The Staar Club lights up Orono nightlife

New bar aims to compete in crowded college scene

By Matt Shaer

Posted on Jan. 28, 2002, at 12:00 a.m.

Garth Brooks once said “I’ve got friends in low places,” but Garth has never been to Orono’s newest low place-the Staar Club.

Located in the basement of the University Inn Academic Suites at the corner of College Avenue and Main Street, the Staar Club opened last Friday with local blues band The Nightcrawlers headlining the bill.

“It’s basically kinda an experiment,” said Tracey Richard, co-owner of the University Inn Academic Suites and the founder of the Staar Club. “I just bought the motel in September, but it seems like everyone who comes in wants the bar open, there was so much feedback, just a huge need to have it open.”

So in November, Richard, with her husband Scott, decided to begin work on opening a bar in the basement of the building.

“We canvassed Orono with a thousand flyers,” Tracey said of the Staar Club’s grand opening advertisement scheme. “And I think the sign outside is my best advertisement.”

But the ambiance of the Staar Club is more likely to draw crowds than any form of advertisements. A cozy, decidedly un-barlike environment, the club is split into three rooms, separated by intricate dividers and a maudlin flowered wallpaper better suited for a nursing home than a bar. Tables and windows that look into nothing at all line the walls of the Staar Club, and the stage, un-elevated, rests towards the rear of the building.

But Richard is the first to admit the interior decorating is not of her own picking.

“[The wallpaper] to me is like a cafe restaurant. But I plan to renovate parts of the bar. I’m taking out the wall between the lounge, changing the wallpaper and I’d like to put in a nice long sitting bar in there.”

Renovations or not, opening night at the Staar Club was a grand affair; dollar drafts abounded, and a good mood reigned over the slightly older crowd in attendance. Upon entering the University Inn a group of giddy workers directed patrons down a staircase where a green arrow points toward the bar area.

The University Academic Suites, formerly the University Motor Lodge, was bought by Tracey and Scott Richard in September. Renovations began with a new sign on the Orono landscape and the opening of the Staar Club, but Richard says she’s not going to stop there.

“[The usual customers] at the motel now are parents, professors that come up to lecture, a lot of teens. But we’re looking to get sports teams to come, get some new customers.”

And the opening of the Staar Club, Richard hopes, can only help.

Although the patrons on opening night were predominately an older crowd, Richard remains confident that the Staar Club will attract as many college students as locals.

“I think it’s going to be a real mix,” Richard said, “we had a Bangor policeman, some graduate students, professional businessmen, some fraternity brothers, and the energy was great.”

Richard said that she intended to crack down on under age drinking, a measure that she says will help raise the bars image.

“We’re really strict on carding people,” Richard warned, “and it was interesting on opening night. Groups of college kids would come in, and leave as soon as they realized they couldn’t get in without identification. This is not an underage drinking place, and I think that’s going to eliminate a lot of the riffraff.”

But the Staar Club has some serious competition to deal with. In a small college town already dominated by the three major Orono bars, the Staar Club will be left to carve its own niche out of the established university nightlife.

“I remember when I went to school, you did the loop,” Richard said. “You barhopped, you never stayed in one bar for too long. And I’m right on the strip, fraternity row is right there, so I’m confident.”

The Staar Club is currently open on Fridays and Saturdays from 4-12, although as time goes on, Richard plans to open the bar for more hours.

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