NEW TEMPORARY LOCATION

Last Headliner till OCTOBER

Join us the month of August for

LAST COMIC SITTING

THURSDAY ONLY

A letter to Our Friends and & Supporters of Donnie B’s Funny Bone:

            Here we go again, after 2 ½ years in the City of Bloomington and after 1 year at the Castle Theater, Heartland Bank has asked us to move out of the property because they are having their sheriff’s sale on the 25^th.  Even though there is a little to no chance of someone purchasing the property the building can not be occupied due to whoever purchases the property will take possession that day.  The bank feels that by having a tenant in the building it will detour potential buyers.  Because of this, as you can see on the webpage, our next show which is on June 21^st will be held at Fat Jack’s.  This is a temporary location and with it being summer time we only have 1 show on Thursday’s.  Our comedians are still the top of the line high quality comedians that we have on the weekends, the comedian performs on the following Friday and Saturday at our Springfield location.  People have asked me what are plans are, we have 2 options that we are looking at:  We are looking at going into a business, bar, hotel, etc that has a room at least 3500 square feet and bathrooms.  There needs to be ample space to accommodate crowds of 200 plus and a parking lot that will hold at least 100 cars if not more.  The other option that we are exploring is to rent on our own, instead of with an existing business, in a high traffic area with ample parking. These are our only options: 1. to share an existing business or 2. Have own our business with our own bar.  You may e-mail me at donniebs@aol.com with any suggestions, any ideas, and so forth.  Despite that lack of attendance since moving to The Castle we appreciate those who did attend and hope that you will continue to support us through the summer so when we come back in the fall we can come back full blast to start our 3^rd year.  It has been an up hill battle but we do believe that Bloomington/Normal has a market for top quality comedians.  We always book the top touring comedians in the country; we don’t bring in comedians that are of B and C quality.  Any question or comments you may e-mail us at donniebs@aol.com.  Again, thank you for your support. 

Don Bassford

Owner/Operator

Donnie B’s Funny Bone

P.S.  I would like to Thank – The Loft, Elroy’s, Daddio’s, ShowMe’s and etc for their support this past year plus all college and regular customers.

Here are answers to questions that we have received over the past couple of days:

1.                  Do you want to stay in Bloomington/Normal?

Yes we do, we feel that there is a market.  We have some support and feel that it will grow if we get the right location.  We have invested tens of thousands of dollars in this city and feel that we can make it work. 

2.                  Why did you leave Brandtville?

We left Brandtville because of the continuous, for almost 5 months, problems of gang activity, drugs and violence going on at The Park/CITY.  The landlord did nothing to help protect us after numerous requests from us.  There was shots fired in the air in the parking lot with an assault weapon in April; we had to move for the safety of our patrons and employees. 

3.                  What made you choose The Castle?

After the weapons being discharged in the parking lot of Brandtville we knew for the safety of our employees and patrons we had to move, so gave our Landlord a 30 day notice.  By word of month, in a weeks time, Mr. Slotky had heard of our situation and came forward as a night in shining armor.  We signed a 2 year lease with him to co-exist in this building with him to compliment what he was doing.  Little did we know that he was missing payments to the bank and was in debt a whole lot more than he could afford.  We think that he thought we would be the goose who laid the golden egg to help him out with his financial problems but when you are so in debt, there is very little that people can do.  Had he been honest with us in the beginning and informed us of the situation then we would have not have moved there.  We don’t want to keep moving around, people have suggested why don’t you buy a place, well being new in town you just don’t go out a buy property you have to see how the market is.  Matter of fact at Brandville we had a 15 year lease but because of the violence and the drug use among other things it was not in our best interest to stay there in case someone got hurt. 

4.                  Is anyone a winner with The Castle?

I would say that if anyone is a winner it is Ben Slotky, who took us for tens of thousands of dollars, misled us, we didn’t know his financial situation and loaned him lots of money and then he filed bankruptcy against us.  The bank is going to lose hundreds of thousands of dollars but I have been told by word of mouth that Mr. Slotky is involved with the upper floors of The Castle when he filed bankruptcy on the 1^st floor.  The City of Bloomington lost a half million dollars.  The other winner would be upper floors which received $200,000 of new windows that tax dollars paid for. 

5.                  What kind of building are you looking for?

We are looking for a place that will have a bar in it, so we would need at least 6500 to 7000 square feet that we could rent.  The other option would be a restaurant, hotel, bar/tavern with a room with 3500 square feet with ample bathrooms that they would share with us and receive revenue from Liquor sales.

6.                  How do we get a hold of you for ideas or suggestions?

E-mail me at:  donniebs@aol.com

7.                  Do you really think Bloomington/Normal would support you?

Yes, before we moved out of Brandtville we spent tens of thousands of dollars in advertising and had a good business but because of the problems down the hall at The Park/CITY attendance started to deteriorate, because people feared for their safety.  When police officers are outside of the building 14 weekends out of 15 weekends it pretty much scares off your business. 

8.                  Why are there only shows on Thursday’s?

Summer time is when most people are outside on weekends.  There are a lot of comedy clubs that close during the summer but our Thursday nights have been decent and we want to continue to bring comedy even if it is just during the summer.

9.                  When do you plan on going back to full weekend shows?

Once we find a location we will announce that later.  We would like to do so by September or October.

10.              Do you regret coming to Bloomington?

Everything in life is a challenge and even sometimes a battle.  I admit that it has been much harder in Bloomington than we thought it would be, but 90% of the problems that we faced were not directly caused by us.  We just happened to be at the wrong place at the wrong time, but we have faith in the people of Bloomington/Normal that if we get it together they will support us. 

2001-2006 Funny Bone Comedy Club