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The inclusive sports bar is expected to open in the spring of 2025 at the former site of Banter in Detroit-Shoreway.
CLEVELAND — With reports saying Cleveland will be the newest city to have a WNBA franchise, the timing couldn’t be better for The W Sports Bar, which is opening soon in Gordon Square.
Serendipitously, female-focused sports bar co-owners Shelley Pippen, Cassy Kopp, and Ally Eclarin are paying homage to Cleveland’s flagship women’s professional basketball team, the Rockers, who held court in the land from 1997-2003.
“The logo and the whole colors were very much inspired by the Cleveland Rockers,” Eclarin told 3News Monday, while seated at a booth in the space they’re about to transform. “We wanted it to feel very current nostalgia — to borrow from Dua Lipa, ‘Future Nostalgia.'”
For these ladies, opening The W Sports Bar is about creating the kind of space they’ve always wanted to hang out in.
“I played sports my whole life, so for me, the ability to play sports and the lessons that you learn and the relationships that you form are invaluable,” Pippen said, seated next to Eclarin. “So to be able to provide spaces and places where people can then continue the camaraderie that comes with sports is an amazing thing.”
“Being someone who’s very much a champion for equality and equity,” Elcarin added. “I’ve always wanted to have spaces where people can root for women’s sports or also just be a woman who likes sports.
“I’ve always been that friend that was like, ‘Hey, this is cool that you liked insert-men’s-sport or insert-game here, but there’s also this really cool game going on. You know, the college game or WNBA or NWSL.’ So that’s always kind of been who I am, and I’ve just loved it since I can remember.
The W Sports Bar isn’t just for women who love women’s sports. It’s also for women who love men’s sports, and men who love both.
“I think 43% of the women’s sports fan base is men, so this isn’t a place that’s meant to be exclusionary in any way,” Pippen said. “It’s a place to celebrate sports of all kinds, and women’s sports because it hasn’t been having a light shined on it in our hospitality industry in the way that men’s sports have been.”
While The W Sports Bar is a bar for everyone who has always loved sports bars, patrons shouldn’t expect the same experience they’re used to.
“It’s going to be a totally different experience,” Eclarin said.
“Like, we heard from folks they don’t want to sit over their plate with a fork and knife because the action’s on the TV,” Pippen said. “So we’re thinking through how we deliver on that.”
Pippen, Eclarin, and Kopp hope to open their doors at 5428 Detroit Avenue (the former home of Banter) to fans of all types of games this spring.
