While currently a construction zone, according to a plugged-in tipster, Lucky Strike is aiming to open their doors at 200 King Street by the end of the month, filling a rather large retail hole in South Beach which was Mission Bay when Borders vacated back in 2010.
∙ The Incredible Shrinking Mission Bay (And Expanding South Beach) [SocketSite]
∙ Mission Bay South Beach Borders Closing Its Doors October 16 [SocketSite]
At $75/hour for a lane, and drink prices running $14, and god knows what other charges, this will be likely catering to the after the baseball game crowd looking for something to do, not the locals.
My understanding is that the one in LA does that pretty successfully.
Great name
Tipster is right – I would expect minimal interest from locals. Can game day crowds really sustain this kind of place?
Presidio Bowl is $60 an hour for prime time, so $75 seems cheap in this location.. Not sure where you got your numbers, but I wouldn’t be surprised if it was more.
“At $75/hour for a lane, and drink prices running $14, and god knows what other charges, this will be likely catering to the after the baseball game crowd looking for something to do, not the locals. ”
Bunch of negative nonsense, as usual. Everybody who talks about the drinks at these places says they’re “reasonable.”
Actually, I think this will do quite well with the locals – particularly with a lot of the 20-something tech types in the area. $75 an hour can be split, what, 4? 6? 8 ways?
Presidio Bowl is great, but I don’t think it’s that well known (I still meet SF residents who don’t know it’s there) and I would guess is probably mostly patronized by residents in the northern half of the city.
Honestly, Tipster, I challenge you to produce anything showing “14 dollar drinks” for Lucky Strike Lanes. And don’t play it off like one single malt Scotch distiller’s edition is what you were saying. Every bar charges 12 or 14 bucks for good rare spirits. You were using a broad stroke with some sort of weird hater intent.
Weird hater intent? Did you mean to say actual facts? Are you going to claim this as one of my “many lies” when you were, as usual, to lazy to look up the facts?
Had you searched for “Lucky Strike $14” it would have been the third search result. I realize it’s too much mental energy for you when you are on your meds, but still.
Go to this page and search for this text to see the review: “$14 for what’s normally an $8 or so drink. Food was decent, but not enough to bring me back.”
http://www.yelp.com/biz/lucky-strike-lanes-and-lounge-los-angeles-2#query:LUCKY%20STRIKE%20BOWLING
Since when is what some people have to say on Yelp factual? A bunch of others said “reasonable” drink prices. From the same link the happy hour goes till 8, and beers are apparently $3.
I won’t go if PBRs are more than $2
Anyway, this place will be packed with locals enjoying themselves. Guaranteed.
Yup, agreed.
I’m a local. And I’ll likely go.
Why does a high priced bowling alley feel so 90’s to me? The whole thing is so contrived and manufactured.
As someone who grew up in San Francisco and Marin, I know of NOBODY who ever went bowling. Surfing, biking, hiking, skiing, skateboarding are what we grew up doing here. Bowling is what out of town transplants from the Midwest do.
More and more I find myself longing for some of the places I have been visiting in certain districts of L.A. like Venice and Silver Lake. Why is it that I am finding neighborhoods in L.A. with more and more homegrown authentic places that remind me of the way San Francisco used to feel?
^Lucky Strikes Lanes started in LA.
Maybe you’ve changed?
Really astonished? Because Park Bowl always felt very SF to me.
Bowling is a lot of fun… but terribly uncool. Lucky Strike solves this problem as it combines bowling with a super cool super hip venue. This will easily become one the coolest spots in the city as San Francisco doesn’t do cool very well (that’s probably a good thing because coolness can very easily slip into pretentious). The tech crowd will be the best customers since they are always seeking cool to deal with their basic insecurity about being geeks (even though they have just about conquered the world and being a geek no longer carries any negative connotations.
astonished wrote:
> Why does a high priced bowling alley feel
> so 90’s to me? The whole thing is so contrived
> and manufactured. As someone who grew up in
> San Francisco and Marin, I know of NOBODY
> who ever went bowling.
Growing up I didn’t know anyone who went bowling, but in the last 10 years I know quite a few people who have gone to the Presidio Bowl and bowling at the place above Moscone Center.
I wonder if astonished remembers Tim Bedore from KQAK “The Rock of the 80s”. Around 1981 some study came out that said bowling was the most polular “sport” in the United States. Tim made bowling jokes on his show for the next few years and when I saw him at the Punch Line he was offering a free drink for anyone who would stand up and admit to being a bowler and making a pledge to stop…
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tim_Bedore
I’m an avid bowler – any “sport” where drinking beer and eating nachos is considered de rigueur is aces in my book. Presidio Bowl is great, but it can tough to get a lane sometimes. Sea Bowl in Pacifica is fantastic – it’s walking distance from Nick’s Restaurant as well.
Lucky Strike opened in the Seattle area 5 years ago and does an incredible business. If it is successful up here it will do just fine in SF. $14 is not an unusual drink price at City venues.
And I suppose you spend every weekend at Fisherman’s wharf. Oh please. It’s going to be an after-the-game tourist trap. The restaurants in that area are mostly doing the very same thing. They are all dead on non-game days.
I suppose you think they located the first of these in the bay area one block from the ball park and are rushing to open it ahead of baseball season merely coincidentally?
They know their market. For a few months, the locals will come to try something new, but then business will tail off when the novelty wears off. They apparently have moved to a business model of targeting after-event crowds, and that’s why the location and timing of the opening is what it is.
The boosters not withstanding, this is just a local-tourist trap.
I’ve been to Lucky Strike in other cities and think it’s fun. I’m sure a lot of the 20 and 30 year-olds who live downtown or who work in this part of the city will think so too.
The prices are what they are. If you don’t want to pay for it don’t go. But I’m not sure why you’re so offended by it.
There’s a new bowling alley opening in the Mission too, with a local brewpub concept (as opposed to Lucky Strike’s more “ultra” vibe). Seems like a bowling renaissance in town, with something for the hipsters and yuppies both!
[Editor’s Note: No Need To BYOB To Bowl In The Mission As Proposed.]
The only people I’ve seen paying those kind of drink prices are the red bull/vodka crowd that like to hang out at strip clubs and douchey nightclubs. Hopefully, they will all flock to this place, thus reducing the amount of urine and vomit they seem to enjoy depositing in North beach every weekend. Here’s hoping it’s a huge success!