by Debbi | Feb 18, 2011 | Cool Stuff, Newsworthy, Off the Wall
So, the other day I was checking out our Google Analytics info, which I don't do nearly as frequently as I should, mostly because I haven't taken the time to really understand why it's so important.
I found a reason: you never know who might be talking about you on the internets.
I noticed a large number (okay, 30 or so) of visits coming from Forbes. Yes, that Forbes- the site with "information for the world's business leaders." Why in the world would Forbes be directing people to a tiny little bar in Kansas' website?
I followed the link and found a blog about webcams– and more specifically, why webcams are a voyeur's delight.
The article was really a warning to people who have webcams that really aren't intended to be public- like a security camera for a jewelry store- and the author wrote about how easy it is for someone to find public webcams and potentially rob your store.
At the end of the blog, the author concedes that some places actually want people to watch their webcams- and mentions a little bar in Lawrence, Kansas, called the Sandbar. And, of course, includes a link to our webcam.
Pretty cool that we ended up mentioned in an article on Forbes!
by Debbi | Dec 8, 2010 | Newsworthy
The University Daily Kansan recently had a "Top of the Hill" contest where students voted on their favorite bars, restaurants, shopping and other places around town. We were very excited to find out that we won third place in the "best overall bar" category!
According to the paper, we got 10% of the total vote in the overall bar category. First and second place went to more obviously student-oriented bars The Hawk and Quinton's.
I would link to the article, but the best I can find is a link to the PDF version of the Top of the Hill edition. Download if you want.
An interesting tidbit about our relationship with the Kansan- our ad sales rep this semester is Andrew's high school buddy Matt, who accompanied us on the awesome Orange Bowl trip (and not-so-awesome return trip) nearly three years ago.
by Debbi | Nov 15, 2010 | Newsworthy, Ottawa, Sandbar Subs
The Lawrence Journal-World featured an article the other day about Lawrence businesses expanding outside of Lawrence. Many prominent businesses were profiled, like Johnny’s, Quinton’s and and Ingredient, who have all taken their concept and opened additional restaurants in Kansas City and other places.
We were surprised to see our name mentioned in the article, too! A long time ago, we talked about opening more Sandbars outside of Lawrence. Peach opened one in Ottawa, but then decided to go in a different direction and open sandwich shops instead, calling them Sandbar Sub Shop.
Since she opened the first one several years ago, she’s begun a partnership with the folks at Zarco66 that has included opening Sub Shops inside their gas stations. So far, two franchise locations are open- one in Lawrence on East 23rd Street and the other in Ottawa- and a third one is set to open on 6th Street in Lawrence soon.
It’s fun and exciting to expand a business and take it in a different direction! But don’t worry, we aren’t changing anything about the original Sandbar in downtown Lawrence. Except maybe adding more stuff to our walls.
Read the full LJW article here.
Read past stories about Sandbar Subs here.
by Debbi | Oct 5, 2010 | Cool Stuff, Newsworthy, Social Media
Using one of my favorite new tools for finding mentions of The Sandbar online (www.socialmention.com), I discovered a fun blog post written by an anonymous guy here in Lawrence that happens to mention our bar.
Jum (no idea if that's his real name, nickname or just something random he calls himself online so he can stay anonymous) made a sort-of Top 5 list of fictional bars that would be interesting to drink in. Sort-of, because there are six bars, not five. They're all bars you're familiar with from TV shows or movies.
The Sandbar is mentioned in #2, McLaren's from "How I Met Your Mother." This is a show I've never watched, I'm embarrassed to say, but I might have to tune in now just to check out their hangout.
Here's a little bit of what Jum had to say:
Music scene: TBD. The jukebox doesn't seem to get much play at McLaren's, but it seems like the kind of place where if you fired up some Neil Diamond or some Journey, within seconds, everyone would be cheers'ing each other and singing along. Very similar to the Sandbar here in Lawrence in that by the end of the night, you can conceivably be friends with almost every patron in the bar because of its cozy, intimate layout.
We think his description of The Sandbar is right on. Check out the full blog post here, and leave him a comment to let him know what you think. Who knows, maybe he'll talk about The Sandbar again- or even better, reveal himself to us!
by Debbi | Apr 13, 2010 | Newsworthy
If you subscribe to the Lawrence Journal-World, or read it online, you might have seen this little article about businesses and social media. It was actually on the front page of the print edition on Sunday!
The reporter called me last week and asked a bunch of questions about what we do and how we do it, with regard to social media. I thought I'd share some of that information here, since news articles always get cut short due to space.
We've had a website for lots of years, along with our famous webcam. Lots of funny stuff happens at The Sandbar, and we started joking about how someday we should write a book. I started learning and hearing about blogs, and eventually decided that if we were serious about a future book, it would be much easier to start small.
This blog was born in September, 2006. As of right now, there are 820 posts- a few are saved drafts, but most of those are published. That's a lot of stories. I don't know if they'll ever be compiled into an actual book, but they'll live on for eternity right here.
When I researched where to set up the blog, lots of people recommended MySpace. Remember, it was the hot thing at the time. I didn't want the blog to be on a site where people had to be members in order to read it, but I decided it would be fun to have a Sandbar MySpace page. We don't do much with that page these days- sorry to those of you who still play there.
We're also big fans of videos. Our indoor hurricane began in 2002, and we've uploaded videos to YouTube for several years. Most of our videos were uploaded to my personal account (since I didn't know any better at the time), but now we also have an official Sandbar YouTube channel.
Once I got a little bored with MySpace, Facebook started to hit my radar and I decided to set up a Sandbar page. Only I did it wrong. I didn't have a personal Facebook account at the time and had no idea how it worked, so I ended up creating a profile that people "friended." This is actually against Facebook's Terms of Service, as businesses should have fan pages, not profiles, and people should become fans, not friends. I figured that out, recreated a Sandbar fan page, and here we are.
Then, Twitter. We joined this micro-blogging site a little over a year ago. It's a nice compliment to the other social media efforts we've made, and Twitter has allowed us to reach out to new people and the community in ways that Facebook or MySpace don't. You can follow us here.
That's a little bit about how our business started down the path of social media. It's been fun to learn and we hope our fans enjoy our efforts!
by Debbi | Feb 20, 2010 | Cool Stuff, Newsworthy, People
Peach brought us a copy of the Baldwin City Signal- it featured a picture of one of our Sandbar friends!
Check out this snow sculpture (and try to ignore the horribly crooked scan):
The caption reads:
Scott Schoenberger had a little time on his hands Friday and plenty of snow to create this snow sculpture of a shark. He even took time to don fishing gear for a picture.
It should come as absolutely no surprise to anyone that we know this guy.
Scott is famous around The Sandbar. He sang lead vocals on our original Hurricane song, a re-worded version of Copa Cabana that we recorded in a local studio. (Does anyone remember that version?) He's also a popular character on many of our St. Patrick's Day Parade floats. Many guys don't like to dance, but not Showtime. He lives up to his name and puts on a show.
Very creative use of the few inches of snow in his yard. Nice job, Showtime!
