, prospective clients may prefer to drive north to see a bit more skin at a Tampa strip club. At the same time, everyday drinkers may avoid the spot for fear of having to explain to significant others that, as Rardin puts it, “you can see more at the beach than you can see here.”
The performers are glorified go-go dancers. The main difference between a regular bikini bar, or even a night club with go-go dancers, is that here the girls will actually hang out with you at the bar.
“It’s not pushy,” Rardin insists, “It’s not like, ‘Hey, buy a lap dance.’”
Other than the relaxed performers, the main difference between Club Sinn and a gentleman’s club, or any of the lounge clubs down the street, is how cheap it is. Rardin threatens to charge a $5 cover on Fridays and Saturdays, but I’ve yet to see this enforced, and drink prices rival the hipster dive bars on Central: $2.50 PBRs and MGDs, 1$ shots, and $4 bombs.
Along with the stigma of being a bikini bar, the club also has to fight the vagrant ghosts of Williams Park.
“When we first got here it was terrible,” Rardin says. However, she admits the city has done a good job cleaning up the park. “I mean, you could probably go for a walk over there and not be scared.”
Across the street the Williams Park bus stops sit empty. Blue lights illuminate the trees like street lamps over a lawn surprisingly free of sleeping silhouettes. The new American Stage space creates a wall of light that attracts older couples most every night to a location where panhandlers used to collect under the awnings of vacant businesses.
No matter how you label Club Sinn, there's no doubt that it's the place in downtown for people watching. The first night I dropped by, the place was drenched in Santas and Elves roaring through the annual Bad Santa Bar Crawl. Another night, a friend and I played pool while we watched two drunks demonstrate break-dance moves for two performers. Then of course there's the one stray dancer bouncing around the club like the Energizer Bunny in a bikini, USF boys awkwardly hitting on the girls, sleeveless fishermen yelling at the game on one of the flat screens, and the well dressed and nicely sloshed business-class women climbing on stage at the night's end.
Will Club Sinn lead the charge of new bars up 1st Ave. N.? Who knows? Still, you can’t help but respect Rardin for diving headfirst into this cutthroat business with a smile. And why not? Fortune favors the bold, and the bikinied.
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