Here at the 443, we have always strived to create a more… civilized environment for enjoying live music.
We don’t force musicians to compete with big-screen TVs, a jukebox, a pool table, or Quick Draw. We do our best to make guests feel like they are beloved friends visiting our home.
We are a seated, intimate, listening-style room with table service. We want our guests to relax, enjoy the performance, and focus on the stories and songs. We create space for our audience to connect with what’s happening on stage without the distraction of people milling around, talking, or going to the bar for drinks. We offer a carefully curated selection of craft beer, wine, and spirits and a small, but tasty food menu.
Funny story…
I was prepping crostini behind the bar recently when singer-songwriter Will Hoge rolled in for a show with Tim Hause.
Will: “Whatcha making?”
Julie: “Crostini with whipped feta and fresh tomatoes and basil topped with balsamic glaze”.
Will: (Blinking a couple of times) “Wow…that was NOT what I expected when we walked into this place!”
Julie: “Why… because we’re in the ‘hood?”
Will: “Well… YES!”
HA!!!
Our seating arrangements have evolved continuously over the last 3.5 years, but I’m always tweaking our arrangement trying to find the magic formula to fit a few more people in the room. Our official cap is 88 but it’s nearly impossible to hit that number – the most we’ve ever managed has been 82-84… and it was PURE CHAOS.
Remember our old living rooms??
At a certain point, I had to admit that stuffing more people into the room is never going to get us where we need to be anyway.
We knew going into this business that live music would probably not keep our doors open, and originally we thought being a coffee house during the day was the answer. When that didn’t work out, we tried our damndest to make it happen with live music alone, but honestly – it’s been an exercise in futility.
And I’ve made peace with that.
Our VIP Patron program is one piece of the puzzle because it allows our guests to help support what we’re doing financially. Renting the room out for private events is another – because private parties are less labor intensive than our regular shows, and therefore more profitable. We have to develop other income streams if we want to survive and continue to provide a home for live original music, and it’s always a work in progress.
Another lesson I’ve learned is that sometimes we have to give up precious real estate to make things work the way they should.
For example, last year we sacrificed one side of our bar (2 or 3 seats) to create a service aisle. It was a massive leap in efficiency for our staff, plus it allowed room for a second POS station – invaluable when 70 people walk in at once. We were also able to move wine service to this area to take pressure off the bartender on busy nights. We can’t easily put two people behind the bar due to the wonky design, so the server’s ability to pour their own vino is huge.
Anyway, back to live music shows –
A couple of weeks ago, I was standing at the door saying goodbye to guests after a show. A couple stopped on the way out and said, “You know, if you swapped out those low tables along the wall for high tables like you have in the front window, the sight lines would be amazing”.
GREAT IDEA!
It was actually something we talked about doing a while back but we lost track of it along the way. Sometimes the day-to-day is so hectic, it doesn’t leave a lot of time or brain power for big-picture planning, you know? It’s too bad because scheming about how to solve problems and improve our guest experience is one of my favorite things to do.
The next day I started shoving tables around and it sparked a major overhaul of our seating arrangements.
Green tables in the floor plan are bar height, orange tables are regular height.
Old Floor Plan
Since reopening after COVID, the far side of the stage has been our “GA” area, with 15 high tables and wooden bar stools. The side closer to the door has been our “premium” area, which is mostly regular height tables, except for the back row.
The back row of tables under the front window ended up being some of our most requested seats by our VIP Patrons because the sight lines are excellent – the tables in front of them are all low, so you have an unobstructed view of the stage and nobody sitting behind you.
The “premium” side isn’t any closer than the “GA” side, but the regular-height tables and chairs are usually more desirable to our guests, mainly because of the backless barstools we had in “GA”. This created a weird dynamic for shows that weren’t fully sold out, with the “premium” side always filling up first, and sometimes nobody sitting on the far side of the room. It also caused confusion for guests who thought “GA” meant they had to stand through the whole show, which is understandable.
Old GA table set up
I swapped out three low tables along the wall for high tables. You can’t see tables 1 and 2 in this pic but I left them as is – it’s the only place I can fit a party of 8 or 10 people.
Then I took the displaced low tables and put them in the front row on the old GA side. I liked the direction it was going, so I added a second row of low tables and got rid of three tables altogether, giving us two rows of low tables with two rows of high tables behind them – 12 tables instead of 15.
New table set up
In our old arrangement, we often had stools all the way around the tables. In our new setup, we stuck to “cabaret style” seating – chairs and stools only on one side of the table facing the stage. This makes it far easier for our servers to navigate the space.
SO MUCH BETTER!
I was on a roll and feeling good about the updates, so I decided to tackle another problem area – the merch table.
When we carved out our service aisle, we relocated the merch table to the nook under the front window. We have a 4′ table and a tri-fold pegboard backdrop for band merchandise. It works fine for some bands, but others travel with a huge amount of stuff to sell – it’s a big part of their revenue, and helps finance their travel from town to town. Also, we’re doing more and more co-bills (two artists), which means double the amount of merch coming in the door.
We had customer tables in front of it, which didn’t give the bands much space and probably sucked a little for the people sitting there…unless they’ve always dreamed of selling merch for their favorite indie band? LOL.
The sturdy stools had backs and the sight lines were great, but you were basically sitting on top of the merch area. So, I got rid of one row of low tables, added a set of stanchions to block off the sales area, and put the high tables on the other side of the divider.
This gave me room to add a second 4′ table, plus a cocktail table and stool for the musician or merch seller. The space under the covered tables can be used to stash extra t-shirts and other backstock. It’s not perfect, but it’s loads better than what we had before – both for the musician AND the guests.
The last issue to contend with was our backless wooden barstools, which are universally loathed by our guests.
The main reason our “GA” section was the last to fill up was because of these little instruments of torture.
I chose them because they were the lowest-profile stools I could find. I was trying to cram a lot of people into a small area, and I didn’t want the furniture itself to take up any more room than necessary. Plus, they were cheap. But, after a year and a half of use, they are falling apart and require constant repairs. At least a third of them have completely broken down.
I had not really factored in how long guests have to sit on these things – our audience is usually with us for 2-3 hours. I heard from visitors regularly that they didn’t like to buy tickets for shows once the premium seats were sold out.
Ooooof…no Bueno!
My son sat at one of these tables for a comedy show we did a while back and told me they were truly awful – and he’s a skinny kid in his mid-twenties. Our average customers are 50+, so I’m sure they did not have a good time with them. Not exactly the “civilized” experience we were shooting for.
I finally bit the bullet and ordered commercial bar stools with backs and padded seats. I recently paid off a credit card that had a 12-months-no-interest deal going on, so I took a deep breath and placed my order.
This was a big scary purchase considering the current state of things if I’m being honest…I’m not at all confident we will survive another year in business in this post-COVID reality. We’re still fighting like hell, but this is an insane time to be a live music venue – and venues are closing their doors pretty regularly these days.
Quality stools make a HUGE difference…our high tables are now some of the best seats in the house AND they’re comfortable.
My goal was to remove any stumbling blocks to our guests thoroughly enjoying their time with us. I don’t want to get to the end of the road with this business and wonder what would have happened if I only had tried X, Y, or Z.
“You live, you learn, and you upgrade” – Anonymous
I’m super-pleased with the whole project. The room looks a lot more orderly and less like a drunken brawl just occurred. Our guests have more elbow room, and it’s far easier for our staff to navigate during service. We’ve eliminated a lot of the gridlock that used to happen when we have a sold-out show, and the uncomfortable wooden stools have mostly been phased out – we’ll keep a few along the back wall for emergencies.
Employee Sheila surveyed the updates and said, “It’s a lot less cluster-fucky… I like it!”
So what does this mean for buying tickets for a show?
Green tables in the floor plan are bar height, orange tables are regular height.
We now have 3 tiers of ticket options:
Tier 1 – (YELLOW) – Most expensive tickets. Stage Side tables for two and single barstools at the bar.
Tier 2 – (BLUE) – Mid-priced tickets. High and low tables with excellent sight lines – particularly the high tables.
Tier 3 – (LAVENDER) – Least expensive tickets. Two low tables of two, plus a large (potentially shared) high table for single attendees.
We have always struggled a little to accommodate single attendees, and we have a fair amount who come in regularly. We reserve our bar seats for single guests, but once all four are sold, we have to either lose a seat at a table of two or seat them with strangers. Sitting with other parties is common practice in comedy clubs, but I try not to do it unless absolutely necessary. After a lot of discussions, I decided that it’s less weird to put single attendees who don’t know each other at a big table rather than putting them at a table for two staring at one stranger. Our back row, tables 29-32 can be pushed together or pulled apart as needed.
Flexibility is the name of the game in a small room like ours.
So, what do you think? Basically, we’ve created a poor man’s version of the multi-level floors you see in bigger music clubs, improved the sight lines to a lot of our seats drastically, and overall created a more comfortable environment to enjoy a show. Win, win, WIN!
If you’ve been at our place in the last week or so you’ve probably seen some of our updates as they happened. We’ve given it a few test runs and so far everyone has been thrilled with the changes.
Ticketing will not change for shows that are already on sale, but 2022 ticket holders will benefit from the improved arrangements. We’re about to begin announcing new 2023 dates soon and the tiered ticketed system will be in place for them. Keep your eyes peeled, we’ve got lots of great shows coming your way.
CHEERS!
