Toronto is known to most of the world as a very safe, friendly place. For the most part, I agree with this. I generally agree that Torontonians are friendly, with some exceptions. My issue tonight is with the nightlife in Toronto , and specifically bouncers at downtown clubs in Toronto .
People go to nightclubs to have a good time. Toronto is known to have a good nightlife. This is great for the economy of Toronto , and also for tourism in Toronto . Young people have money to spend and want to spend it going out and having a great time with friends. I have been going to Toronto clubs in downtown Toronto since I turned 19 years old. It has been 8 years now, of clubbing almost every weekend. Needless to say, I quite enjoy clubbing. What I do not appreciate are the rude, sarcastic, power-tripping bouncers that are hired by clubs in downtown Toronto . Don’t get me wrong, I have had many pleasant experiences with some bouncers, but generally I have found that these bouncers generally act as though they have so much power over their customers that are just itching go get in a spend their money in the club. I had once seen a few bouncers throw a drunk customer on the ground, telling him to “get lost”. This person needed help, not punishment.
Tonight I went out to celebrate my best friend’s 27th birthday. The night started at Bistro333. The dinner was great. My best friend wanted to go there, because she was told by the manager that if her party had dinner there, she would be given free passes with line by-pass to Distrikt Nightclub in downtown Toronto . It sounded like a great deal to her and to the rest of the party. After spending over $700 at Bistro333, the party of 18 people proceeded to Distrikt Nightclub in the cold, snowy night. When we got there, one of the bouncers at the door told us that he knows ‘of’ this manager at Bistro333, but that he could not let us in, even if Bistro333 had told us we would get in right away. I thought it was amusing that this manager of Bisto333 promoted Distrikt Nightclub to a party of 18, and Distrikt did not even bat an eye and thank their lucky stars that this person had sent them some business. Considering we had just spent $700, we were not even halfway done our night yet. We wanted to have a great time celebrating our friend’s birthday, and being 27ish young professionals, we had money to spend; which we did throughout the night. We stayed until they started turning on their lights at around 2:45am; which means that the party is over. Even the fact that there were police officers at the doors when we arrived at the club could not deter us from having an good time tonight. We simply could not be alarmed if there were uniformed officers on the premises, which really is not the norm for most clubs in Toronto .
So we waited in the lineup for some time because we were not given the line by-pass we were promised. Once we got inside, we paid $3 to check in our coats, most of us leaving a $2 tip for the persons keeping an eye on our jackets. Once we walked further inside the club, we found ourselves inside an empty club. Of course thoughts went through our minds: ‘They made us wait outside in the freezing December cold for an empty club? Where is the humanity of keeping people outside to freeze?’
The night was fun enough. At 2:45am, the lights started to turn on, which meant the club was closing and it was time to leave. This is very early to end the night for a Toronto nightclub. Perhaps it could have been because Toronto was experiencing the first big snowstorm of this winter season. We waited in the line to pick up our jackets to leave. I gave 3 tickets to the coat check person: mine, my friend’s, and my husband’s. This means I should have gotten 3 coats back. However, I only got two. According to the coat check girl, they no longer had my husband’s jacket. I asked the girl what she meant by that. She stated that the hanger that my husband’s jacket was on no longer had his jacket on it. She asked me what it looked like. I described it to her, to which her response was ‘You don’t have to be rude. It’s not MY fault.’ At this point, it is 3am in the morning. There is a snowstorm outside. Distrikt Nightclub had lost my husband’s jacket; along with his jacket were his hat, scarf, gloves, and a sweater. And this girl did not want to take responsibility. I very quickly informed the girl that I was not being rude, I was merely describing the jacket to her, and it certainly was not MY fault that the jacket may have been given to the incorrect person. The fact is that I paid $3 plus $2 tip for the coat check people to guard our jackets, and to give us our jackets back at the end of the night using the tickets that THEY THEMSELVES had given to us to pick up our jackets. I hardly believe that this is a hard thing to do. Take my money, give me a ticket, watch my jacket, and then give it back to me. Take accountability for losing a jacket. It is certainly not the customer’s fault if the jacket was lost on the premises, and perhaps given to the wrong person. I asked the girl what would be done about this. She responded that we could talk to the manager, but would not advise me to do so at the moment, because he was busy trying to get people to leave the club. As if that was my problem. I asked numerous times to numerous people to speak to the manager. I got many responses as to why I could NOT speak with the manager, the last response being that he was “busy counting the money in the back room”. Okay… so he was busy counting the money he made that night from my friends and I, and could not come out and speak to us face-to-face.
I was told that my husband and I should call on Monday. Let’s see… the last time I checked, nightclubs were not opened on Monday. What was my husband supposed to do without a winter jacket on Saturday night, Sunday and probably on Monday? Most likely I would reach the voicemail, and after that a callback denying that the situation ever happened to begin with. Obviously this was an assumption on my part; I just could not understand why the manager could not come out and face the situation on the spot. Why did it have to wait until Monday? As well, I asked the bouncer who gave me this news how my husband was supposed to get home in the snow wearing only a thin short-sleeved dress shirt. His blank stare told me that it was not his problem and that he did not care.
In the meantime, the coat check girl was getting very defensive and irate because I asked her for the ticket number back. She said, ‘I already gave it back to you like you had asked me to.’ Unfortunately for her, she was caught in her own lie, as one of her colleagues who was standing next to her was holding the ticket in her hand and promptly returned it to me. The ticket number was 1550. At this point it was almost 3:30am, with no resolution in sight. I was very irate. I was in a heated discussion with the girl, expressing my frustration, when one of the bouncers came over and yelled at us to stop bothering the coat check girl. Little did he know that she was the one who became irate first, and I was at that point defending my position within this situation. I told him that this was my husband’s jacket, and that I was not happy with the non-outcome of this non-existing resolution. His response was ‘So? I have a wife at home.’ I looked at him in disbelief because I could not understand the point he was trying to make with this statement. I asked him if he would allow his wife to walk out of a club without her jacket in this snowstorm. Obviously his blank stare told me his answer was no.
I understand these people wanted to get home. We all wanted to get home. But luckily for them, they all had their coats, jackets, scarves, hats, gloves to weather the snowstorm we were experiencing at that point. My husband did not. I would also like to point out this was not an inexpensive jacket and it was a new jacket. I had purchased this jacket for him 3 weeks ago; the sweater was not inexpensive, nor the hat, gloves and scarf. I wanted someone to take accountability and to let me know how Distrikt Nightclub would handle this situation. I was very disappointed to see that they did not have a procedure in place for this type of situation. I am sure this is not the first time this has happened and am very confident this will not be the last.
As it turned out, my husband and I had to take a cab home. We could not find a cab, as being on the main street where there were many people leaving clubs along the same street, all cabs were full. We ended up walking to Yonge and Queen, where we had to pay $90 for a cab ride home because of the bad road conditions. Imagine walking from Peter/Richmond to Yonge/Queen with a light jacket that would not zip up due to a broken zipper. This is the jacket that Distrikt Nightclub provided to my husband because they could not find his.
I wanted to write this story because I think it is important for people to know that Distrikt Nightclub is not a place of integrity. They will gladly take your money, but at the end of the night, customer or not, they will not care what happens to you. What kind of heartless people run this place? As mentioned earlier, there were some police officers on the premises. As my friends waited patiently outside the club [they were told to leave, even when they explained that they were waiting for friends who were still inside the club], they asked the police officers to help them with the situation. The police officers asked them to move out of the way, as they had to make sure the GARBAGE and RECYCLABLES were packed as they should be. This was what the police officers were hired for? I am sure that we can all now peacefully sleep at night knowing this little piece of information. The police officers ignored the situation altogether, as they were too busy packing the garbage. As well, another situation arose outside, where some of the bouncers were giving a party of girls a hard time. A guy friend of mine calmly tried to de-escalate the situation. The response was less than friendly, and should even be considered as [life] threatening.
I also wanted to write this story to shine some light on shady business that occurs within this place. First off, my friends and I smelled smoke within the club throughout the night. Obviously people were smoking inside, while the club bouncers and owner or manager turned a blind eye. This was displayed in front of me while I was speaking with one of the bouncers about the situation at the end of the night; he lit and smoked his cigarette at the club in front of me. The last time I checked, there was a law put into place June 2004 [I could be wrong about this date] which prohibited smoking within nightclubs. My friends and I also smelt Marijuana within the club during the night. The last time I checked this was ILLEGAL in Ontario . Considering that supposedly all persons are frisked when entering the club, obviously the bouncers did not do such a good job with checking what people were bringing into the club, or again, they turned a blind eye.
If these nightclubs are recognized in Toronto as businesses, they should be obligated to abide by the law. They should also have rules and procedures put into place to handle escalated issues. It is not enough to have the bouncers turn customers away and tell them to call on Monday. This would be unacceptable for any other businesses who do not take accountability for their actions. It should therefore not be accepted for these businesses. It is too easy to have illegal under-the-table practices occur if these businesses are not made to abide by the law and rules and principles of the norm. These nightclubs should be inspected more closely to ensure that they do resemble and act like legitimate businesses. For this reason they should have set procedures put into place, where all nightclubs must follow these procedures.
I will be contacting the manager of Distrikt Nightclub on Monday. Quite frankly, I am almost certain that I will not get a response, and that somewhere out there someone will be running around wearing my husband’s sweater, hat, gloves, scarf, jacket, while my husband now has to buy another brand new jacket, hat, gloves, scarf and sweater. Someone should be held accountable for this. And I would like that someone to be the owners/managers of Distrikt Nightclub.
I would really appreciate for this story to be published in the Toronto Star. I feel strongly that this has happened to many people, and that it will continue to occur unless something is done about it. The nightclub industry gets away with so much, which other businesses would be in big trouble for. Could this be because when their business is open, most of us are usually sleeping safe and sound in our warm beds that we could not be bothered investigating what goes on within these downtown nightclubs? If this is the case, then the industry is headed in the wrong direction. People should be able to go out and have a great time in Toronto . Corrupt nightclubs should not damper the mood and ruin the image of nighttime clubbing in our wonderful city.
As mentioned, I will be calling the manager of Distrikt Nightclub on Monday. Depending on the outcome, I may then need to contact the Better Business Bureau. I believe it is within the city’s best interest for the Bureau to investigate these clubs that many Torontonians go to for a good time.
