by Debbi | Feb 10, 2011 | Birthday Party
We're a popular place for birthdays. It might be the hurricane and the prospect of wearing the mermaid costume; maybe the tropical drinks; or perhaps it's the fancy fur-trimmed tiara that the birthday girls get to take home.
Last Saturday, there were a couple of birthdays in the bar before it was even dark outside.
I'm not sure if one of these mermaids was the birthday girl, or if they were just part of the group, but they were having fun on the bar. Of course, Dave can't resist any opportunity to jump up there and dance, and you might recognize Peach on the left.
We like to think of bar dancing as our own version of a flash mob. People jump on the bar, and spontaneous dancing breaks out everywhere.
Our friend Kirsten from Dunn's Landing celebrated a birthday, too, and Peach brought a large group of ladies to the bar before they went out for a fancy dinner.
Birthdays always call for a shotski:
And this large group required the BIG shotski. They pulled it off!
by Debbi | Feb 8, 2011 | Good Things, People
Hey fellow hospitality industry folks! Here's a great opportunity for you to raise money for children in our community while having fun with your friends and co-workers.
Bowl for Kids Sake is an annual fundraiser for Big Brothers Big Sisters. This year, they've added a special event for the hospitality industry- "Bloodies and Bowling." It's a special day of bowling that will feature a bloody mary bar, breakfast burritos and lots of fun.
- Date: Sunday, May 1
- Time: 1-4 p.m.
- Where: Royal Crest Lanes
Carrie, one of our former bartenders, and I have been asked to recruit team captains from bars, restaurants and liquor stores around town. Are you interested? Here's all you have to do:
- Let us know who your team captain is.
- Sign up your team online here.
- Recruit five other team members, for a team total of six people.
- Each team member commits to raising at least $125, for a team total of $750.
- The website provides easy ways to email friends and family to solicit donations.
- Have fun!
If you're interested in putting a team together, please let us know. You can send an email to sandbar@thesandbar.com and we'll answer all your questions.
You can even get your bar, restaurant or other business involved in raising funds! Challenge another business to a competition to see who can raise the most money. Here are a few ideas to get you started:
- Donate all or a portion of a cover charge to your team goal.
- Put out special Bowl For Kids‘ Sake tip jars.
- Create a drink that goes with your team name/theme and donate a portion of the profit to the team goal. Encourage patrons to order that drink because “it’s for the kids.â€Â
- Sell tickets for patrons to win a t-shirt or other item.
- If you have a pool table or foosball table, hold a tournament where all proceeds go to your team goal.
- Ask your patrons for their “pennies and pocket lint.†Any change or lint in their pocket goes straight to the kids.
We're looking forward to this great event and hope you'll join us!
RSVP on Facebook.
by Debbi | Feb 7, 2011 | Trinkets and Toys, Tropical Drinks
We've had lots of drink toys over the years, but recently it's become clear that the trinkets you love the most are the ones you can wear. Moustaches, glasses, pretty much anything you can put on and take a picture of yourself in.
Our latest tropical drink, the Jersey Shore, recently made its debut, and Dave was looking for the perfect toy to serve with the drink. He found these fabulous shades:
The gummy stars are another option with the drink. We thought the stars were funny- kind of a joke on the "stars" of the reality series.
The toys arrived on Friday and the bartenders started handing them out that night. They were immediately a hit. I've never seen so many pictures from the Sandbar show up on Twitter in one night, especially of drink toys.
And of course, on Saturday night the staff had fun with them too:
You can see more pictures on our Facebook page or our Flickr photostream.
by Debbi | Feb 6, 2011 | Around the World, Off the Wall
We started our Sandbar "Wall of Fame" project a couple years ago- it's a small section of the wall by the popcorn machine, covered in corkboard and photos of people wearing Sandbar shirts all over the world.
People are really starting to get into this project and we're getting more and more pictures, which is awesome! The problem is, we were running out of space on the wall, and some of the pictures that were on there were fun pictures, but weren't of Sandbar shirts.
The other day I spent some time taking all the pictures down and sorting through them. Most of them went back up on the wall, and the others will find a new home somewhere else. There's not a lot of empty space, but there's still room for you!
If you've got a picture of you wearing your Sandbar shirt somewhere other than Lawrence, we want to see it. You can email it to us at sandbar@thesandbar.com, post it on our Facebook page, tweet it to us or just print it out and stick it on the wall. Can't wait to see it!
by Debbi | Feb 5, 2011 | People, Random Questions, Sandbar Stuff, Valentines Day
Sandbar friend Alison created our fantastic pint glass design for Valentine's Day. We asked her a few questions about her Sandbar experiences through the years. You can find Alison online in a variety of places: at her personal blog, her professional design site and on Twitter.
What's your favorite jukebox song? Everytime I go to Sandbar, my friends always overload the jukebox with Disney and Grease soundtracks. So I'm going to say "You're the One That I Want" has to be a favorite, since it's inevitably played every time I'm there, but there's few things I love more than hearing "Sweet Caroline" or "Friends in Low Places" getting belted out by everyone in the bar.
Tell us about the first time you came to the Sandbar. I'm not sure I actually remember the first time I went to the Sandbar, as it was shortly after my 21st birthday (to be fair, that whole year is pretty blurry). But I do remember one of the first times we ever went we played upstairs in the sand most of the night. The cutouts are so funny, they should start making more apperances downstairs! I also remember scouring the fish tanks and giving names to our favorites, and obviously doing the car wash after dirty banana shots.
Favorite drink? I can usually only do one or two tropical drinks before hitting a sugar high, but I always have to have at least one shark attack every time I go. Also, dirty banana shots are the greatest shots known to man.
What's the longest you've waited in line? The only time I remember having to stand in line for a really long time was the first time I brought my mom and her friend. They had never 'partied' in Lawrence with me before, and I knew they would have a total blast at The Sandbar. We thankfully only had to wait about 30 minutes or so, and it was well worth it.
…which leads to my funniest memory of The Sandbar. I had promised my mother a legendary hurricane, and once again, it did not disappoint. I think the best time I ever had at The Sandbar was doing a hurricane and singing "Car Wash" with my mom standing on the benches, Bahama Mamas in hand. We laughed so hard, she had the best time.
Favorite memories at The Sandbar? My favorite memories of The Sandbar HAVE to be the birthday parties. My friends and I have been for the past two years, and they are legendary! We took about a gazillion pictures in the photobooth, they're still hanging up in all of our apartments. And last year we got a picture with Coach Self! It's also a lot of fun with the live bands and shutting down the whole block, it's like Sandbar just takes over all of downtown for one night a year!
Favorite drink trinket? I think my favorite drink toys are the Shark Attack sharks, I have more than my fair share of them. I really want to figure out a way to display them properly. Brenna suggested making lights out of them by stringing them on a strand of christmas lights, I think that would be so much fun!
Jukebox song you never want to hear again? Again, with all of the sing-a-long jams my friends pick EVERY TIME we're at the bar, there's more than a handful I'd be fine with never hearing again. Abba's "Dancing Queen" and "Hakuna Matata" from The Lion King are definitely at the top of the list. (Editor's note: Aren't those a couple of Brenna's favorites?!)
Where can you be found when you're not at The Sandbar? When I'm not dressing up as a mermaid for the 11th time (seriously, Erin and I have a contest going to see who can be a mermaid more times than the other. Is there a Guiness World's Record entry for that yet?), I am a Graphic Designer for the Lawrence Journal-World. In my free time I enjoy traveling as much as possible, cheering on the Jayhawks to assured victory (while biting my nails and yelling at the TV), and fighting the effects of my late nights at Sandbar with pilates, soccer, dodgeball, and kickball.
