Bar Owner Shares Secret to Building Loyal Customers

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Emily Brown still has the overdraft notice hanging on the wall at Eebee’s Corner Bar.

“I just thought, ‘Man, this is really real,’” Brown said. “I started laughing.”

At the time, the buildout for her Washington, DC bar was nearly complete. Her loan money was gone. Her underfunded 401(k) was wiped out. She borrowed $3,000 from a friend just to get liquor on the shelves. She opened earlier than planned because she needed cash coming in immediately.

Now there are lines around the block.

Brown’s path to Eebee’s wasn’t a straight line. After years of bartending in New York City, she moved back to DC, where she ran private tours, managed Airbnbs and secretly cleaned them herself just to pocket the cleaning fee.

“I never told anyone because I was embarrassed,” Brown said.

Back in DC, she got her first real look at what it took to open a business when a cousin launched a pizzeria and she helped it get off the ground. Watching that place find its footing planted something. Brown started carving out thirty minutes every morning to sketch ideas for her own spot. She listened to Audible books and podcasts between long shifts running beverage programs. She was building something in her head long before she had the money to build it for real.

A podcast about deathbed regrets pushed her the rest of the way.

“Oh my God, you’ve got to change the way you think about yourself,” Brown remembered thinking. “If you won’t even try, how can you live with that?”

She had a specific vision for her bar:

• Somewhere between a dive bar and a fancy cocktail spot
• A place where someone could show up in sweatpants
• Order a properly stirred Negroni
• And stay long enough to become a regular

Brown jokes that she can “hardly use a computer,” but she knew exactly what she wanted to build — and she started building it before she felt ready.

What happens when the plan works too well

Brown thought Eebee’s would be a quiet neighborhood spot.

“There’s no hostess. There’s no system,” Brown said, describing the original vision. “I thought this back bar would be closed Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday.”

She was wrong about that. Within the first week, the place was overwhelmed — and the scrappy instincts that got her to opening day had to scale fast. Brown hired a host, then realized she needed two. On a recent Saturday, the wait hit five and a half hours. One 10-person party waited more than seven hours to sit down. Now guests hand over their phone numbers and wander the neighborhood while waiting for a text. Behind the scenes, Brown brought in 7shifts to help manage the operation.

The product itself reflects the same resourceful thinking. Things like the dry-aged burger, Czech beer taps imported from Prague and even the baseball cards in the bathroom. Every detail was considered, but none of it required a big budget or a famous name — just a clear sense of what the place should feel like.

That extends to how the staff treats customers. Brown’s bar isn’t trying to impress anyone with technique. It’s trying to make people feel known.

“You remember that their grandmother had surgery,” Brown said. “You remember that they had a bad date.”

Investors are now approaching her about opening more locations. She still drives a dented 2008 Toyota Corolla, lives in a tiny apartment with no dishwasher and orders a burger at her own bar every single day just to make sure it still tastes right.

“I’m doing everything for the first time,” Brown said.

The overdraft notice is still on the wall. At this point, it might be the best piece of decor in the place.

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