YNot Sports Pub / Forbidden Pub - Bar Rescue Update - Open or Closed?

In this Bar Rescue episode, Jon Taffer visits YNot Sports Pub in Everette, Washington.

YNot Sports Pub and Grub is owned by couple Yvette Otto and Jon Ellis

They bought the popular sports bar in 2013.

Yvette has been in the bar business over seventeen years while Jon has owned two coffee stands.

They planned and ran different fun events in the beginning but the reality of running a bar caught up with them.

An arena opened beside them and they got busy only before or after events, in between their bar is empty.

They have had a series of bad employees, over pouring, drinking on the job.

There was a bad kitchen and disrespectful staff.

They are in $155,000 of debt and this is growing.

They are struggling and may lose their house if they don’t start making a profit.

Jon recons the bar with expert mixologist Phil Wills and expert chef Sean Olnowich.

They see inside the bar and Jon E is calling customers to sign up for fish racing and they cannot believe it.

Jon fills them in on the owners and the situation at the bar.

While a few are in the race, most of the customers are not interested or taking notice of it.

Jon tests the business by bringing in ten friends to simulate a concert situation.

They are to order food and drinks then leave in half an hour.

The ten friends sit together and sit for more than five minutes before they are attended to.

They order ten shots and it comes within eleven minutes, no food is ordered and the gold fish are still taken care of.

The party then order appetisers and the cook Gerald and bartender/cook Alana both cook with bare hands.

At twenty five minutes in their food has still not been served as it is still being prepped and they order more shots.

When the food starts coming they have to leave as thirty minutes has passed.

Jon and his experts come in and they taste the food the table ordered.

The food is bad, the burger beef is tough, the nachos taste old and are glued together by the congealed cheese.

Jon E and Yvette meet Jon and they give feedback on how nothing about the meal was good.

Jon and the team order some cocktails as well and they are awful.

They inspect the kitchen and see a grease pool behind the fryer with a rag soaking it all up.

There is a bedroom door on the walk-in fridge so it is not working properly.

It is a health violation to be cooking anything from the fridge.

They task them with cleaning the fridge before the next day.

The staff get into a fight that night but get it cleaned.

Jon comes in and is happy to see the place clean before sitting down with the staff.

They say they do not have the right tools or equipment in place to work effectively.

Yvette says they let a lot slip but also allow their staff get away with a lot of things.

Yvette calls Alana out for excessive drinking on the job and Jessica for tardiness and not collecting payments.

Due to this she fires both of them.

Yvette breaks down on having to make those decisions and Jon excuses them to sort themselves out.

Brandon a bartender quits on the spot in solidarity with his friend Jessica.

Jon returns to see no staff for the bar but Yvette and Jon E insist it is a step in the right direction.

Sean trains Gerald in the kitchen while Phil has no one to train and Yvette has to find two new bartenders.

They find three bartenders - Rachel, Sara, Aubryn and a waitress Lisa by nighttime, who have varying degrees of experience.

Instead of the usual stress test they will be having a bartending relay as an audition.

Phil evaluates each bartender as they serve customers and tags them out if they do poorly.

Jon E will be helping in the kitchen while Yvette will be helping front of house.

Sara is first but she has no experience at all so Phil has to walk her through.

Orders come into the kitchen and they are slow taking twenty minutes to fulfil a ticket.

Sara is tagged out for Rachel who has to be taught to count and reminded of the recipes by a customer.

She breaks a glass of drinks and spills into the ice bin causing delays in drink making.

The food going out is found to still be raw and sent back to be disposed of.

Aubryn is next to be tagged in and she needs little hand holding as she has a year’s experience and knocks out 4 drinks in less than 2 minutes.

At an hour and a half, the bar is shut down as drinks and food are not going to meet up.

The next day Phil gives feedback to the bartenders and Yvette decides to keep all of them.

Yvette is commended for being decisive about this decision.

The training starts for Phil who trains them on a three-shot drink and a citrus based cocktail that are both Asian inspired.

Then focus on the technical training.

In the kitchen, they make some more burgers with Asian influences.

The bar is renovated all night and the next afternoon the staff are gathered to unveil a new bar.

Ynot is too common a name for a bar so the name is changed.

The bar has been renamed to Forbidden with a bold red and black exterior.

Inside the bar has been made upscale and has an Asian theme, lanterns and a fish tank in the wall.

The fish tank has real tiger fish from china and koi from japan.

They have two stations and three 2touch POS systems.

West Coast Refrigeration replaced their walk-in and there is a lifetime subscription to Partender for inventory.

On relaunch, the bar is opened to the public and they are happy with the ambience.

The bartenders start great and work fast.

In the kitchen they are calm and serving good food.

Rapper Sir-Mix-a-Lot comes for the relaunch and loves the service.

Yvette takes a picture with him.

What Happened Next at YNot Sports Pub and Grub ?

Six weeks later, it is revealed that business is up 60%.

The new cocktails are doing extremely well.

They are converting new customers into repeat customers.

They changed the name of the pub back to YNot Sports Pub and Grub as customers thought they had closed.

They also reverted back to the original set up of the bar and ditched the Asian theme.

YNot Sports Pub and Grub closed in August 2017.

Reviews after the episode were very mixed with some loving and hating the food and service.

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This post was last updated in February 2022.