Restaurants and food / Los Angeles, next to USC

901 Bar & Grill

Every four years 901 loses all its customers. It's been that way since 1947

901 Bar & Grill has been on South Figueroa, next to USC, since 1947. Every four years its crowd graduates, and we had to introduce the bar to a new class that had never heard of it.

Before

7,223
followers: 32%
of the audience in Los Angeles

After

11,000
followers: 49.4%
of the audience in Los Angeles: 1.9M
Instagram views: +516%
growth in new follows

1947

A bar whose crowd graduates

901 has stood on South Figueroa since 1947, next to USC. Its crowd is students, and students graduate. Every four years the room fills with people who know nothing about the bar, and almost 80 years of reputation mean nothing to them until someone says "let's go to 901".

The obstacle

What made it harder

Americans drink less than at any point in ninety years, the young most of all. Yet young people's bar visits rose over the last two years. They need a reason, so the content had to sell a reason to get together, not alcohol.

The history was the hardest part. Too modern, and the bar stops being itself. Left as it was, it turns into a museum people walk past. Every format had to pass two tests: a current student sees themselves in it, and someone who came here in 2000 doesn't wince.

The metric

Counting what fills the room

On paper the account looked fine: 7,223 followers and regular posts. But Los Angeles was only 32% of the audience, so two thirds of the followers couldn't get to a bar on Figueroa. That reach doesn't fill a room. We moved the ad targeting to locals and the age groups that make up the crowd.

Nobody goes to a bar alone. A group decides, and someone in it is the first to say "look what I found". So we worked for shares, because sending a video to friends means vouching for the place. A like means nothing. A share is an invitation.

Content Production
Page Management
Audience Research
Local Ad Targeting
Party Reels
Staff Humor Reels

The content

Parties in their language

What happens in the room, cut the way today's twenty-year-olds are used to seeing the things they like. And the staff, so a freshman walks in already knowing someone.

199
shares on 11,800 views: 174
shares on 15,400 views: 120
shares on 4,777 views

Tap to preview

Party nights

Tap for sound

Sample content

The top format

Staff humor landed best

Someone laughs at a reel with the bartender, then walks in a week later and sees him behind the bar. For a freshman new to the city, knowing someone there already matters more than any menu. It's also what gets shared: you're not sending friends an ad for a bar, you're sending a person you liked.

The results

The audience became local

Los Angeles grew from 32% to 49.4% of the audience, so almost half the followers now live within half an hour of the bar. Followers went from 7,223 to 11,000, and new follows were up 516%.

The reels that took off got 199 shares on 11,800 views, 174 on 15,400 and 120 on 4,777. On the last one, shares came to almost three times the likes.

Attendance went up. The client said the season would have flopped if the work hadn't started before the school year. The comparison with last year confirmed it.

1.9M
Instagram views: 47,000
profile visits, up 183%: 26,200
link clicks: 343,100
Facebook views

Why it matters

If you have a physical place, half your statistics mean nothing. A follower in another state won't drink your beer. Watch two numbers instead: how much of your audience lives nearby, and how often people share your content.

Timing matters in a seasonal business. For a bar next to a university, September decides the whole year. If new students don't know you when classes start, you're catching up until summer.

A new generation doesn't inherit your reputation, either. For them your place starts the day they hear about it, so every few years you have to explain what it's worth again.