DANCE CLUB FORTUNES.

Hauraki Plains Gazette, Volume XXXIV, Issue 4578, 22 June 1923, Page 2

DANCE CLUB FORTUNES.

(By O. Patrick Thompson, in the “ Overseas Daily Mail.” An Italian ex-head waiter recently sold for £42,000 the fiance club m London which he bought, two years ago ter £6,000. In addition to his profit of £32,000 he had already made a fortune out o£ the place before selling it This is exceptional even in the magical of dance club enterprise, which, when the club caliches on with the right seti, is nearly as lucrative as diamond mining—for, a short time. Values of dance places fluctuate wildly from year to year. One place which opened in the last year of the war cleared for its proprietors £60)000 in twelve months. Tofiay it is Tiot making a thousand a year and would not fetch £5OOO in the market. The proprietor of another club refused £75,000 for it in 1920. Last year’ he gladly sold out for a few thousand. Most, dinner-and-dance clubs have a butterfly life. They are clubs in name only. They have no social atmosphere or purpose. Acquaintances are not made there. And so people who dance ijn these places tire quickly, unless something exceptional is done to keep them interested and amused. If •'■he club is.the accepted rendezvous or the world -which amuses itself—aml there is room for only two such places in one capital at the same time—difficulties vanish. There may be no r.oom to dance in the square left by the dinner tables, the band may be only average, the floor may not be sprung), professional dancers and mannequin parades may be dispensed with—yet the crowd will fight to get in and cheerfully pay high prices for food and drink.

Another club, catering for a less exclusive world —stars ol revue, wealthy stockbrokers, business magnates, prosperous cosmopolitans—will find it necessary to put on exhibition dance acts and devise all sorts of brilliant “stunts” in order to keep its clientele.

Whether it be an expensive and exclusive place or one to catch the dancer of moderate means and simple tastes, depends on the man who runs the club. Personality, which creates an atmosphere, is the thing that, counts.