Nightclub Executive: "80% of Madrid's Trendy Venues Are Bankrupt"

Executive: "80% of Madrid's Trendy Venues Are Bankrupt"

A business that used to sell nights discovers it now sells almost nothing. The commercial director of The Club and former head of Teatro Barceló, Iñigo de Lorenzo, stated on the podcast Hablando en Plata: "I'd say that 80% of the trendy places in Madrid right now are at risk of bankruptcy, plain and simple." He wasn't talking about neighborhood bars or roadside clubs. He was talking about the discotheques antiestéticatured in magazines.

This statement isn't just a businessman's tantrum because his Saturday night was empty. According to him, it's the realization of a sector that has simultaneously lost its social function, its price advantage, and control over who walks through the door.

The Diagnosis: Oversupply, High Rents, and PR Salaries

De Lorenzo lists the three wounds. The first is oversupply: there are more venues than customers willing to pay what it costs to get in. The second is fixed costs, and the businessman doesn't mince words here: rents are much higher than years ago, decoration, public relations teams with quite high salaries. The third is a minimal profit margin that turns any slow Thursday into a loss.

The result is a business with no cushion. Before, a bad week was compensated by a full Saturday. Now, according to his own description, missing just one day means losing money.

How Much Does a Night at a Club Cost?

Here, the customer and the businessman disagree less than it seems. The prices cited by participants range from 10 euros for entry with a drink, to 12 or 15 euros for a standard drink, and up to 20 euros for a drink at venues with stricter access control. Some talk about paying 30 euros just to get in.

What's most irritating isn't the price, it's the margin. One forum user calculates that a bottle of whiskey yields twelve drinks served in plastic cups, and another estimates a full night out, including dinner, taxi, and two or three drinks, at 100 euros per person.

Dating Apps Have Taken Over the Main Function

For decades, the nightclub sold a service not listed on the menu: the chance to meet someone. That service is now provided on mobile phones, for free and without queues. De Lorenzo says it bluntly: there are online tools to meet people without leaving home, without fighting with anyone, without taking a taxi, without paying for dinner, and without paying for two or three drinks.

Added to this is a broader change in habits: healthy lifestyles, new forms of entertainment, and plans within one's own neighborhood. As one forum user summarizes, those who go out do so with a very orchestrated plan or with a family checkbook that allows them to pay for security and a taxi home.

The Door: Bouncers, Dress Code, and Unequal Entry

The access filter has become one of the most repeated complaints. A forum user recounts being denied entry to a group for wearing shorts in the middle of summer, with the excuse that "it's not season yet," while women in miniskirts were allowed in through the same door. And the feeling, difficult to prove but repeated, that treatment changes depending on who arrives at the queue.

For several participants, the bouncer acts as the venue's first commercial filter. This explains much of the accumulated resentment: the customer pays, and on top of that, they are scrutinized.

The "Tardeo" as a Lifesaver and Raves as an Alternative

While traditional nightlife is bleeding out, two formats are growing. The "tardeo" (late afternoon gatherings), which allows people to arrive at the club already tipsy, with less expense and at an hour when they still have energy. And underground entertainment: raves, clandestine parties, and DJ sets that one user estimates at 40 euros once a month. It's not a large market, but it's loyal.

Some argue that what is dying is not nightlife as a whole, but a specific format: the mega-party venue with bouncers, cheap liquor, and deafening sound systems. One forum user claims, without providing proof, that it's in their interest for the clubs to fall one by one, without accounting shocks, which they call "boiling the frog." In the middle are the "tardeo" venues and breweries, which offer conversation, free entry, and no queues.

With drinks at 20 euros, bouncers who decide based on clothing, and apps that do the job for free, the business is very likely to continue declining. If the nightclub disappears, who will take its place: the "tardeo," the rave, or nothingness?