Strip Club News

Rick’s Cabaret International recently identified the strip club it previously declined to name when it announced it entered into a letter of intent to purchase a club in Florida for $25 million this past October.

Rick’s acquired Tootsies Cabaret in Miami Gardens, FL. Tootsies is an all-nude club that features full bar service. The club boasts that it has 250 dancers and is open seven days a week, offering “full friction” lap dances. Tootsies is large, with 47,000 square feet of space on multiple levels. The gentlemen’s club also has a full restaurant that serves dinner and breakfast (open until 6 AM on weekends) and a five acre parking lot.

Rick’s made the acquisition by paying $15 million in cash and giving the prior owners a $10 million promisory note payable in three years.

Tootsies is the 15th adult nightclub in Rick’s portfolio of clubs across the United States. The deal closed on November, 30th and Rick’s officially took over management on December 1st.

Officials in Daytona Beach, FL, are preparing to crack down on strip clubs just in time for annual Biketoberfest.

Thousands of motorcycle enthusiasts will be pouring into town and if they are pouring beer down their throats, they won’t be able to look at topless or scantily clad women.

City ordinance prohibits nude or scantily clad dancing in any establishment that serves alcohol or is within 500 feet of another establishment that serves alcohol. As part of the upcoming crackdown, police will be combing local strip clubs looking for any dancer who shows too much skin. Even pasties and G-strings are illegal per city ordinance as they are deemed too revealing by city law. The city even went so far as to distribute an image of the minimum amount of attire a dancer may wear, essentially establishing a dress code for dancers (now the government is telling people how they can dress—how’s that for free expression?).

If a dancer violates the ordinance by showing too much skin, she can be arrested. Club managers could be arrested as well.

Though club attorneys are eventually hoping to take this before the US Supreme Court, in the meantime city leaders will do their best to harm the economic viability of businesses that offer adult entertainment and infringe on the rights of consenting citizens for no other reason than their own personal dislike of this type of entertainment which is enjoyed by millions of people every year.

(I have been to several fully-nude strip clubs that serve alcohol over the years in a few different states and never once have I witnessed anybody misbehaving or causing trouble.)

In Europe you can find women topless at any beach or pool in full view of men and little children. In many countries, there are nude beaches or sections of public parks set aside for nude sunbathing and recreation (like Englischer Garten in Munich, Germany, for example). Yet in Daytona Beach, Florida, if a dancer shows too much of her buttock or covers her nipple with a pastie she can be handcuffed and hauled off to jail if alcohol is served within 500 feet. Unbelievable!

Citizens need to start voting with their wallets. Next year people who attend Biketoberfest should take their money and go to a city that is more respecting of peoples’ freedoms.

Five dancers were arrested and the manager of Vegas Showgirls was cited for violations of Pinellas County ordinance 6-2 which prohibits the exposure of the female areola or genitals where alcohol is sold.

This arrest follows an investigation of complaints of illegal activity at the club. This is the third time in the past six months that dancers have been arrested at Vegas Showgirls.

Pinellas County Code

Recently, the US 11th Circuit Court of Appeals refused to grant a Daytona Beach strip club a rehearing in a case in which the court overturned a lower court’s decision ruling that the anti-nudity laws of Daytona Beach, Florida, were unconstitutional. Police are preparing for crackdowns on clubs operating in violation of the ordinance.

Attorneys for Lollipops Gentlemen’s Club, a nude strip club in Daytona Beach, are preparing briefs in hopes that the US Supreme Court will eventually decide to hear their appeal. Other clubs affected by the ordinance are Club Topic, Molly Brown’s, Pink Pony, and Shark Lounge.

The Daytona Beach ordinance prohibits nudity in establishments that sell alcohol or are located within 500 feet of places where alcoholic beverages are sold. In addition, the city ordinance severely restricts where adult oriented businesses can be located.

Daytona Beach Nudity Ordinance

On Oct. 10th, Sarasota County, Florida, officials will hold a public hearing on plans for new restrictions on strip clubs. The new restrictions under consideration are bans on liquor and lap dances along with stringent location requirements.

The owner of Platinum Gold in Boynton Beach, FL, Norman Goddard, was reportedly arrested along with two dancers and five other people following a month-long undercover investigation into on-premise prostitution and drug sales on August 31st.

The owner was charged with drug trafficking, deriving support from proceeds of prostitution, and keeping a house of ill fame.

Two dancers were charged with drug possession, one of them was also charged with solicitation of prostitution. Five others including a 17-year-old girl were charged with either drug possession or sales.

Employees said that they paid the club’s owner a portion of the proceeds from the sale of drugs. Oxycodone, methadone, cocaine and marijuana were found inside the club.

Police expect that there will be charges of selling drugs brought against eight more people in the near future.