It’s been nearly two months since the Minnesota statewide smoking ban took effect. As Chris Buckley reports, it’s having an impact on bar business on the Iron Range.

Palmers Tavern in Hibbing has been in business nearly fifteen years. Owner John Larson says he’d expected business to take a hit after the new law went into effect and he did immediately.

He says this October he sold nearly thirty percent {less} product than October of 2006.

And the biggest hit was the weekday afternoon crowd.

“The people getting done with work that want to have a couple of beers, a couple of cigarettes, and go home.

These people don’t go out at night, they don’t go out on weekends, this was the only time we’d see them, and many I haven’t seen since October first.”

“Our reps have said they’re at least 30 to 35% down in sales, I do know of a place in Orr that’s already begun laying off people because of it.”

He says pull tab sales are also nearly thirty percent lower than normal.

“I see the same regular players but don’t see them gambling as much, some would spend several hundred a night, and now instead of playing for three hours they’re here maybe an hour.”

The non-smokers who frequent the bar, he says, are happy with the new rules.

But those are people that are there several times a week. He hasn’t seen any new customers taking advantage of the smoke-free environment.

“I’d be interested in asking the non-smokers that say they haven’t come out in ten, fifteen years that stood in front of the county and said, we’re ready to go out. Geez, I’d like to see it - we’ve been here for 15 years, now we’re smoke free, you wanted it so here it is!”

Source: Northland News Center. Link

This entry was posted on Tuesday, November 27th, 2007 at 10:31 pm and is filed under Bars/Taverns, Job Loss, North America. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Responses are currently closed, but you can trackback from your own site.