The Hustler Club is a series of bars and chain of go-go clubs licensed by ''
Hustler
Hustler or hustlers may also refer to:
Professions
* Hustler, an American slang word, e.g., for a:
** Con man, a practitioner of confidence tricks
** Drug dealer, seller of illegal drugs
** Male prostitute
** Pimp
** Business man, more gener ...
'' magazine publisher
Larry Flynt
Larry Claxton Flynt Jr. (; November 1, 1942 – February 10, 2021) was an American publisher and the president of Larry Flynt Publications (LFP). LFP mainly produces pornographic magazines, such as ''Hustler'', pornographic videos, and three por ...
.
Early history
Flynt was discharged from the
Navy
A navy, naval force, or maritime force is the branch of a nation's armed forces principally designated for naval warfare, naval and amphibious warfare; namely, lake-borne, riverine, littoral zone, littoral, or ocean-borne combat operations and ...
in 1964 where he had served as a
radar operator. After this stint in the Navy he worked in manufacturing jobs including one at a
General Motors
The General Motors Company (GM) is an American Multinational corporation, multinational Automotive industry, automotive manufacturing company headquartered in Detroit, Michigan, United States. It is the largest automaker in the United States and ...
factory in
Dayton, Ohio
Dayton () is the sixth-largest city in the U.S. state of Ohio and the county seat of Montgomery County. A small part of the city extends into Greene County. The 2020 U.S. census estimate put the city population at 137,644, while Greater Day ...
. In 1965, with $1,800 in savings, he made a down payment on a bar in one of Dayton's working-class neighborhoods.
[Pederson, Jay. International Directory of Company Histories, Vol. 31. St. James Press, 2000.] He specifically targeted working class patrons for his new bar by setting up horseshoe stakes and picnic tables and naming it Hillbilly Haven. Because of this, Flynt exponentially increased the bar's sales. By the end of 1965, Flynt was able to buy a second bar, and, the following year, a third. Both were similar in approach and customer base to Hillbilly Haven.
Flynt opened a fourth bar named Whatever's Right. He purposely made this bar different from his earlier ventures. He sought to make this bar a "more elegant atmosphere" and geared it more to
affluent
Wealth is the abundance of valuable financial assets or physical possessions which can be converted into a form that can be used for transactions. This includes the core meaning as held in the originating Old English word , which is from an I ...
and upscale male patrons. The club featured a dance floor and attractive hostesses whose job was to dance with patrons. These dancing hostesses were a huge success. In 1968, Flynt took this hostess idea a step further by opening the first Hustler Club which features semi-clothed girls. He figured that if fully clothed girls resulted in good sales, then semi-clothed girls would make great sales. His thoughts were right and the one Hustler Club in Dayton quickly creating a chain of clubs with the same name in Cincinnati, Columbus, Cleveland, Toledo, and Akron. Flynt sold his first two bars to focus on his Hustler Clubs and by early 1970, he had eight clubs and 300 employees.
Closing
Flynt began publishing the ''Hustler Newsletter'' containing information about his various clubs. By 1974 the ''Hustler Newsletter'' had morphed into the full-fledged magazine, ''
Hustler
Hustler or hustlers may also refer to:
Professions
* Hustler, an American slang word, e.g., for a:
** Con man, a practitioner of confidence tricks
** Drug dealer, seller of illegal drugs
** Male prostitute
** Pimp
** Business man, more gener ...
''. A year into publishing ''Hustler'' the magazine was grossing more than $500,000 per issue. Later that same year with publishing profits far surpassing those of the Hustler Clubs, Flynt decided to get out of the bars business and be a publisher full-time.
Rebirth
For close to 30 years the Hustler Club name lay dormant. In the early 2000s,
Larry Flynt Publications
Larry Flynt Publications, or LFP, Inc. is an American business enterprise that owns, manages and operates the adult entertainment businesses founded by American entrepreneur Larry Flynt. Founded in 1976, two years after Flynt began publishing ''H ...
began to license the Hustler Club name for new clubs across the country to
Deja Vu
Deja or Dejah may refer to:
* Deja News, an archive of messages posted to Usenet discussion groups and its successor ''deja.com''
* Andreas Deja (born 1957), German animator
* Dejah Mulipola (born 1998), American softball player
* Dejah Thoris, a ...
, its partner in the pornography distribution business. At the opening of Hustler Club -
San Francisco
San Francisco (; Spanish language, Spanish for "Francis of Assisi, Saint Francis"), officially the City and County of San Francisco, is the commercial, financial, and cultural center of Northern California. The city proper is the List of Ca ...
in March 2002 where Flynt was in attendance he said "there's a difference between style and class. We want this club to be about class." There are Hustler Clubs in six states and four countries. The brand continues to be expanded by Deja Vu, opening a new Hustler Club in Nashville in 2020.
Current clubs
United States
*San Francisco, California
*San Diego, California
*Washington Park, Illinois (St. Louis)
*New Orleans, Louisiana
*Baltimore, Maryland
*New York City, New York
*Cleveland, Ohio
*Shreveport, Louisiana
*Las Vegas, Nevada
*Nashville, Tennessee
International
*Melbourne, Victoria, Australia
* Warsaw, Poland
See also
*
List of strip clubs
This is a list of notable strip clubs, both active and defunct. A strip club is a venue where strippers provide adult entertainment, predominantly in the form of striptease or other erotic or exotic dances.
Strip clubs Multinational
*
*
Cana ...
References
{{reflist
*Koopman, John. "Hustler Club's naked truth Strip club hustles up interest" San Francisco Chronicle, March 11, 2002.
*Pederson, Jay. International Directory of Company Histories, Vol. 31. St. James Press, 2000.
External links
HustlerLarry Flynt
Larry Flynt Publications
North Beach, San Francisco
Strip clubs in the United States