Dress code in bars and clubs

In this country our bars and clubs rip us off left right and centre with the cost of drinks or admission fees.  To add insult to injury many of these places are now starting to insist on a dress code before you can even get through the door.

In the town where I live we have two weekend late-night drinking establishments. The one most people prefer to frequent is a modern, bright, fairly expensive wine bar with a resident DJ. On a Saturday night people looking for somewhere to continue enjoying their night out start queuing at 10.30 in order to ensure that they gain entrance.

This establishment however, has a rather strict dress code, jeans and trainers not being considered suitable attire.
Several times I have queued up with friends only to have the slightly stroppy bouncer deny entry to some of them for the sin of wearing, shock horror, JEANS and TRAINERS!

'Denim is denim - whatever the colour'

And there is no reprieve for white jeans, chinos or whatever you like to call them (denim is denim whatever the colour or label) or any trainers that resemble “normal shoes” but are in fact not as they are made of fabric not shiny leather or leather effect plastic.

So what makes this form of dress offensive? I take it that it isn’t because the wearer is deemed to poor to drink in the establishment as he can only afford jeans and trainers to wear because everyone knows that a decent pair of jeans and trainers costs quite a lot of money. Maybe the management assume that the wearing of these items turns the normally mild mannered person into a beer swilling trouble maker who has nothing better to do than start a fight and wreck the establishment. Most of my friends spend all week working in offices dressed in “proper” trousers and shoes and prefer to spend their weekends in less formal clothes, maybe it is time that bars and nightclubs stopped being so snobby about dress.