07/11/2025
Very nice… Give thanks for the opportunity to bless the two stages….
❤️💛💚
Dear community -
Palmers' family, friends and patrons deserve a better, more complete explanation for why Palmers is going out of business after 119 years.
When we bought Palmers it was with a trusted partner that we had worked with for over 18 years. In 2022 we discovered that trust and partnership was broken, leaving Palmers in dire financial and operational straits.
We decided to move forward to rebuild and restore the business with the full confidence in what Palmers is and what Palmers represents to the community and beyond. We truly had this confidence because we have outstanding and dedicated staff, a loyal customer base and the support of so many musicians and artists. Unfortunately, things did not work out the way we had hoped...
Due to the current economic environment, people’s changing drinking habits, and the challenges of losing so many other bars and businesses in our neighborhood, Palmer’s has been losing $10,000 - $30,000 a month. The situation was no longer sustainable.
We cut expenses as much as possible and adjusted prices where we could and it just wasn’t enough to climb out of the hole we were falling into. The idea of a worker owned collective was considered, and is a good idea, but burdening the staff with this magnitude of loss is not fair to them. We had run out of options and decided to start work with a experienced commercial real estate broker last year to find a suitable buyer for Palmers. She approached many people in the bar and venue industry and the response from all was a unanimous “hard pass”. As we reached the end of our resources and still needed to sell, she expanded the scope of her search for a buyer and we finally accepted the the one and only offer we got - from our next door neighbors for a community space.
We may have failed in your eyes, and we promise you this has been the hardest decision we have ever had to make, but the alternative was an orange sticker on the locked door with no notice to staff or patrons.