One of Portland’s Essential and Longest Standing Gay Bars Will Close This Weekend

One of Portland’s quintessential gay clubs will close October 11. CC Slaughters, which has stood as a destination for Portland’s queer community for 39 years, announced its impending closure on social media yesterday. “Unfortunately 2020 has been very hard on small businesses everywhere and we are no exception to the hard times we all are experiencing,” the post says. “We hope we can open our doors again to you (our family) sometime in the future, but until then, please be safe, practice social distancing, and take care.”

With its storied history and vibrant energy, CC Slaughters is one of the city’s few gay clubs, as opposed to the more relaxed gay bars or full-time strip clubs; it became an entry point and hub for many young queer Portlanders. After the closure of Embers in 2017, it remained one of the west side’s largest LGBTQ+ bars.

CC Slaughters, like many other bars and clubs in the Portland area, shut down in March in response to the coronavirus pandemic; three months later, it opened with reduced capacity. In September, owner Bruce Rice told the Oregonian that business was down about 80 percent, and the club’s Paycheck Protection Program funding was about to run out. “I see businesses all around me closing right now,” he told the paper. “If the government doesn’t come up with something else, then I really think a lot more are going to close. I might be one of those.”

• CC Slaughters [Official]
• CC Slaughters [Facebook]
• Oregon small businesses brace for brutal fall as federal coronavirus relief money runs out [O]