I wrote most of this 2024 recap post over our holiday break and planned to publish it the first week of January.

But… PLOT TWIST!!

Instead of coming back to the club relaxed and ready to take on 2025, I landed in the hospital with a brain bleed, of all things.

Luckily, the bleeding stopped, and after a couple of days in the hospital, I was able to come home to recuperate. They tell me it will take a few weeks for the blood to reabsorb, and in the meantime, I’m learning how to manage the residual headaches and dizziness. I am not able to work at the club more than a few hours a day, so my capable kick-ass crew is running the shows without me.  I’m hoping to be back sometime in February.

Anyway… here’s our annual Year in Review.

2024 was a WILD ride… I have always shared the unvarnished truth with you all, so here’s a peek behind the curtain at 443 as we head into 2025:

BY THE NUMBERS

182 live music shows (up from 140 in 2023)

100 sold-out shows (roughly the same as 2023)

12 shows were canceled – (same level in 2023)

(most due to low ticket sales, a few due to medical issues, and one due to the death of the artist – Rest easy, Paul Nelson)

12 private events (same level in 2023)

HIGHLIGHTS

THE MAGIC

At its core, the 443 is about the powerful magic between an artist on stage connecting with an appreciative audience… and 2024 was no exception.

This year, we shared so many incredible moments with our guests and our favorite artists—heartfelt stories, whole-room sing-alongs, kazoo choirs, and dancing with wild abandon with friends and strangers.

We welcomed a stellar collection of artists to our humble stage for the first time:

Some of these shows were extra special for me because they were artists I loved long before we opened the club: Joe Pug, Chris O’Leary, Dave Hause, and Victor Wainwright.

Honestly, five months later, I’m still in shock that we were able to book singer-songwriter Joe Pug after years of trying.

NEW RECORDS

In October, we held our first-ever four-night residency featuring the insanely talented Vanessa Collier—and to no one’s surprise, she sold out all four shows!

We squeezed in a new all-time record just before the calendar turned over – on December 30, legendary blueswoman Janiva Magness sold out her first show with us in just 6 hours. (!!!)

NEW PROJECTS

I had our logo redesigned this year:

Since we finally had a proper logo, the time was right to pull the trigger on merch.

MERCH

We have our merch with the new 443 logo on it! T-shirts, hoodies, and water bottles arrived in the fall.

And baseball caps and beanies arrived just before Christmas.

LIVE STREAM

Intrepid sound tech Dave Kane has been tinkering with camera angles and other technical issues with our live stream for at least a year. We’re not done tweaking and improving, but we finally launched our ticketed livestream shows in December.

I expect building a significant viewership to take a while, but we’re off to the races!

You can find our Live Stream calendar HERE.

BRANDING

Speaking of the live stream, we knew we needed a sign with our logo on the stage so our videos and live stream would be branded when people saw them in the wild.

We had a laser-cut metal sign with a copper finish made for the stage backdrop, and I LOVE the way it came out.

My husband and I took a trip to Philly a few months ago to see two of our favorite singer-songwriters, The White Buffalo and Shawn James on a double bill at World Cafe Live. As we were waiting for the show to start, I noticed they were running a slideshow advertising their upcoming dates.

We have a retractable screen on our stage and a projector mounted on the ceiling – they were Marketplace bargains my husband found when we were getting ready to open, but we’ve really only used them for private parties up until now.

EASY, no-cost, and…why the hell wasn’t I doing this all along?!?

BEHIND THE SCENES

On the back end of things –

When our landlord moved out this year, we unexpectedly acquired more space in the basement, and the extra square footage allowed us to carve out a green room—a huge leap forward for us.

CORPORATE SPONSORSHIP

Our individual membership program is critical to our survival, and in 2024, we added a Corporate Sponsorship option and picked up our first sponsor. Matt Kosty, an avid music fan and owner of Wild Birds Unlimited in Syracuse, came on board in the spring. We can’t thank them enough for their support!!

UNEXPECTED KINDNESS

Our guests continue to humble us with their unwavering support and kindness.

When things are difficult, they remind us of how important the work we’re doing is to artists and our music-loving community. The 443 is a church of sorts for many of our guests, a respite from all the madness going on in the world.

JACK CHUNCO

In November, we lost our friend Jack Chunco. I was stunned when I read his obituary and discovered he had asked for donations to the 443 in his memory in lieu of flowers.

Bill and Jack, Photo by Jack O. Bocchino

MR. B

Then, in early December, our long-awaited shows with the Adam Ezra Group were canceled because the band leader, Adam, injured his back.

We took a big financial hit. The shows (matinee and evening performance) were canceled at the last minute, so we had ordered inventory and already spent a couple of days prepping for a very busy Saturday.

Our staff lost income they were counting on before the holidays.

A week or two later, I got a call from a gentleman (I’ll call him Mr. B) who informed me that wanted to send us a check to make up for the loss.

WHAAAAAAAT?!?

For context, Mr. B has only been in our club a handful of times. He grew up in Syracuse but currently lives in the Rochester area. He’s an avid music fan and supports his local music scene in pretty big ways, with both his time and money.

He wanted to replace the income our staff lost. He sent us enough to pay for both shifts (11 people) what they would have made had they worked. We had 6 employees who weren’t scheduled that day; they each got a “Holiday Bonus,” and there was still enough left to help cover our losses with inventory and labor.

Crazy, right?

The Virtual Tip Jar on our website has never been more active, and many of our guests regularly hand me cash when they visit. They recognize that what we’ve created is not self-sustaining, and they don’t want it to go away.

I’m so grateful for everyone who has contributed to the cause—it has allowed us to keep our doors open.

LOWLIGHTS

86-ED MUSICIANS

SEXUAL MISCONDUCT

The environment we’ve created is truly unique from a hospitality perspective. Our staff is pretty insulated from the nonsense and bad behavior that happens in regular bars and restaurants. We’ve weeded out most of the guests who don’t understand how to treat waitstaff respectfully, and sexually inappropriate behavior is non-existent.

We enjoy genuinely kind and lovely guests 99% of the time.

The same can be said for the touring musicians who visit us… most of our musicians have been absolutely delightful.

We had our first major “issue” in 2024.

A touring act rolled in to perform for the first time, and from the moment they arrived, they were MF-ing HANDFUL. They took advantage of our generous artist food and drink policy and double-fisting cocktails from the moment they arrived. They even pushed guests and staff out of the way at the bar and demanded drinks from the bartender as she was slammed and trying to take care of the service bar.

We breathed a sigh of relief once they finally took the stage and launched into their high-energy show. The room was going NUTS, and several musicians came off the stage to work the crowd during the performance.

Then, one of them thought it was a good idea to put his hands on one of our young servers in an inappropriate way. She was stunned initially, then ended up in tears when it sunk in.

At that point, the show was close to being over, so we tucked the server away in the basement to keep her away from the handsy band member.

Everyone worked together to get the customers out of the room and hustle the band out the door as quickly as possible, but they were not having it. They wanted to stay and drink, but we had already cut them off. I had a conversation with the band leader about what happened, which led to some heated discussions within the band, which led to an actual shoving match at the front door.

Finally, intrepid sound tech Dave Kane put his head down and plowed them all out the front door linebacker style, then he scrambled back inside and locked the door.

Whew… it was A NIGHT.

To add insult to injury, the promotor who booked them was fully aware of the problematic band member… and brought him to our room anyway. He relayed multiple incidents at other venues that were giant, screaming red flags, but he did not share them with me until I confronted him with the events of the evening.

Needless to say, the band was permanently 86’ed from our venue –  and the promotor was too.

LOCAL BANDS

Our stance on booking local bands has fluctuated over the years, but we have always primarily booked touring artists.

In 2023 and 2024, 30% of our shows were local artists.

It’s tough to convince people to buy tickets for a band they can see for free all over town.

A handful of local bands work well in our place, mainly because their fans have figured out that they aren’t just paying for the band with the ticket price.

They are paying for a guaranteed seat (this is BIG for everyone over 40) at a linen-covered table with a friendly server to visit them and take their order. They are paying to be in a room where the performance isn’t drowned out by Drunky McDrunkerson having a full-on blathering conversation right next to you while they slosh beer on your sleeve. They are paying to be comfortable and to actually hear the music.

In the spring of 2024, an incident with a local band caused us to hit the brakes HARD on adding more local bands to our roster – and it had nothing to do with the band itself.

When local bands play in our room, especially first-timers, we usually end up in a frustrating, no-win situation. The band’s fans are used to seeing them perform in regular bars, and they expect to talk throughout the show. Our regular customers have the expectation that they will be able to enjoy the performance without the table next to them chattering away at top volume.

Both sides end up mad at us. The band’s fans are annoyed because we’re shushing them, and our regulars are annoyed because they can’t enjoy the show in peace.

Anyway –

We booked a show with a local band who had never played in our room before, and the guests who came to see them were oblivious to the “listening room” vibe – despite the information on their ticket, signage on the table, and in the club and the announcement before the show. The worst offenders were the immediate family of the band, which is not unusual. Wives and close family of local bands are almost always problematic, and it becomes weird and uncomfortable for us to try and reign them in.

We often get some version of, “Don’t you know who I am??”

After several attempts to get the family’s table to lower their volume, one of them informed her server that it was “BULLSHIT” that she couldn’t talk through her brother’s show. She asked the server to point me out, then proceeded to shit-talk me to anyone who would listen until she left. Before we were out of the building that night, she sent me a nasty email and posted a negative Yelp review. She was utterly oblivious to the fact that her brother had booked the show at our place on purpose – BECAUSE we are a listening-style room.

Over the six years we’ve been open, there are dozens of similar stories, but this was the final straw that broke the camel’s back.

Dozens of bars around town focus on local bands, but we’re one of the few venues in the area that features original, touring artists – most of whom wouldn’t stop in Syracuse at all if we weren’t here. We are at a point where it makes more sense for us to focus on that.

The crowds that come in for local shows alienate our regular customers who support us every week all year long, and my staff and I end up feeling like we went five rounds on the losing side of an MMA fight.

At the end of the day, it’s just not worth it.

COMEDY FAIL

In 2024, we experimented with comedy shows, and to my surprise, we could not make them work. We have the perfect room setup for comedy, and the shows we ran were top-notch and insanely funny. My staff and I LOVED the comedians AND the change of pace.

Inexplicably, we just couldn’t sell enough tickets to continue the experiment, and after a few months, I was forced to admit defeat and end the project.

I expect to be HIGHLY annoyed by this fact for several years. 🙁 

PULLING THE PLUG ON EXPANSION

We finished 2023 in the best shape we had been in during the five years we had been in business. We were reliably selling out just about everything on our calendar, and sales were way up. By the end of the year, I was even able to start paying myself a modest salary every week, which was a first.

WOOOO -HOOOO!!

When we closed out the year and did our taxes, we showed a small profit for the first time.

We went into 2024 optimistic about the future and began looking for a new, larger location. Operating in a space that isn’t designed for what you’re doing is wildly inefficient, and it felt like we were bursting at the seams on Burnet Ave.

We found a new spot that had everything I was looking for… central location, decent parking, and a proper kitchen. Space for multiple green rooms and an office. A historic building with a cool history. It was exactly the right size for the modest increase in capacity I had in mind, increasing our cap from 75 to 125-135-ish. In fact, if I could have designed a space for the 443 from scratch, this would be pretty dang close. We signed a letter of intent and anxiously looked forward to making the move.

But 2024 had other ideas.

In 2023, we were averaging 15-16 shows a month and selling out just about all of them, so my plan for 2024 was to increase the number of shows we were offering. More is better, right? For the first several months, we averaged 18-22 shows a month, and things DID NOT go as planned.

We began to struggle to sell tickets and fill seats during a time of year when we are traditionally busy. We fell short even with artists we have reliably sold out in the past.

We couldn’t make the jump to running that many shows, so I began switching gears.

By May, I had our calendar back under control, but we continued to struggle through the summer. By the fall, I had to face the fact that there was no earthly way we should think about expanding.

I sadly pulled the plug with the owners of the new building in November.

CHANGE IN DRINKING CULTURE

The biggest issue we’re grappling with is the change in the culture around alcohol consumption.

During COVID, many of us developed some unhealthy habits – we were all sitting around the house in our jammies, drinking a whole lot more than we should because we couldn’t go anywhere. As life returned to normal, most of us started dialing back on the booze.

Dry January became a thing. Then Sober October. More and more people have begun making the switch to 100% sober living.

Weed became legal, and that has impacted people’s drinking habits too.

This is good for us as a society, but it’s a death knell for the current business model of live music venues. Our revenue does not come from ticket sales; that’s how the artists are paid. Our revenue comes from selling food and drink.

Which, if you think about it, is pretty f*cked up… our actual survival depends on how much booze we can convince people to buy on any given night.

We have made moves to adapt. In 2024, we increased our selection of NA beer, created a real NA cocktail list, and moved our printed mocktail menu from a “by request” stand-alone menu to a part of our main menu that every customer sees.

Still, our daily sales began to crater in 2024. The high sales numbers we used to hit with most of our sold-out shows are a distant memory, even with the steady increase in drink prices due to the increased cost of goods. Our average sales are down 25-30% from 2023.

I was chatting with my beer rep, who told me the distributer has been watching this shift closely, especially because younger people just don’t go out and drink as they did in the 80s, 90s, and early 2000s. They’ve invested heavily in NA options to keep up, so this is not unique to our situation.

We are like a business that depends on outdated technology—for example, a movie company that depended on DVD sales when streaming began to take over. We have to adapt, or we will die.

The current live music venue business model is obsolete.

LESSONS LEARNED

1. The most important lesson we learned in 2024 was that we are better off doing fewer shows and selling them out than trying to pack our calendar. We are profitable doing 3-4 shows a week, but we often lose money or have to cancel shows when we try to do 5-7 shows a week.
2. If you look at our numbers at the beginning of this post, you’ll see that we added 40 more shows to our calendar in 2024, but the number of sold-out shows remained the same.
3. It doesn’t make sense for us to run an undersold show, even with a skeleton crew – we cannot generate enough income from 15-20 guests to pay even minimal staff. We are better off being dark.
4. We might cautiously add a few local bands to our roster this year, but we plan to keep our focus on touring artists.  It’s what we’re set up to do and what we do best.
5. If we want to survive, we have to reimagine our business model and adapt to the changes in the culture around drinking alcohol.

This was a LOOOOOOONG blog post. If you’re wondering, “What comes next?” – stay tuned. I’ve got another post outlining our game plan coming up soon. 🙂

Thank you for following along, we appreciate it!