How rowdy crowds on one stretch of Sansom Street caused 3 bars to pull out of Center City Sips

It’s already last call for some bars that signed up to participate in Center City Sips this year.

Time, Vintage, and DBG (formerly Drury Beer Garden) have pulled out of the Center City-wide Wednesday happy hour, say the owners of three establishments, who cited flagging sales and safety concerns as crowds have mobbed the street outside the bars for three straight weeks.

The bars are clustered around a stretch of Sansom Street between 13th and Juniper Streets in Midtown Village, which has turned into a block-party-meets-bacchanal after a viral list of Sips recommendations from user @phillyishh called the area “lit and mixy.”

“You go here if you don’t wanna go inside the bars but still wanna vibe ... Pull up and park,” said the TikTok, which has been viewed more than 273,000 times. Videos from the first three Sips Wednesdays show crowds dancing and imbibing as cars struggle to pass and police sirens flash. Eventually, videos show, a swarm of officers on bikes moved to barricade the strip of Sansom Street to foot and vehicular traffic.

“It’s never been like this,” said Jason Evenchik, who owns Time, Vintage, and the sports bar franchise Garage, among other establishments. “No one is inside, and it’s mayhem outside.”

Organized by the Center City District, Sips began in 2004 as a low-key neighborhood happy hour designed to give restaurants a boost during the summer Shore slump. Over time, the weekly promotion developed a reputation for bar brawls, bad tippers, and giving khaki-clad interns space to black out and frat flick to top-40 remixes without consequence.

After a two-year hiatus during the COVID-19 pandemic, Sips returned in 2022 as a more demure affair, much to the chagrin of partiers.

Now patrons and business owners are unhappy with the happy hour, which they say has veered out of control and been spoiled by crowds that don’t convert to customers.

» READ MORE: From 2024: Center City workers aren’t happy houring like they used to. Bar owners are hoping Sips deals can lure them back.

Sips returned for the season June 4 with 95 participating establishments offering half-priced appetizers and drink deals from 5 to 7 p.m. every Wednesday through Aug. 27. The trouble, Evenchik said, began almost immediately.

» READ MORE: Happy hour, then dinner? Center City Sips now comes with dinner discounts

“Hundreds” of people have been congregating on the street outside Time and DBG on Wednesday evenings with no intention of patronizing either bar, Evenchik said.

Instead, he claimed, people are selling alcohol out of their cars and bringing coolers to make their own cocktails. At one point on June 11, Evenchik said, a Tesla blocked a crosswalk while a man made piña coladas with a pair of blenders hooked up to the car.

“It’s pushing restaurant goers elsewhere,” said Evenchik, who had signed Time and Vintage up for Sips without issue since 2008 and 2006, respectively.

Evenchik said he voiced concerns at two mid-June meetings with other Midtown Village business owners, the Center City District, and the Philadelphia Police Department, which said it would start citing people for open-container violations. Officers would also block off the portion of Sansom Street if the crowds persisted.

That response only exacerbated the problem, Evenchik said, when about a dozen officers last Wednesday barricaded Sansom Street between 13th and Juniper from about 7:30 to 11:30 p.m., preventing patrons from showing up to reservations and the band scheduled for the jazz bar Timefrom its gig.

“We basically sat empty. ... No one could come to this block at all,” Evenchik said.

Business is down more than 50% at Time and wine bar Vintage compared to a normal Wednesday, Evenchik said. He pulled Time and Vintage out of Sips the next day. .

“It’s the only lever we have to pull,” Evenchik said.

There has been an increased police presence along Sansom between 13th and Juniper on Wednesdays “due to crowds,” a police spokesperson confirmed. Last week, the spokesperson said, officers handed out around 10 citations there for various alcohol-related violations.

Police and bar owners have met weekly “and will continue to do so as we map out a plan to work together for these events,” the spokesperson said. “We are working with the bars and night clubs to determine an appropriate deployment each week and hear their concerns.”

DBG owner George Tsiouris also withdrew the happy hour favorite from Sips last Thursday after having participated for 14 seasons.

“Because of the excessive crowds gathering on the streets, and with some having no intent of supporting any of the neighborhood businesses, it has created a sidewalk crowding issue ... [that] has made it difficult for our guests,” Tsiouris said over text. “Therefore, we have decided to pull out of the Sips program.”

No other Sips participants have withdrawn from the program, Center City District spokesperson JoAnn Loviglio said in a statement.

Loviglio said several establishments near the stretch of Sansom Street have reported instances of “young people congregating in large groups, crowding and blocking the narrow sidewalks, and drinking from their own ‘self-catered’ bottles of beer and liquor,” to the group, but that behavior is not contained to Sips.

Crowds also gather on Fridays and Saturdays, she wrote, adding that the quasi-block parties have “largely occurred later in the evening after the Sips happy hour timeframe.”

“Our understanding from local businesses and police is that this is not an issue stemming from Sips patrons (or participants), but from social media posts that have encouraged excessive crowds,” Loviglio wrote.

But those crowds have begun to ick out some Sips regulars, who have taken to social media to complain about how the resulting drama is harshing their vibe.

Celia Joy, 33, has partaken in Sips regularly since 2017 but doesn’t know when she’ll return after getting stuck in the crowd on Sansom Street while on her way to Time on June 11. She recalled stepping around empty handles of alcohol and watching overwhelmed security guards turn people away.

“It’s never been like this. ... It looked like probably a lot of young people who aren’t used to going out down there. It’s not a party place,” said Joy, who lives in West Philly. “Once those people get bored of it, I’ll be back.”