Bar Rescue - Frankie T's (Freaki Tiki) Update

On tonight's episode of Bar Rescue, Jon Taffer and crew are in Clearwater, Florida to try to rescue Freaki Tiki.  Freaki Tiki is a tiki bar that was once grossing $1 million a year, but is now supposedly losing $6,500 a month.  The owner is neglectful and the bar is in need of many repairs.  Also a used condom is found in the bar while Bar Rescue is there.

During the Bar Rescue makeover, Freaki Tiki was renamed to Frankie T's, and they have somewhat kept the new bar name, but it seems they are going with Frankie T's Dive Bar now. Let's take a look at some information, reviews, and updates for Frankie T's since Bar Rescue came and made all of the changes to the bar (All reviews are post-Bar Rescue):

Reviews:

• There are not too many reviews, but here are some from Facebook, 
• A Yelp review talks about the plumbing issues that are apparently not fixed - "I went to the restroom which wasn't sparkling but not bad either. When I flushed the toilet I noticed it didn't flush, so I held down the handle and it started to swirl but then I heard the other two or three toilets start to bubble. That tells me they have major plumbing issues that they're ignoring."

Other News and Links:

• The Bar Rescue makeover happened in December 2015.
• Here are two preview videos of the episode from the Spike TV website - Video 1, Video 2
• Here is the Frankie T's website and here is the Freaki Tiki website, which is still live.
• Here is the Frankie T's Facebook Page and the old Freaki Tiki Facebook page.
• By looking at their Facebook Page, the bar name went from Frankie T's A Sporting Bar to Frankie T's Drinkery, and it is currently Frankie T's Dive Bar.
• Here are the Facebook pages of the owners Frank, Shawn, and Woody.
• The Frankie T's Facebook page posted this after seeing the episode description/preview of the episode: "Jon Taffer is no stranger to finding rats, roaches, and raccoons inside the bars he rescues. But his discovery of a used condom at this rundown Florida tiki bar redefines owner neglect. Owner neglect? Cleaning crew comes through 5 nights a week, sweeping and mopping behind bar, so if you buy this I have some swamp property for sale, cheap in the everglades. Join us Sunday for the TRUE story with question and answer session after the episode.. Dance party after with Matt the Bratt. Come party with us. LOL."
• The description of the bar on its Yelp page says, "We were formerly the Freaki Tiki Bar, Jon Taffer of Bar Rescue came in Dec/2015 and made us a "Sporting Bar" the concept didn't take, so we are now Frankie T's Dive Bar. An upper scale "Dive Bar' with nautical theme, Great Food and awesome drink specials. We are a full liquor bar, live music every Wed. 730 pm til 1030 pm and DJ spinning on Friday and Saturday nights."
• There is some discussion on the Facebook Page of a security guard from the bar and it says "Lets just say i wish i would of been in the islands during his visit but couldn't bail on Woody n Frank...We all took his scripted show n staged bullshit like men....It wasn't pretty..."  Followed by someone asking, "Holy crap...they script that abuse?" and Frankie T's responding, "No, but they "lead you" lets say"
• On Woody's Facebook page, he seems very disappointed in how he acted for the show and says things such as, "was so mad head was spinning and first time in my entire life I was speechless, we all are disappointed in how we were not true to ourselves because of cameras SUCKS"
• He also replied to someone, "maybe you can come visist me when I'm in jail out there for flying out to kill some reality tv star, LOL"
• Woody's review of Frankie T's on Facebook says, "The rebranding after the mediocre job Jon Taffer and Bar Rescue attempted is AWESOME. You should check it out!!!"

Conclusion:

Frankie T's has somewhat kept the name, but they have ditched the concept installed by Jon Taffer and Bar Rescue.  They now go by Frankie T's Dive Bar and are marketing themselves as "an upper scale dive bar with a nautical theme."  The bar doesn't have too many reviews but apparently there are still plumbing problems at the bar.

The owners of the bar(especially Woody) seem to have some bad things to say about Jon Taffer and Bar Rescue.  They are not happy with how they acted for the show and say they did it for the cameras.  They also deny that the condom found in the bar was due to their negligence.  Apparently they may come out with more information after the show airs, so if anything of interest comes up, I will update this post.

UPDATE - Frankie T's closed in February 2017 - Info on closure.

*To see how all of the bars from Bar Rescue are doing, go to the Bar Rescue Update page, and also Like us on Facebook or Follow Us on Twitter to stay up to date with all things involving Bar Rescue.