What a bizarre place. Everything about Gino's screams "dive," but the prices are "swanky SF cocktail lounge." I was prepared for a serious dive experience. The imposing steel doors and windowless façade set the stage for a dark and stripped down interior. There is no refrigeration for the beer, which sits in ice buckets behind the bar. There is no soda gun, so the cans of juice and mixer sit warm under the bar. There is a very small selection of liquor, and most of the bottles appeared to be unopened and had no pour tips on them. There were maybe 3 or 4 regulars sitting around watching the ball game on an old TV, who all turned in unison when we walked into the place. Like I said, it just screams "dive." As a huge fan of dives, diners, and drive ins, I was stoked. I ordered a whiskey and coke, and the bartender asked what kind, and I said "cheapest." Figured that would be a safe bet in a place like this. She seemed really confused, and asked for my ID. So I showed her my California Drivers License, and she kept flipping it over and said, "this looks funny. What are you, from Arizona or something?" Uh, no lady, it says "California" in big letters across the top, and it happens to be the state where we are located, so maybe you should recognize it? She eventually accepted it, and walked over to the rack where the whiskey is kept. She picked up a Crown Royal bottle, examined it, put it back. Same with the Jack Daniels. Then she landed on the Jamesons, sort of shrugged, and decided that was the winner. She carefully measured one shot out in a jigger and rang me up for $9. WTF? If she had poured me some rotgut bottom shelf whiskey in a dirty glass and charged me $3, I would have given this place 5 stars and extolled it as a one-of-a-kind dive, but at those prices and given the bartender's strange behavior, it leaves me to wonder if this place is just a drug front.
Review Source:I would give this review zero stars, if that was possible on Yelp. Â My horrible experience at the bar is just like some other reviewer's experiences here. A group of us stopped into Gino's last night after going bowling at Serra Bowl. Â They totally gouged us for the drinks! Â They charged one of my friends FOURTEEN dollars for a rum and pineapple juice. She refused to pay it, so they lowered the price to $10!
They charged me TEN dollars for a vodka/soda. Â They charged all of us $10 for our well drinks. Â We felt totally unwelcome at this bar. Â I would bet a million dollars that they were not charging the regulars in that bar even half of what they charged us for drinks. Â So we sucked down our drinks in a hurry and left. Â We ended up driving a little further and going to the "broken record" for more drinks, where we were charged the typical dive bar price of $5 for our cocktails. Lesson learned. Be forewarned.
SUPER bizarre experience. Â
Read the good review from Nancy who is a client and friend of mine and were at the Bowling Alley for a B-day, so decided to swing by for a drink.
Party of 6, $60 bill for ONE DRINK EACH. Â
WTF???
Beers were $10, mixed drinks were $14, but of course only AFTER you ordered. Â Prices weren't listed anywhere, so it was awkward to say the least.
Someone in our party actually REFUSED to pay $14 for her mixed drink so they were *gracious* and charged her $10 instead.
All the women in the bar were wearing revealing clothing that made me wonder if there was some kind of sex trade going on there--I don't say this as a slam, it really seemed that way. Â Tables with groups of 3-4 men and then one woman, wearing a super short spandex skirt, low cut blouse covered in bedazzling, who kept leaning forward and touching the men...we didn't stay long enough to notice if and who the women left with.
There were no *normal* looking people in the bar--just *Johns* and *hooker* types and ALL the ladies (save for our group) were dressed like they were going clubbing @ Ruby Skye.
The bar was was exclusively Latino, so maybe because we were all white, we were fronting the money to run the place?
The ONLY good thing I'll say about it is that when we came in 10 min after the rest of our group, we were offered chairs. Â That was decent, but presumably they just wanted to make us feel at home so we'd keep buying drinks!
I've had this same thing happen in Korean Karaoke bars in the Richmond and Tenderloin, and also when traveling abroad in India, South America and Africa.
I've come to think of it as *white people tax*.
Never again.
SF dive bar lovers better make a pilgrimage to DC, because Gino's is the real deal -- Â not like those poser bars filled with tatooed hipsters who think they're Charles Bukowski. We wandered inside to seek refuge after wandering thru Daly City on an unsuccessful quest for a cab, after faulty planning landed us at the wrong bowling alley for Lebowski fest.
The bartenders here are friendly, hot, curvaceous Latin mamas who do shots with the customers and dance to some reggaeton. I was able to practice my hybrid Italian-Spanish (Itanish? Spalian?), be serenaded by mariachis, catch up on my Telemundo, and drink a very strong gin martini, with the full knowledge that I would follow it up with White Russians at a bowling alley. May explain why I don't feel so good today.
We eventually made it to Lebowski fest, at the heartbreak of our new best friend at the bar who wanted to buy us drinks all night. I'm not sure what team he was batting for, because I don't know if he was hitting on me or my friend. But what a great diversion that made our adventures in foggy Daly City all that more entertaining.
Don't judge a book by it's cover.
From the outside, Gino's Club says old school bar and cocktail lounge circa 1957. You'd probably expect a similar clientele to that of Globe Tavern down the street, Â grey hair, older whipper shnapper types, some real fogtown og's. But no!
Fast forward to 2009, Gino's is a different type of dive. Now it serves beers and cocktails to the hardworking Latino blue collars who come here to drink their blues away after they probably sent a good portion of their cash back home. You'll probably here a couple of "Ay yay yayyyy!" in between some of the tuba bass from the blastin' ranchero music.
Now if you never been to a Mexican bar, they are a little bit different. The waitresses are there to socialize and may be a little bit older but they still rock that Telemundo swag.
They pretty much stock all the Mexican beers as well as Bud. It's friendly table service so tip the staff well.
I like it here because they got some of that ice cold Negra Modelo!
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