Ace's Sports Hangar - Bar Rescue Update - Open or Closed?

In this Bar Rescue episode, Jon Taffer visits Ace’s Sports Hangar in the Colony, Texas.

Ace’s Sports Hangar is owned by Will and Candace Kuhn.

They own a chain of bars and bought Aces in 2020.

Candance usually designs the bars and Will runs them.

This time she wanted to run the bar herself and the opportunity presented itself to buy the bar.

However, they were challenged by running all the bars under the pandemic conditions.

Left on her own, Candace has dropped the ball with the bar.

There are many managerial problems that have drained their savings.

Money has also been pulled from the profits of the other businesses.

The problems have started to affect their marriage.

Jon does the surveillance of the bar from his command centre with expert Chef Anthony Lamas.

Jon introduces the owners, manager Kelsey, bartenders Emily and Jason and Tyler the cook.

For recon, Jon has football player Nick Solak and his fiancée Roxanne come to test out the bar.

There is no drinks menu and they do not have any ingredients for some common drinks.

The drinks they have ordered are too strong and they hate the taste of it.

They order their food and Candace goes to help the cook in the kitchen.

They are unorganised with no ingredients to make some orders and are running low of others.

Will is not helping matters and is walking around making comments.

Tyler is wearing a sleeveless shirt and does not use gloves whilst touching the food.

He touches raw food and then serves the plates out to be taken to the customers.

Jon and Anthony rush into the bar and stop service from the kitchen before the plate reaches them.

Jon reprimands Tyler for all the sanitary violations and Candace for bad management.

He also scolds Will for putting in and losing $290,000 in the business.

Candace is moved to tears by Jons criticisms and her husband is sympathetic.

The next day, Jon arrives early in the morning to talk to the staff.

He finds out there is a lot of disrepair, neglect, inventory issues and cash flow problems at the bar.

There is a manager but she is not equipped to manage properly.

No staff acknowledge that there is a leader at the bar.

Will says they have a high turnover of staff so there is no time to train or lay down processes.

Jon reminds them they are the ones that are allowing bad practices to prevail and the business is spiralling.

Jon brings in his experts, expert chef Anthony Lamas and expert mixologist Derrick Turner.

Jon speaks to the couple together to find out the issues at the bar.

They reveal Will could help her with management but she wanted to do it on her own so he was hands-off.

Derrick takes the staff through a test of their skills and trains them on a new cocktail recipe.

Anthony trains the staff, including Tyler who is wearing sleeves, on making basic delicious nachos.

For the stress test, they have a plan to tackle the management issues.

Candace will be in the front of house while Will will expedite and they will switch roles when needed.

For the stress test, customers are let in to the bar.

The staff are hopeful but they begin to make mistakes with a number of drinks being dumped.

The food orders come through and Tyler starts slow because he was slammed.

He turns it around, making good food and it is sent out on time.

Will confuses orders and is slow taking it from the window to the tables.

Before long the food is coming out before drinks and there is no cutlery on most of the tables.

It takes a while but they eventually get into a rhythm and meet up with food and drink.

Jon praises them for having a decent stress test, with everyone served before the night ended.

The next day, Derrick praises them but there is still room for improvement and he teaches them three new cocktails.

In the kitchen, Anthony takes them through making a Tex Mex.

Jon has a plan for the new concept for the bar and renovation starts on the space.

Later, Jon meets with the staff outside of their bar and he reveals he is slightly changing the name of the bar.

The bar will now be called Ace's A Sporting Bar.

The exterior has been brightened up with more signage showing that it is a bar and grill.

Inside the bar has been given more character with texture and colours.

They have been given a Partender subscription, three Harbour Touch terminals, two Skytabs, an Orange Door Entertainment System and a Pathspot machine.

Candace is moved to tears by the changes that Jon has made.

She lets the customers in for the relaunch and the staff are ready.

The bar staff are confidently making drinks and the customers are delighted with them.

Food is also coming out of the kitchen quickly and to a high quality.

Candace is more confident leading her staff and helping where she is needed.

Will is impressed with her diligence.

The two spies who came in on recon on the first night are present.

They love all the changes to the bar, especially the service and the improved food and drink.

What Happened Next at Ace's Sports Hangar?

Six weeks later, it is revealed their sales are increasing with new patrons and the staff getting much better with their new menu.

They kept the new name that they were given during the episode.

Ace's Sports Hangar closed in February 2022.

They closed after selling the bar to new owners.

The new owners changed the name of the bar to Twisted Bar and Grill.

Click for more Bar Rescues

Previous episode - Gilly's Sports Bar

Next episode - The Brick Tavern

This post was last updated in October 2022.