Nightclub AG now a.D.
AG as in Aktiengesellschaft (corporation) and a.D. as in außer Dienst (out of service), is what I’m trying to get at here, people. Back in the days of Rick’s Café Américain, things certainly must have been a whole lot easier when it came to running a nightclub. Or financing one, I should say (to be more exact).
Berlin’s now infamous “Goya” nightclub just went broke after being a mere four months in operation. And this isn’t at all that out of the ordinary in this day and age, unfortunately. It’s hard to get a business up and running anywhere these days. The interesting thing about the Goya adventure was that it was a privately financed undertaking, or more accurately, Berlin’s first stock-financed nightclub.
2,700 unlucky winners bought stock in this operation, raising an amazing 7.5 million euros in cash. Unfortunately, the extravagant reconstruction work put into the venue, the beautiful old Metropol Theater building on Nollendorfplatz, ended up costing more in the neighborhood of 11 million euros. And that turned out to be a neighborhood much too expensive for the tastes of the Goya’s too few guests, it seems.
This “Millionengrab” (grave for millions) had actually filed for bankruptcy back in March, but it wasn’t until the end of April that operations for the club and its 89 employees came to a close.