Vivid Gentleman’s Club now offers a drive-thru to address COVID-related challenges to business.

• Dancers strip behind barricades, as viewers toss dollar bills from their cars. 
• Purple lighting cases a club-like ambiance.
• Some performers wear face masks.
• The concept was first applied in the Lucky Devil Lounge in Portland.

Since Governor Abbot ordered that bars and restaurants closed in March, servers and entertainments lost their incomes. 

• Bars remain closed, but this strip club decided to reopen safely with a drive-thru experience.
• The drive-thru menu includes typical strip club options: nachos, burgers, jalapeño poppers, alcohol.
• To drive through the drive-thru, customers enter a popup white tent, in which each car has a two-son limit. General manager Gino Dilollo said, “you’re able to get some live entertainment” while your food is being prepared.

Vivid offers its employees a lifetime with this risky (risqué) chance: DiLollo explains that “to keep us open, we just can’t do the numbers. We’re not making any money. This is purely for the staff.”

• All other strip clubs in Texas have furloughed or laid off entertainers.
• The staff’s dependence on the club for income makes Vivid an “essential” business. “They rely on us, this is how they make a living. I do think we’re essential,” said DiLollo.
• The club aims to adapt to the circumstances, transitioning into more of a restaurant than a bar in order to accommodate the circumstances.

Read the full report.