Ginger's, downtown's only LGBTQ+ space, goes on 'indefinite hiatus'

https://sfstandard.com/2025/10/31/gingers-bar-downtown-closed/

It’s Halloween, which means thousands of partiers, both gay and straight, 
will descend on the city’s LGBTQ+ venues for a night of costumed revelry. 
Where they won’t be going is Ginger’s(opens in new tab), a downtown 
basement venue known for its craft cocktails and drag performances. 

As of Friday, the bar is closed — or, to be more specific, on “indefinite 
hiatus,” according to owner Brian Sheehy. The spiritual successor to a 
1970s-era bar of the same name, Ginger’s opened in 2017, closed in 2020, 
and reopened in June 2024.

Sheehy, CEO of nightlife hospitality group Future Bars, told(opens in new 
tab) SFGate that Ginger’s was losing money every month. However, a week 
ago he told The Standard that it was doing better than ever. 

It turns out, both were true. Ginger’s had been on a path toward 
profitability but was operating at a loss. Additionally, Amelia Long left 
as GM, and Sheehy has been unable to fill the vacancy. “It’s a very 
demanding position,” he says. “They need to bartend, have management 
experience, and book the performers.”

He’s had few applicants who possess that unique skill set, and there’s no 
one at the company who can take over on an interim basis. The result: The 
bar’s last day of business was Thursday. “If a miracle happens, and 
somebody comes out of the woodwork, we will reopen again,” Sheehy said. 

The closure comes a week after Future Bars opened Long Weekend, a three-
story Cuban bar in North Beach that will change to a different concept in 
nine months. Sheehy was clear that no such pivot is in the works for 
Ginger’s, which will operate from now on essentially as a special-events 
venue, with several private parties booked through December. 

Throughout the 2010s and into the 2020s, San Francisco witnessed the 
closure of one LGBTQ+ space after another: Castro icon Harvey’s, Mission 
lesbian bar The Lexington Club, working-class Tenderloin dive The Gangway. 
This year has seen something of a reversal of fortune, with women’s sports 
bar Rikki’s in the Castro and “straight-friendly” queer bar Mary’s on 
Haight among the year’s notable openings.

As for Ginger’s, Sheehy strikes a defiant note. Patrons “might be upset 
seeing that it’s closing, but if those people made more effort to support 
Ginger’s, it would have helped,” he said.


-- 
November 5, 2024 - Congratulations President Donald Trump.  We look 
forward to America being great again.

We live in a time where intelligent people are being silenced so that 
stupid people won't be offended.

Every day is an IQ test. Some pass, some, not so much.

Thank you for cleaning up the disasters of the 2008-2017, 2020-2024 Obama 
/ Biden / Harris fiascos, President Trump.

Under Barack Obama's leadership, the United States of America became the 
The World According To Garp.  Obama sold out heterosexuals for Hollywood 
queer liberal democrat donors.