Keeping up with the Garza's

“We spend money we don’t have, on things we don’t need, to impress people that don’t matter.”

For those of you who follow me on twitter you were probably either sound asleep or not checking your timeline when I went on a long ass rant last Friday night.  I was at a club in downtown Charlotte, North Carolina called LaTorre’s for their version of the Colombian Independence Day party or whatever (1).  Even though women were free before 11:30pm (this should read “women got in free before 11:30pm” some of you were like, “Free women before 11:30pm! Where?!”) I knew that dudes were going to have to pay $10 to get in (2), so I was mentally prepared for the hit.  Some of you may call me cheap because I don’t want to pay $10 to get in to a club but we’ll get to that later.  I’ll be real I just hate paying cover if it’s over $5.  I don’t know if it’s because I’m more of a bar kinda guy but I just hate paying $10 to a club when I’m going to spend money on drinks anyway.

So we walk in and it happens (3), $15 freaking cover! $15!!! What the hell!?! Let’s think about this, everyone has a limit that they’d pay to get into a place, mine is $20. I WILL NOT PAY more than $20 to get into a place unless it’s in another country or they have open bar.  I will pay $20 if I was in New York or maybe Miami (or D.C. if you have convention there and Brothers wanna overcharge but that’s another story). I am not kidding, once me and Esco were chilling waiting to go out with some friends.  When they called us and told us it was a $20 cover we just said “fugg it” and stayed at home.  For me it’s kind of a scale and goes a little something like this:

Level 1: College town/small town.

Reasonable cover: $0-$7.

Level 2: A large metropolitan area but not very glamorous (think Cleveland or Oklahoma City).

Reasonable cover: $5-$10

Level 3: A large metropolitan area that has some kind of glamour to it (Atlanta, Dallas, Chicago, but definitely NOT Houston)

Reasonable cover: $10-$15 (and I still wouldn’t pay $15 most of the time if I can help it)

Level 4: Miami, New York City and sure throw in L.A., that’s it.

Reasonable cover: $15-$20

Level 5: A place where you are probably never going to be again so you better enjoy it while you’re there(Milan, Paris, Tokyo, Seoul, Buenos Aires, Mexico City, you get the idea).

Reasonable cover: $20 +

*This is only for clubs/bars/lounges. Strip clubs are a whole ‘nother mess. And every scale has exceptions but this is what I use when deciding whether to pay a cover charge or not at a club.

Where would you put Charlotte in that scale? Think about it…duh level 2!  Who says they are going to Charlotte for a trip just for the heck of it (excludes NASCAR races)?  No one!  Look I love Charlotte.  Charlotte is a big city but it doesn’t feel too big; it’s just right.  It’s in a nice part of the country and it’s close to a lot of nice places, but at the end of the day it’s just plain old Charlotte. (4)

Ok so now we go to the point of the whole damn thing, kinda.  I rarely go to a club that isn’t a Latin spot.  I mean, I just don’t wanna go to a hip hop club.  The people I associate with don’t really want to go either.  It just isn’t our scene.  We want to go to a place where we can dance salsa, bachata, merengue, maybe hear some reggaeton. (5) We want to be there when the DJ gives the inevitable stupid shoutout, “Donde estan mis Centroamericanos/Dominicanos/Venezolanos/Mexicanos/Colombianos…etc” and then we cheer like idiots. (6) Then again it makes sense, Latina/os WOULD go to Latino clubs.  Who else is gonna go besides 50 year-old white couples that wanna try out the dance moves they learned from their Salsa instructor?

My issue is with how these clubs operate.  Look I know the point of any business is to first and foremost make money, that’s easy, you don’t need to take a high school economics class to know that.  But I also feel like you should be ethical about it and treat your customers and employees with respect.  If not then we’d have companies like Coca-Cola putting crack in their drink so more people would buy it (They did that before? No they didn’t that was cocaine not crack silly!)  I mean, I respect Chick-fil-A because they don’t open on Sundays and they will not budge on that. I love that.

I just have a huge issue with Latin clubs because I feel like they hurt our community.

I look around the club and I see people just buying drinks like they’re not going to see tomorrow.  And then I ask myself: how many of these people have money to be buying drinks like that?  How many of them are paying with their credit card that only has 10% of its limit left on it?  How many of them just bought a new $80 pair of pants just for tonight? (7)

And here’s where I feel that the clubs need to change, need to help out their fellow woman and man.  And I say this because it seems like ALL Latin clubs overcharge ridiculously.  Before I continue I do have to say this: I don’t expect these clubs to have $1 beers.  A recent study in England showed that a 1% increase in alcohol prices resulted in a drop of 5,000 assaults. Look I know my community, and I know that things would get out of control if we had $1 drinks at a club. (8)

But they also shouldn’t get too ridiculous.  Look I think $3-$4 beers at a club are very reasonable.  It just gets out of hand when you have to pay $7 for a Corona.  When you’re paying $10 for a coke and house whiskey you’re just overcharging period.  At this one place in D.C. they charged me $4 for a bottled water.  It’s bad enough that you have the thermostat set at 70 degrees and there are 200 people in a place that’s probably 100 more than the fire marshal would allow.  So now you are going to overcharge for something that should be free?  And another thing they can fix is their $15 cover charge. Really?  Again, you all need to get real.  I know that clubs are providing a place for us to congregate and have fun but don’t ruin people’s credit off a $140 bar tab.  Help us out some, our community doesn’t need more people in debt than we already have.

I guess you’re probably reading this and thinking: was this entire post all about “unethical” Latin clubs and how you’re mad cause you paid $15 to go to a club in Charlotte?  No, it isn’t.  That would be stupid because ultimately no club is going to read this and say, “Hey this guy is 100% right, let’s make beer $3 and well drinks $4!” (9) It has to start with us.  The consumer has all the power.  No one is holding a gun to our temple and forcing us to drop $60 at a club. It’s us.  We have a real problem with money.  And it’s not just in my community but all over the country.  It just hurts more when it’s my community because, well, it’s my community.  It’s kind of a twisted, sad cycle. 

Let’s take two people, Paco and Kiko.  Paco and Kiko know each other, they’re not super close but they’re close enough to hang out every now and then.  One day Paco goes to Kiko’s house and notices Kiko has a 65” HDTV, 500 DVDs, (10) and every gaming system available.  So Paco starts thinking to himself, “Hey if Kiko can have all these things why can’t I?  We’re no different.”  So Paco gets a Best Buy Card and builds up his collection, little by little.  But what Paco doesn’t know is that Kiko is already $5000 in credit card debt as a college student.  And Paco soon realizes that he’s paying a nut in finance charges off of his card.  Once Kiko sees all the new, better shit Paco has he wants it too.  And the cycle continues.

We spend so much energy, time and most importantly money on things we think we need because our neighbor has them.  But what we don’t know is that a lot of times our neighbor is falling into extreme debt because of those very things.  Again, this is a societal problem, but one that greatly affects my community.  We ruin our credit scores because we want to impress the person next to us that probably doesn’t even matter to us.  We spend $25 on a girl at a club that we’ll never see again and probably just wanted you to buy her drinks anyway.  We get a check after working long hours at the mall and spend 10% of our check that weekend because we want to eat out every night.

I just want you to realize that we have to be realistic with ourselves.  If your friend makes $100,000 a year and you make $35,000 don’t try to keep up with them, you can’t.  In reality you’re just falling further behind.  Learn how to say no and don’t judge people when they say no.  Look I know there are people out there who we call “cheap.”  But you don’t know what they’re going through, maybe they can’t keep up with your ballin’ ass cause they have other things they need to take care of.  Or maybe they just want to do something we should all be doing: saving!  Don’t continue the cycle. (11)

I’ll just end with this quote: Live today like no one wants to so that you can live tomorrow like no one else can.  We need to plan for our futures.  What’s going to happen when you apply for a real job and loan for your house and your credit is garbage because you routinely spent $130 at the club every weekend when you were 27?  Be smart about your money and don’t try to keep up with the Garza’s.  At the end of the day you’ll be the one paying your bills, not them. (12)

Just want to throw this in there also: I hate these "upscale" Latin clubs cause you know 90% of people in there don't have real money yet they dress and drink like they do.  Sigh.

EDIT:  After reading this I hope you think about your money BUT I do want to say that you also need to enjoy yourself too! Life is too short.  It's all about finding a balance of saving and spending.  I know people that only save save save and let's be real that's not the life for me, but to each their own.  If you have money and you can put enough away for a rainy day then by all means enjoy yourself! Like the billboard says, "Life is too short, get the shoes."

(1)  If you’re still shocked that there are Latina/os in parts of the country that you never imagined…well wake up. We are everywhere, ask Canadians.

(2)  How bad do we want equality? I know that clubs don’t want sausage fests but still.  If I were malicious enough I would sue the club and probably win (it’s happened before). Discrimination based on gender, no two ways around it.

(3)  I hate 95% of surprises.

(4)  There’s a reason why there’s no song that says “I’m in Charlotte bitch” or “In Charlotte, concrete jungles where dreams are made of, there’s nothing you can’t do.” You get the idea.

(5)  R.I.P. Reggaeton, 1991 (c) – 2007.

(6)  They always lump all the Central American countries together.  But let’s be real how many Nicaraguans are actually at the club anyway?  Other normal exclusions on the DJ shoutouts: Peru, Ecuador, Chile, Uruguay, Paraguay, Cuba, Bolivia (NEVER gets love), and Argentina (they’re Italian anyway).

(7)  I always take a step back and admit that I am not perfect either.  I wanted the nice shit that the people around me had/have.  I wanted a flat screen HDTV, some nice clothes, etc.  So I spent a lot of money that I didn’t have.  Let me say that again.  I spent money I didn’t have.  And I’m much better now but to some extent I still do it.

(8)  That last sentence was a huge understatement.  “Out of control?”  That’s like saying Jamarcus Russell really, really enjoys cough syrup.

(9)  They’re not going to read it anyway. I wonder how many people actually will read this post?  If the over/under is 5.5 I easily take the under?

(10)                 This should probably read “Blu Rays.” Must suck for the person that has DVDs and now has to start all over with Blu Rays hahaha.

(11)                 I will say this though.  If you are broke you better not go on a roadtrip with me and not offer to pay for gas or food.  If you can’t go you can’t go, don’t force it.

(12)                 I need to make sure I reread this post twice a month.  Trust me I am not as much of a saver as I should be.