Today we’d like to introduce you to Harold Brinkley.
Hi Harold, we’re thrilled to have a chance to learn your story today. So, before we get into specifics, maybe you can briefly walk us through how you got to where you are today?
I started in the hospitality space unknowingly in the 11th grade back home in East St. Louis, Illinois, which was 22 years ago. I was a party promoter and the first one that I knew of, so I had no mentor or blueprint to follow. My friends and I essentially went to a nightclub owner and asked could we bring our friends to their club and didn’t even think about being compensated. We made flyers in Microsoft Word, printed them on heavy card stock, cut them in fours with a paper cutter, and then handed them out all around the school and put them in everyone’s lockers. Considering we had no competition, it was wildly successful. So much so, even lots of the students that had graduated and went to college even came back! The feeling I got from seeing people have a good time and enjoying something that my friends and I put together became a feeling that I will always find gratifying!
After graduating high school, I moved to Atlanta to attend Morehouse College, where I continued in party promotions. In college, we had a lot of competition, and my partners and I had to make a name for ourselves to be successful. After getting to know the lay of the land my freshman year, I found myself aligned with some other gentlemen in the nightlife space and we joined forces my sophomore year. We were one of the premiere party promotion companies in the Atlanta University Center during my junior and senior years in college, which was 2004-to 2006. We had the benefit of being exposed to the non-collegiate nightlife industry here in Atlanta, which helped us better curate our collegiate nightlife experiences. We also had the luxury of being able to do events at all of the premier venues in Atlanta, including Visions Nightclub, the original and 2nd Club 112, Compound, the original Velvet Room and Club NV. Most of those clubs were owned and operated by arguably the best to ever do it in urban Nightlife, Alex Gidewon.
Nonetheless, after graduating from college in 2006 I continued with my entrepreneurial efforts. My business partner at the time, Anthony Rumph, and I started an internet radio station called Go Click This Radio, which we then rebranded under the name Flavor450.com. We built the original studio in the garage of our townhouse! At the time, it was a very heavy lift, and it was hard to monetize the business. So, I ended up taking a corporate job. The corporate job helped provide a steady source of income and a great work-life balance to be able to continue working on my entrepreneurial endeavors, which was key!
After operating the station for nearly five years, we had a great presence in the local Atlanta market and had a growing global listening base in countries all over the world! We ended up moving our studio and operating out of Robert W. Woodruff Library located in the Atlanta University Center, which a lot of our peers don’t even know! We got a chance to work with a lot big named artists such as Rick Ross, 2 Chainz, Travis Porter, and Jada Kiss just to name a few! Ultimately, we ended up dissolving the radio station in about 2011 and then founded an event marketing and ticketing platform called Eventfast.com. After using Eventbrite for the first time in 2008 and realizing the value add it provided to nightlife, we essentially modeled our business after them, as it was still relatively new to the nightlife industry in the Atlanta market. We planned to use our nightlife relationships all over the country and provide a niche offering in the nightlife space that we could scale outside of Atlanta. We sold over 1400 tickets to an event the first time we used Eventbrite and it was such a value add for so many reasons when compared to collecting money at the door, so it was a no-brainer for us to start our own service for nightlife. We also knew how important it was to collect emails in a nonintrusive manner! Using this service as a promoter was golden for collecting emails for remarketing purposes…and still is! However, at this time VC firms and angel investors weren’t as obvious of a thing as they are today, so after trying to raise capital the hard way and being unsuccessful we dissolved that company also. It’s hard to compete with a giant being undercapitalized! With Eventbrite being our primary competition, it was hard trying to compete as they were backed by the likes of former Paypal founders and executives and more than well capitalized (human capital and cash). Thus, not having access to capital was our downfall…which is another story for another time!
I stayed in the nightlife space after college as a side hustle. However, after becoming a more tenured corporate professional, making more money, and traveling, I started to notice the differences in the quality of nightlife experiences compared to other cities. I also started to notice how homogeneous everything was in the Atlanta market and the lack of options for people that were maybe older, not as attracted to the big nightclub experience and tourist-based bottle service prices. Thus, I started changing my approach to the types of events I hosted. So, I chose to create a niche for more discerning party-goers with a focus on hospitality and experience. There was less competition in this space and plenty of opportunity for growth and scale. As a part of this approach, I sought out venues that were either lesser-known, new, or unattainable for the average party promoter. I also chose venues that had a more elevated design aesthetic and an overall more polished customer service experience compared to your average nightclub in Atlanta. So, the beginning of this new approach really began to take shape in my partnership with NYC-based hospitality company Gerber Group and the former W Hotel Midtown. Tucked away inside the W Hotel Midtown was a very chic lounge called Whiskey Park, and the customer experience was that of which you would expect from famed hospitality and nightlife maverick Randy Gerber. In partnership with Gerber Group, I was able to create a polished and elevated nightlife experience for people that were looking for something different and what I call “age-appropriate” for yuppies (young urban professionals.) I also had a chance to work with the Denver-based hospitality company, The ONE Group, which owns the vibrant eatery STK Steakhouse, and coined the term “Vibe Dining.” I worked with them on the execution of their national large-format Champagne Dinner Party Series called “Magnum Mondays.” In working with The ONE Group, Gerber Group, and being a student of nightlife and hospitality, I started to notice what made these companies, as well as other companies like SBE and TAO/Hakkasan Group so special — which was music, aesthetic, premium experiences, and excellent customer service at the highest level.
However, what I also noticed was how what these groups do in other cities doesn’t translate here in the Atlanta Market as the culture here is unique and those organizations lack cultural fluency in what we call “Atlannuh.” They also mainly hired placeholders and not people that were from and of the nightlife side of the hospitality industry here in Atlanta. Thus, in Atlanta specifically, two areas that they screw up are dress code and musical programming, which are two very important elements that an “elevated” establishment has to get right to avoid “posturing” and coming off as discriminating towards a particular group of people…primarily that being African Americans. Lots of higher-end places try to covertly control the types of clientele they get through musical programming and dress code. But, after a certain point, it’s not even covert…it’s obvious.
So, after a while, I just got fed up with the lack of intentionality and gross dismissal of what makes Atlannuh special. I travel all over the world and have seen high-end concepts embrace hip hop music, reggaeton, R&B, pop, house music, afro beats, etc., and it still is an elevated experience. However, in Atlanta and lots of other southern cities, I’ve just always thought we lagged in being more inclusive with musical programming and allowing expression through fashion without offending someone. Now, to be clear, I’m not saying this is how every place is, as it has gotten better over the years and a lot more places are playing more rhythmic tunes in their establishments, and I’m happy to see it. However, most of these places aren’t “elevated.” I also understand how tricky it is to balance those elements in Atlanta….it is a very difficult thing to do! Places get called out on social media for being racist and discriminating all of the time, and the internet is very unforgiving. So, reputational risk is something you have to consider. But, instead of continuing to be fed up and complaining, I decided to use the relationships and know-how I had acquired through my work with Gerber Group and The ONE Group and be the change I wanted to see… and here we are today talking about my story. Welcome to my Ted Talk…
I’m sure you wouldn’t say it’s been obstacle free, but so far would you say the journey have been a fairly smooth road?
The biggest struggle I have had is being seen for what/who I am and overcoming the perception most non-African American-owned venues have when it comes to working with black promoters. The other issue is overcoming the word “promoter.” It’s such a limited term and I have always been so much more than that. I’m a very dynamic person, and I positioned myself with Gerber and The ONE Group as a branding/marketing consulting agency to give myself more latitude and opportunity to have different types of partnerships and business relationships.
Alright, so let’s switch gears a bit and talk business. What should we know about your work?
I’m a Brand Consultant and event planning expert boasting over 18 years of experience. I have consulted and had partnerships with other lifestyle hospitality groups and luxury spirits and champagne brands such as Gerber Group, The ONE Group, Moet Hennessy USA, GH Mumm, Remy Martin, and Grey Goose. I have helped these clients develop lifestyle event programming which has helped them generate millions of dollars in topline revenue. I also have a finance and regulatory compliance background, with over 15+ years of experience auditing multi-billion dollar banking institutions for the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation.
I have used all of these synergistic experiences to form my own Lifestyle Hospitality company called Juxtapose Hospitality Group, Inc. Juxtapose possesses the industry know-‐how and intimate market knowledge needed to successfully operate within the higher-end of the Atlanta Hospitality/Nightlife space.
With over 15 years of experience in the Atlanta market, I have observed and identified a knowledge gap in the Hospitality Industry. This gap is inherently created due to organizations employing decision-makers and managers that aren’t active participants in the hospitality and nightlife community locally, nationally, or internationally. Thus they lack those deep industry relationships and exposure to culturally enriching opportunities, both of which are essential in developing sustainable programming for establishments in the Atlanta space. So what sets me/us apart is that we get it. We know the difference. I’m most proud of the success of our first brick-and-mortar flagship concept, The James Room, which has been operating under Juxtapose’s ownership and leadership for over two years now, and we plan to be opening more locations soon!
What sort of changes are you expecting over the next 5-10 years?
I see other mega lifestyle hospitality groups moving into the Atlanta area in the next 5-10 years and overall corporatizing the space. As the city evolves and continues to gentrify, it will become easier for these companies to find their footing. Currently, SBE nor TAO operate in Atlanta and I believe it’s because they haven’t quite figured out how to “fit in” here. As a point of reference, STK here in Atlanta does not look like STK in New York, Miami, Las Vegas, etc. It looks like Atlanta and I think those groups may be afraid of having a concept that isn’t congruent with the type of audience they’re used to seeing at their locations in other cities. However, I think the Nobu Hotel and restaurant opening in Buckhead later this year will tell the story of just how the lifestyle hospitality space stands to exist in Atlanta. I’m looking forward to watching it evolve and I hope more independent F&B operators stake their claim in the space before these bigger entities swoop in and gobble up the market. It’s already hard for African American operators to get access to class A commercial retail space and it is not getting any easier. Thus, we have to be more strategic and more heavily vetted than our non-Af-Am counterparts.
Contact Info:
- Email: harold@jhghospitality.com
- Website: www.thejamesroom.com
- Instagram: personal page: @the_choice / business page: @thejamesroom
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/thejamesroombar
Image Credits:
Madelynne Ross Felicia Burzotta Chuckyfoto Brian Winston Fraser
