Sara Yergovich, left, and Danielle Thoe, who hope to open Rikki’s Bar, a women’s sports bar, in San Francisco, wear new shirts for their bar on Thursday as they stand for a portrait at Rikki Streicher Field in San Francisco. Rikki’s is named in honor of Rikki Streicher, San Francisco business owner, leader in San Francisco LGBT movement and a creator of the Federation of Gay Games.
Lea Suzuki/The Chronicle
Sara Yergovich, left, and Danielle Thoe, who hope to open Rikki’s Bar, a women’s sports bar, in San Francisco, stand for a portrait on Thursday at Rikki Streicher Field in San Francisco. Rikki’s is named in honor of Rikki Streicher, San Francisco business owner, leader in San Francisco LGBT movement and a creator of the Federation of Gay Games.
Lea Suzuki/The Chronicle
Sara Yergovich, left, and Danielle Thoe, who hope to open Rikki’s Bar, a women’s sports bar, in San Francisco, stand for a portrait on Thursday at Rikki Streicher Field in San Francisco. Rikki’s is named in honor of Rikki Streicher, San Francisco business owner, leader in San Francisco LGBT movement and a creator of the Federation of Gay Games.
Lea Suzuki/The Chronicle
Danielle Thoe and Sara Yergovich had the same experience too many times. They wanted to watch a WNBA or NWSL game somewhere, and many bars weren’t accommodating. When Bay FC began play this year and they struggled to find sports bars that would play the games or turn on the volume, they knew there was a need for the type of space they already had been discussing.
Conversations after their soccer club games took a turn toward serious about a year ago, as they started asking themselves: Why couldn’t they be the ones to bring a bar focused on women’s sports to the Bay Area? At first, they kept waiting for someone else to do it. Women’s sports bars popped up in Seattle, Minnesota, Long Beach and Omaha, Neb., but with two expansion clubs — Bay FC and the WNBA’s Valkyries — awarded to the Bay Area, a designated spot had yet to appear.
They decided they’d do it themselves. On Friday, Thoe and Yergovich announced the brand launch of Rikki’s Bar, which would become the first women’s sports bar in the Bay Area. They’re hoping to open by early 2025 if everything goes off without a hitch.
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“Sometimes we would be somewhere to watch the NWSL and it would feel like we’re taking up their TVs,” Thoe said. “So we thought, why can’t we be the ones to do this?”
The two started a campaign on WeFunder on Friday that is open for public investment. Since January 2023, at least six women’s sports bars have opened in the U.S. Named after San Francisco’s own Rikki Streicher, Rikki’s honors the founder of what is now known as the Gay Games who also built two renowned queer bars in San Francisco, Maud’s and Amelia’s.
The trend of women’s sports bars in the country has been tied to the resurgence of lesbian bars nationally, with more than a dozen opening since the end of 2022. The Sports Bra in Portland, considered the first women’s sports bar in the U.S., initially was a lesbian bar. San Francisco gained a lesbian bar in Mother last year.
The name is a way Thoe and Yergovich want to signal to members of the large queer sports fan demographic that the bar will center them in a way that hasn’t existed in the Bay Area. Hi-Tops in the Castro is a gay sports bar, but focuses on a male audience; the sports on TV are overwhelmingly men’s sports. There hasn’t been a place in the Bay Area for queer women to enjoy women’s sports.
“Women’s sports have historically been pretty queer,” Yergovich said. “The tide is changing a bit with women’s sports being more mainstream, and that accessibility and entry is great. But also we want to hold on to that queer history as well and make sure that people know about it.”
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Rikki’s doesn’t have a location yet, but Thoe is looking for somewhere between the Castro and the Mission, where lesbian bars Jolene’s and Mother are popular. They need around $550,000 in capital in addition to the private funding they’ve already raised.
Once that money is raised, Thoe and Yergovich know they want a space around 3,000 square feet that previously had been a bar or restaurant. They still need to sign a lease, make improvements and add TVs and sound systems. And they have to get a liquor license. Though the two expect their application for the license to be ready in a couple of months, wait times in San Francisco can be up to six months, which could make an opening date later than early 2025.
Thoe left her job as a real-estate professional to focus on Rikki’s full-time. Yergovich has worked in marketing and customer service, and the two are hoping their mix of experience will be a good fit.
Their advisory team includes Anchor SF CEO Bobby Dunn, 2019 Food and Wine Magazine Sommelier of the Year winner Vinny Eng, Netflix “Drink Masters” contestant and cocktail-bar entrepreneur Chris Suzuki, and design consultant Amelie Au.
Both Thoe’s and Yergovich’s lives have centered around sports for as long as they can remember. Yergovich remembered going to a St. Mary’s women’s soccer game as a kid and realizing sports can be a profession for women. Thoe grew up in Detroit and seeing former USWNT World Cup player Debbie Belkin coach Michigan women’s soccer in the 1990s connected how close greatness in women’s sports is.
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They both play with the San Francisco Spikes, an LGBT soccer club. Yergovich has been a part of running clubs in the city and played everything from volleyball to softball. She and Thoe want to make Rikki’s a gathering place for queer women’s athletes who play rec sports in the city as well.
Streicher used her bars to sponsor local volleyball, basketball and softball teams. Thoe hopes by honoring the queer history of women’s sports in the Bay Area, they can create a new space for modern women’s sports fans and athletes. Streicher died in 1994 and Streicher’s longtime partner, Mary Sager, died in 2023, but Sager’s partner of the past two decades, Michelle Jester, ran Sager’s estate and gave permission for the bar to use Streicher’s likeness and has donated images and artifacts from her life.
“I’m hoping that there is a real community base of women’s sports fans, and especially queer women, that can gather there and feel like this is our community,” Thoe said. “The Valkyries coming to San Francisco as well, I can’t believe how close they’re going to be and we can rally around them.”
The two partnered with Women’s Sports Takeover, an Instagram account run by Megan Andrews who created gatherings around women’s sports events on TV at places like San Francisco Athletic Club and Standard Deviant Brewing. Before Rikki’s opens, Thoe and Yergovich plan on using that resource to host more watch parties and prime their potential customers for a full-time location.
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“This is meant to be a community space,” Thoe said. “We would love to hear them and connect and like, build the kinds of events that people want to come to.”
Reach Marisa Ingemi: [email protected]; Twitter: @marisa_ingemi
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