Marks and Spencer support new 'Hooters' in Bristol

[JessinAvalon]

Dear all
(I've posted this under the feminism list but it's been suggested that I post it here as well.)

I live in Bristol and, last week, 'Hooters' was granted a licence to open in the city centre. The site is virtually opposite 3 apartment blocks, the lower floors of which are social housing and children are living in them.

What's most disappointing is that Marks and Spencer are leasing the site to 'Hooters'. They have been e-mailed by many concerned people to ask if they will reconsider leasing the building but they have just replied saying it is a "commercial decision" (as if that makes it ok!). In Sheffield, a 'Hooters' didn't even make it to application stage because the developer (Ask Pizza) realised that it would be better not to be associated with a company like 'Hooters'.

Marks and Spencer don't seem that concerned, however. Although they have signed up to the "Let Girls Be Girls" Mumsnet campaign they are not concerned about a company which sells merchandise including babygros which say "Future Hooters Girl" and "Does my butt look big in this?"

I have written to Marks and Spencer telling them that I won't be shopping in their stores again. If you feel strongly about this, please e-mail:

[email protected].

'Hooters' tries to sell itself as a family friendly restaurant but it is anything but. The Hooters in Nottingham attracts mainly stag parties and football fans. Hooters Girls take part in bikini contests and iced wet t-shirt competitions (the t-shirts are put in the freezers before the girls wear them). 'Hooters' has links to Playboy magazine....I could go on.....

I think Marks and Spencer should be shamed for facilitating this company's expansion into Bristol. They are selling women and girls down the river by leasing to this company and all just to make a "quick buck". As one former customer said to them, being a hitman is a "commercial decision" but it doesn't make it right!

Thanks everyone.

We have a petition here which we set up and a blog here which is recording articles etc and news on the Bristol Hooters.

There is (was?) a Hooters in Birmingham too - right opposite the City Art Gallery :( Hopefully that means it's closed down? :o

I've been in the Nottingham one - got hopelessly lost on the way to visit my sister and stopped there to ask directions back to the City centre - it was getting late and I had totally lost my bearings - had never ever come across it before and had no idea what it was, thought it was an owl-themed restaurant from the outside

It was revolting. The atmos in there was really lairy and threatening and as a lone woman (who is not normally a shrinking violet) I felt v. uncomfortable. I'm really angry that they are seen as acceptable.

It sounds to me as if this company intends to break UK anti-discrimination laws in a number of areas, notably age, also religion (or is there a Muslim version of the uniform?) and sex of waiting staff.

And I would feel depressed if a chain like this just passed into the British culture and became something our dc's see as normal.

Fucking hell there's enough pressure on girls today to be pretty, thin, sexy.

I didn't know much about this company until recently as I didn't need to (thankfully). However, I do remember seeing a guy walking down the street with his young daughter a few years ago and he was wearing a Hooters t-shirt. I remember thinking then that that was really inappropriate to wear in front of your daughter.

I find the whole idea of a restaurant in which only women are employed as waitresses because of their physical attributes and where the whole concept is based on their breasts quite abhorrent. It is an insidious way of bringing sexism back to the mainstream and reducing women to nothing more than a body part.

In Bristol, it seems many people have fallen for rhetoric of empowerment. I've had a few girls/women tell me that it's irony, didn't I know! As far as I can see, the joke is on them.

I, too, would never take any children of mine to a place like this and find it strange that people would. The whole USP of the place are the breasts of the serving staff and I wouldn't want kids of mine taken to a place where that's what women were reduced to.

@Elephantsandmiasmas - how about this place?

Can't imagine many people wanting to take their kids there or men seeing this "as just a laugh".

And at the Council meeting last Tuesday, a protestor read a statement in which he talked about a fictional restaurant called "The Nutsack" and how a perfectly good waiter hadn't been able to get a job there. He was interrupted by the mayor and asked to keep it decent yet all the way through the meeting so far there had been references to 'hooters' and 'breasts'! It's ok to use slang words about women's body parts but not men's apparently!

How hideous. I know Bristol, where is the site?

Without wishing to sound too Daily Express, M&S has really gone down the pan lately. Recent personal experience has been really bad - their customer care was appalling. So it really doesn't surprise me that they have flogged their site to the highest bidder. Smacks of either greed or desperation.

oh that Dongers link it brilliant.
The bit where the waiter leans over and his cock slaps into the male customer's face....

Where is it going to be? Or not, as the case may be!

Have signed....perhaps we should protest?

Err the website you linked to with the childrens party is Motifake - the largest site for fake motivational posters - so not they dont do childrens parties - geez!

As you can probably tell Im not that fussed, I dont think its any worse than having an ann summers or pole dancing club on the high street.

At the licence committee hearing, the lawyer for the company stressed that they would be catering for children's parties and that the only entertainment on offer might be the girls doing a bit of cheerleading type dancing. The lawyer then went to list all the "wholesome" things on the children's menu.

He didn't mention anything about the bikini contests etc.

The site is just off Millenium Square, near @Bristol, opposite the Art Gallery, Pizza Express, and inbetween next to The Living Room, and Costa Coffee.

Ann Summers does not market itself as family friendly...and I can't imagine anyone on this thread agrees with the vast numbers of pole dancing clubs.

So, what happens after 9pm, I wonder?

Birmingham one closed down years ago......pretty tacky as I recall...

Shame on you M&S. Is the UK going back to the seventies in the way that we treat women?

My family spend a lot of money with M&S each month but I would boycott them over this. Disgraceful.

How can a restaurant which essentially calls itself 'Tits' and markets itself around an experience of scantily clad girls genuinely be called a 'family-friendly' restaurant? I think that's the most worrying thing about this proposal.

So is there somewhere online where you can see licensing applications?

Hi Sethstarkaddersmum
I think you just need to keep an eye on your local licensing applications. The other name that the company is using is Bubo or something like that. But look out for anything marketing itself as an American style sports cafe showing sports footage on tv screens and things like that. It'll be a Hooters!

Bubo? That's pretty clever actually - bubo = Latin for owl; it also = Latin for a glandular swelling!

I think a protest of the Mother and Baby type may be just enough to get on the front cover of the Evening post.

I think they should have used an English name such as Knockers, Boobs or indeed, Bristols.

I wonder what would happen if those of us of a certain age, with bodies that shouldn't really be seen uncovered in public, all went along and applied for jobs there?

It's a bit of fun for god's sake. As others have said it is very tame, and by the way, there are men that work there, and there are some over-weight waiting staff. And it's totally ignorant to say that they all have big boobs, from what I have seen there is a huge variation in breast size. Do me a favour and go check it out for yourself before signing a petition against it. Most of the info on this thread is completely inaccurate. It's a fun place to eat! If you have a problem, then let it be your problem, there are some people who are actually rather excited about a new Hooters opening! (sets off to write a letter of support to M&S).

A bit of fun?

Read this

And this snippet is especially revealing:

"Employee handbook requirements
An older version of the Hooters Employee Handbook (prior to October 2006), published in The Smoking Gun reads:[18] which notes that:

Customers can go to many places for wings and beer, but it is our Hooters Girls who make our concept unique. Hooters offers its customers the look of the "All American Cheerleader, Surfer, Girl Next Door."
Female employees are required to sign that they "acknowledge and affirm" the following:

1.My job duties require I wear the designated Hooters Girl uniform.
2.My job duties require that I interact with and entertain the customers.
3.The Hooters concept is based on female sex appeal and the work environment is one in which joking and entertaining conversations are commonplace.
4.I do not find my job duties, uniform requirements, or work environment to be offensive, intimidating, hostile, or unwelcome."

And you think this is tame? I hate to think what you would consider to be acceptable.

Yes and it clearly states its the older version. Find a current one and we'll talk.

But there's no evidence on their website that anything has changed!

BRISTOL woman 0 you need to get in touch with Object i think

also a poster on here called orangina and some otherssuccessfully opposed a tittybar opening in london..i have her email if youcontact me