‘It’s not just a dancefloor’: the precipitous decline of UK nightclubs
https://www.theguardian.com/business/2024/dec/27/calls-to-save-the-uks-ailing-nightclub-industry-after-another-year-of-closures
by Fox_9810
‘It’s not just a dancefloor’: the precipitous decline of UK nightclubs
https://www.theguardian.com/business/2024/dec/27/calls-to-save-the-uks-ailing-nightclub-industry-after-another-year-of-closures
by Fox_9810
43 comments
The current UK nightclub experience is shit unless you’re a student. Manchester, Bristol and Birmingham are thriving with outdoor rave scene and Europe is a much better experience. It’s all about table service and £200 bottles worth £30 at the supermarket.
Even in my early 20s i never understood the point of nightclubs. I go out to socialise with friends. I cant do that if i cant hear myself think. Then you have rude arseholes on the door who think they’re better than everyone else
Is there any data to determine whether or not this is happening in the UK much more than comparable countries ? Anecdotally clubs seem to be doing much better in other European countries I’ve lived in.
People will chalk this up too young people drinking less or clubs being obsolete in the age of social media and online dating but if it isn’t happening anywhere else it’s much more likely to be a falling disposable incomes thing.
Clubs need to have performers to bring people in. Good acts and well planned events. Book them and they will come.
Clubs used to be great. The cost combined with the behavioral impacts of mobile phones are I imagine substantial impediments to them succeeding now.
Tastes and preferences change with every age group. It’ll probably come back around, but maybe night clubbing just isn’t Gen Z’s thing.
I clubbed throughout my 20’s into my early 30’s. The scene has massively changed and young people just don’t party the way we used to. Plus the price of alcohol is so cost prohibitive and you can’t get a taxi for love nor money so all in all no wonder clubs are being consigned to history
Clubs are doing everything correctly. The issue is the lack of disposable income.
It was the only way to pull a girl in the 80s, back when I was a youngsters
Surely amongst the insane drink prices are the dating apps which have taken away the need to meet people
Whenever I read stuff like this I feel glad I was a student in the early 10s when going out every weekend was pretty easily affordable. Clubbing brought me out of my shell and gave me a lot of much needed self confidence as a young adult.
Ultimately the main reason people (well, men anyway) ever frequented nightclubs was to pull.
So whilst people will talk about societal changes, the rising costs, a downturn in binge drinking, knife crime etc – the real reason these places are falling off the face of the earth is tinder and bumble
Clubs are very expensive for a demographic that is struggling with very low income.
Even when i used to go out, 20 odd years ago, clubs were getting stupid expensive. Now, with rising rents and stagnating wages, I’ll bet the cost of entry and the proce of a pint has also gone up.
Club Here in London was amazing last time I went a couple months ago, but it was a Drum n Bass night so very much my scene. That said, the best gigs are little basement clubs, outdoor festivals, and raves in general.
It boils down to one thing – money. 10-15 years ago you could go out and get smashed with £20 in your pocket and maybe have change left over for a kebab or McD’s at the end of the night. Now at my local club one mithering 330ml bottle of corona is £3.50, or £7 for a pint or NINE ENGLISH POUNDS for the in house cocktail. On top of paying for the privilege of entry its just too expensive.
But of course the papers will blame young people for being too boring or whatever
I think people just have less disposable income these days. Everything has gone up, wages have stayed the same. So throwing a load of money on overpriced drinks, food and taxis is inevitably going to suffer.
Interesting reading (and I can tell the comments didn’t read it because we have the same ‘too expensive/ you just use dating apps/ I prefer staying in) comments people always put out on threads about clubs.
>Casualties included six Pryzms and four clubs under the Atik brand. Closures hit towns and cities as far apart as Plymouth, Leeds, Coventry, Portsmouth and Nottingham.
If clubs like Pryzm die out it won’t be the end of the world. I can’t shed a tear for places full of cunts that play shit music.
What will be (and to be honest, already is) depressing is the death of genuinely creative, interesting and forward-thinking club culture in the UK. This is the country that gave the world Aphex Twin, Four Tet, Autechre, New Order, SOPHIE, Burial, Squarepusher…
>Planning is another sore point, with long-established late-night venues often facing nuisance complaints from residents of newly built housing developments.
Just tell them to fuck off! My friend’s mum lives near a youth football pitch that has been there 30 odd years. An elderly couple came knocking on her door with a petition to get it closed because they make a lot of noise on Saturdays. She told them that they were the ones who didn’t fit in to the community and the football pitch had been there longer than they had, and then promptly closed the door in their face. I wish local councils could just ignore these whinging NIMBYs.
They were always horrible and there are so many more pleasant ways to have fun these days.
As someone with 15 years experience in this industry its always interesting seeing the takes that are there saying too expensive, good riddance etc, but a fair few of these clubs are also operating as more than just a night club, and it’s a shame if they go. Not saying directly venues who’s solus mode of operation is room with a dj, but those also offering live music, comedy, theatre, as well as a club offering.
I’m 25. Me and a few mates can only afford to go once a month. We’re not students btw. Shame because we enjoy it but shits expensive. We’re in Stoke which is cheap af compared to where I used to live, but it’s still 7 quid entry, 5 quid a pint, or more depending on what you have, then the ride there and back. It soon adds up, especially if there’s a group of you.
My city lost its last nightclub over a decade ago
Even the gk/stonegate/lloyds places that used to close 3am weekends are more like 1am weekends
Went from four in the seaside resort I grew up in at the turn of the 2000s down to one. People just not as interested. I think imprisoning most of the young in their homes for months during the pandemic pretty much sealed the deal as they either didn’t learn to socialise like we had done in years before or forgot.
There’s not many opportunities around me to listen to club music I even half like.
Part of nightclubs used to be to meet someone. To pull and potentially find a new partner. That’s all done through dating apps now. Nightclubs are for dancing with your friends – which people only really want to do at nice venues with great DJs. Most towns won’t have this.
My opinion that I back up with no data, but just pure experience,is the fact that night clubs are declining, because of stricter ID procedures being a factor. When I was 16/17 at College, I’d meet loads of people from school, college, work, football that were also underage in a club, because clubs weren’t really that bothered about IDing. Now everyone is over 18, there’s a massive hole of income gone.
I noticed the biggest change after financial crisis of 2007-8. Before this most pubs clubs would require you to queue outside on a fri sat night. I even remember over 25s pubs.
The. Smart phone dating apps became the place to meet the opposite sex. Along with high prices and sticky carpets they a were no longer desire able.
I went to Pop world in Aberdeen last night. 11pm
Empty, not a soul in.
They asked for £5 entry told them to forget it
I blame the whole thing on mobile phones appearing and making all clubbing experiences instagrammable. Used to be the DSI photographer took the snaps, made sure the party looked fun and care free. Now everything is about IG or whatever scoundrels use nowadays
It’s deeper than though
Private equity etc bought the nights, the venues, even the land in ibiza. Realised you can just milk the fuck out of a captive audience in Ibiza and turn the whole thing into an “experience” that influencers and regular people will get in to debt , just to get the impression they are having fun.
The same trick tried in the UK and the property boom bust boom fucked everything. Investors realised there’s more money to be made in turning the night scene into over priced shit box apartments. People need to save more money to live in the new “luxury” cells, so they go out less. They are spending so much on their flats built on land owned by a venues new owner, they don’t want to have to put up with the noise on top of their bills, so they complain about the disturbance. Nights close earlier, the operating costs stay the same but revenues shrink, so venues put up the prices of drinks and venue hire to keep their investor pay masters from turning the 500 cap venue into a 1000 flats.
Hire prices increase, night tickets increase, event coordination decreases.
Alcohol price increases, people drink even less.
Influencers keep shilling DJs, more people try out DJing and the quality of DJs drop.
Personally it’s the expense and the fact a lot of my local clubs haven’t moved on for 10 years. When I was at Uni, drinks were £1 in the club which was affiliated with the Uni, and Martin Garrix, DVBBS etc was in the charts, and was pretty good music to have a good time to.
But now the music hasn’t changed and is overplayed to death, the drinks are expensive and most of them haven’t had any updates to decor, or even just basic maintenance. Not to mention there is a definite increased tendency to end up crossing paths with absolute bellends.
Only club in the capital of Cornwall got closed down a few years back. Noise complaints from new builds up the road and expensive sound deadening upgrade requirements were just too much
Pretty hard to justify going to clubs when you have to drive because public transport is shit, so you can’t drink, and there’s not much else to do but drink in the club because the music is too awful to dance to.
It’s an ever changing scene.
My Grandparents ran nightclubs in London for my great Auntie in the 50s and 60s. Suits, singers, cocktails and cabaret. These all went. Nightclubs evolved, they will do again.
Does anyone genuinely go to clubs for anything other than taking loads of drugs and / or getting laid? Neither of those things make the club owner any money.
Let it die. Tastes and options are meant to change across generations and I’m not sure why there is such an obsession with trying to keep the status quo. Just like the whole fight against work from home. Let’s try something different and see what happens.
I think everyone got fed up with rip off watered down drinks, perverted guys who touch, drug women (with bouncers doing fuck all to protect) and ass music.
Last cracking night out I had was just before Xmas 2018.
I think people are just starting to realise that they’d rather have a few drinks indoors with good friends, than go to a drug fuelled cesspit of inaudible noise, crowded with knobheads who just want to fight the first person who looks at them funny…. It’s not a surprise they’re closing down! Bring back the local, I say!
Ritzys on Tottenham Court Road, 50p to get in, 50p drinks all night on Wednesdays, student night. I miss the 80’s.
In Newcastle, I used to go clubbing every friday and saturday between 18-22ish, was great fun. We’re all 30 now and decided to go and take a look around some of the clubs. There’s barely a dance floor, and people are packed into the “good” places like sardines. I don’t know if it’s because we’re close to 30 now and just too old, but it really doesn’t give the same vibe it used to.
Many people can’t afford to go to nightclubs, they have to pay the rent.
Clubs: we face competition from dating apps! Let’s quadruple our prices!
And then they wonder why they are going bust.
Clubbing used to be amazing in 90s in 00s and not just specialist clubs that were part of a particular culture, but almost all clubs
Everywhere you go these days,half the people are just on their phones, so what’s the point
I said this before when this came up previously. I finished uni in like 2013ish and I was a fiend for going out, was out every night I could, probably way too much, drinking, drugs etc
When i finished and became a real boy I remember reading a student article about how even the people who had started after me had dropped off in terms of going out, which you don’t notice while you’re in it but i remember the article and thinking “that’s weird we loved going out”
Then obviously we had the pandemic like 7 years later but that article always stuck in my mind because I genuinely think the trend of young people not going to night clubs not getting involved in the nightlife scene started way before any of the stuff a lot of people blame now.
In 2013 in the north where I was you could still go out and get rat arsed on 20 quid but less and less young people were doing it.
I mention the young because that’s what drives the nightclub scene I’m 31 now and wouldn’t be caught dead In a night club, it’s wine bars and off to bed by 10pm for me now, but the kids aren’t as interested.
My theory is it’s various parts of the internet, music being more accessible for example means that tastes now diverge way more and it’s just possible to go see the music you like, which your local nightclub probably doesn’t cater for and the second is online dating, I did it back in the 2010s met my wife to be on tinder shortly after I left uni but like going out to meet girls still seemed like a really huge deal and I just wonder do people do that anymore?
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