Hudson Lounge Comes Under Fire For Supposed Racist Practices By Craig Hlavaty, Mon., Jan. 3 2011 @ 10:01AM Last Wednesday, the Houston Press Twitter page was inundated with quick terse statements from our followers calling out the chic Hudson Lounge in Rice Village for being overtly racist after a party of African-American revelers was shut down early the night before, without any warning by the management on duty at the time. We made a call to the bar soon after the business hit Twitter and spoke with manager Keith Thompson, and we were also in contact with a handful of partygoers through email and our personal Twitter account. Both sides had obviously radically different tales to tell. The bar's management said it was told a few days before that a small party of only 20 would be coming in on Tuesday night, December 28. Thompson said that the bar made preparations to have two bartenders and a waitress on hand to service the crowd. As the night progressed, this promised crowd of 20 grew to at least 150 people as Thompson stated to us on Wednesday afternoon. At a bar as small and generically genteel as Hudson, on a Tuesday night, this is a recipe for disaster. The story from the Hudson folk goes that once the crowd hit extreme capacity and Hudson couldn't handle the rush, they decided to shut down early, at 11 p.m., an hour earlier than their quoted last call tolling at midnight on Tuesdays. This was contradicted by the posting on the Hudson website and on Yelp, which lists 2 a.m as their usual closing time on Tuesdays through Saturdays. Sundays are noted as early nights, closing at midnight. This was an oversight according to Hudson management, which claims that the listed times were incorrect. The sites have still not amended the hours. Thompson told us that the owner, Adam Kliebert, made the call to shut down the bar early due to the crowd, not because they were scary black people, but because his bar couldn't handle the business. He further stated there were verbal complaints in regards to the closing, but that no one got violent or outwardly aggravated, aside from the understandable frustration. Most of the party would later move on to The Flat off Commonwealth to finish out the night. click link below for rest of story... http://blogs.houstonpress.com/hairballs/2011/01/hudson_bar_racist_allegations.php "I am not a racist," Hudson Lounge owner Adam Kliebert responds in the link below... http://culturemap.com/newsdetail/12-30-10-i-am-not-a-racist-hudson-lounge-owner-adam-kliebert-says/
That's why I don't go to the Village anymore. The Bronx Bar and the Red Door are very racist. They only let certain folks in.
If he is racist, why did he allow the party to occur to begin with? Wouldn't it have been easier to deny them when they initially informed him of the party?
I almost got into a fight with this dude at the Conroe resort last year on Fourth of July. He and his clan tried to jump in front of us while waiting to be seated to eat at a restaurant. He didn't want any.
I've never owned a bar, but I can't imagine that booking a party with 20 people is going to generate any more money than just an average night.
Had a similar incident at Champps Americana in Uptown Park. A group of us (about 10 Asians) went there to have a few drinks on a Friday or Saturday night. They supposedly close at 2 but we got kicked out at 1 after they stopped serving drinks to us. When I walked in and sat down, I heard the owner/manager or whatever say "There's a lot of Asians here tonight." but I paid him no attention thinking he was just a customer/racist. Well yeah, they eventually stopped serving every Asian person a drink due to the request of the owner/manager. I would be ok with it if someone from our group was acting up , but noone was. Needless to say, first time and last time visiting that place.
Reminds me of another incident where a lot of homosexuals were accusing a bar of homophobia because they brought too large a party and got booted out. As I recall, the bar smoothed it over with them and averted the crisis a couple of days later. I'm sure there's a thread about it here somewhere.
I love it when people show up looking like crap, not buying enough liquor to justify it and a horrible girl-guy ratio (or the girls don't look attractive) and then pull out the race card! Some Indian girl was on TV accusing some place on Washington of this. Its survival of the fittest, any bar owner wants good looking guys and girls that are dressed per their standard and will spend money. Its to sustain their long-term goals and short-term profit. If you get 4 good looking, well groomed guys(2) and girls(2) from any race you'll be able to get in anywhere. If that doesn't work then stop trying to go to trendy places, grease the guy at the door or make a reservation for table service and don't overload it with people that don't fit the image/ratio they're focusing on. There's always Sherlocks!!
If this is true is sounds like Racism to me and looks like the owner lied about it being the Managers call.. "After reading this story, Ray Odom contacted CultureMap. "I was one of the party promoters and I made the initial contact and handled all the negotiations leading up to the event," Odom said in a email. "(Kliebert's) comment that is was a small deal for 15-25 people is laughable... we had a Facebook event page, and we also discussed the capacity of the back VIP room (we were told 85-90), we were asked how many guest we were expecting (we said 200), and to be fair, I received every consideration from Keith, the GM. "Keith actually allowed us to run our own playlist through ITunes and it seemed like everything was fine until the owner showed. He didn't look happy when he was leaving, and immediately we were told to we had to turn the music off and that we had to leave at 12:00. We weren't happy, but we pled our case with Keith and got him to switch from techno to groove lounge and to play it by ear if the bar was making money. "At 10:45, we got word the owner wanted us to shut it down. I asked to speak with the owner on the phone, and Keith said it was a losing battle. In an honest moment in the office he said plainly, the owner doesn't like the crowd. To this moment, none of the party promoters have received an apology. It irked us to read your article, and while we realize he is scrambling to protect his image, the truth needs to be told. To be clear, our intention is NOT to "play the race card". His actions speak for themselves, and his true actions need to be exposed."
