Sports bars banking on Super Bowl sales to help offset winter losses

Employees at Changing Times Pub are busy sorting sauces for chicken wings and filling beer kegs on taps, getting ready for Super Bowl Sunday.

Business at the sports bar and restaurant chain so far this year has been sluggish, as snowier and colder-than-normal weather has cut into sales, said Jeff Egan, co-owner of Changing Times, which has pubs in Farmingdale, Bay Shore and East Northport.

Although Sunday is forecast to be freezing, Egan is counting on catering orders and customers watching the game on TVs in the pubs to boost weekly sales by 10%.

“I’ve invested a lot of inventory this weekend, and it’s all perishable. If it snows, those wings are going in the garbage," Egan said. 

The first quarter of the year is the slowest period for restaurants in general, as consumers recover from holiday spending and stay home in the cold weather. But for sports bars and restaurants, the period is historically a boon because patrons come to eat, drink and watch football and basketball games on TV screens, experts said.

This year’s extreme weather, though, has chilled customer turnout at some sports bars and restaurants for weeks, business owners and managers said.

Restaurants already have taken a loss due to inclement weather from what would have been one of their most profitable days two Sundays ago when two NFL conference championship games were played.

That day’s closing cost Changing Times about 10% of the month's revenue, Egan said.

While Super Bowl Sunday sales will help, the cost of hiring extra workers will cut into the profits, Egan said.

Trying 'to think positive'

The lingering cold weather and multiple snowy days this year also are hurting the finances of waitstaff, who get fewer tips, Egan said. Changing Times employs about 100 people, he said.

On Long Island, temperatures in January and February have averaged below normal, while snowfall since Dec. 1 has exceeded the norm by 66%, said Joe Pollina, a meteorologist at the National Weather Service.

“It’s the coldest weather we’ve had in many years,” Pollina said. And Long Islanders will hardly catch a break this weekend, too. The weather service has issued another cold watch for 6 p.m. Saturday through 1 p.m. Sunday. 

Some business operators are concerned that the frigid weather could cut into Super Bowl Sunday sales and profits for sports bars and restaurants if fans stay home.

Already, the weather has caused a 20% decline in revenue this year at The Main Event’s two sports bar-restaurant locations in Plainview and Farmingdale, co-owner Mike Constantatos said.

“We always try to think positive and say don’t worry about what we can’t control,” but overhead costs remain the same regardless of the weather, he said, adding that the business employs about 90 people.

Because The Main Event was closed on Championship Sunday, customers might make up for that by booking more reservations for Super Bowl Sunday than they normally would, he said.

“This year, it seems like we’re getting full already and we’re still days away,” he said Wednesday. 

The Main Event's Farmingdale location, which holds about 500 people, is fully booked, while the Plainview location, which holds 250 people, is getting close to that point, he said.

Super Bowl business is a significant revenue generator for The Main Event, which could see eat-in and takeout business account for as much as 40% of a week's revenue, he said.

Business has been down slightly this year at Salisbury Tavern Sports Bar & Grill in Westbury, manager Joe Assante said.

He attributes the business' close ties with the community — the restaurant is within 2 miles of four high schools and often hosts youth sports teams’ fundraisers — to helping it offset weather-related downturns. The business also draws more families than a typical sports bar would, he said.

“Back in the day, people used to come out just to come out and have some beer and wings. Now we get whole families coming out, which is great,” Assante said.

Dine-in vs. delivery

Third-party food delivery services, such as DoorDash and Uber Eats, give restaurants the opportunity to capture some sales that would have otherwise been lost due to inclement weather.

But sit-down restaurants typically prefer dine-in customers because they are more likely to order alcohol, which has higher margins, than they would if they were ordering food for delivery, said Jim Sanderson, a managing director covering the restaurant industry at Northcoast Research, an equity research firm in Cleveland.

Third-party delivery companies also charge restaurants' fees, he said, making profitability that much more challenging. In some cases, restaurants will pass it on to  customers, he said.

How well restaurants have performed on Long Island this winter varies by location, according to data from Square, a point-of-sale system owned by Block Inc. in Oakland, California.

Square noted a 1.61% decline in the number of transactions it processed for credit and debit card purchases made by customers inside restaurants in Nassau County in January compared to the same month a year earlier, while the number of transactions increased 2.76% in Suffolk County. The number fell 3.76% statewide.

By Tory N. Parrish

tory.parrish@newsday.comToryParrish1

Tory N. Parrish covers retail and small business for Newsday. She has worked at the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review and Observer-Dispatch in Utica, N.Y.