(keep reading to learn what happened)
Season: 9 | View All Season 9 Episodes
Original Episode Air Date: March 2, 2025
The Bar's Original Name Was: Harbor Lights
Harbor Lights Coastal Sports Bar Address: 434 Pennsylvania Ave, Sheboygan, WI 53081
Episode Recap
Harbor Lights, AKA Harbor Lights Coastal Sports Bar, was a Sheboygan, Wisconsin bar that was featured on Season 9 of Bar Rescue.
Though the Harbor Lights Bar Rescue episode aired in March 2025, the actual filming and visit from Bar Rescue took place before that in September 2024.
It was Season 9 Episode 24 and the episode name was “Lights Out in the Harbor”.
In the second episode of this set of Season 9 bars, Bar Rescue is back in Wisconsin to save another Badger State bar.
Unfortunately, I have to say “Bar Rescue” and not “Jon Taffer” because it seems like this is another one of those episodes where Taffer will not be leading the rescue in person.
Instead, the rescue will be led by Spike Mendelsohn.
If you’re not familiar with Spike, he finished fifth place in the fourth season of Top Chef back in 2009.
He also owns a few different restaurants in the Washington DC area.
Spike was also an expert all the way back on Bar Rescue Season 1, though I don’t believe he’s returned to the show since then.
In fact, he posted the following message on his Instagram page celebrating his return to the show:
14 years later, I’m back with @jontaffer!
While last week the show was in Kenosha, the team is in Sheboygan this week.
On a personal note, I think that Sheboygan might be one of the most fun city names to say, so I commend the city on that.
The Bar Rescue crew is in town to rescue Harbor Lights bar, which has a very long history in Sheboygan.
I read one article that said the bar has records of existing all the way back in 1865, which I think makes it the oldest bar to be featured on the show.
Obviously, it’s had just a few different owners of the year.
Most recently, it was purchased by Dave Nennig and Kris Kaiser in 2015.
To recon the bar, the experts send in Judy and Sam as spies.
When the spies interact with the bartender, the bartender tells them that Harbor Lights is best known for its Bloody Mary.
However, as the experts look on in shock, they see the bartender making it using premade Bloody Mary mix.
I don’t know about you, but if a bar tells me that they specialize in something, I would expect them to make it from scratch.
One of the spies also eventually orders a grilled cheese to go with her Bloody Mary.
While the bartender is making the food, we find out that the bar’s kitchen is essentially just a closet, which obviously isn’t ideal for food preparation.
Given how old the building is, though, I’m not super surprised that it’s not using a modern layout.
Unsurprisingly, the Bar Rescue crew decided to mostly keep the bar’s name given it’s long history.
However, it seems like they might have slightly tweaked the tagline, changing it from just Harbor Lights to Harbor Lights Coastal Sports Bar.
I’m guessing that most people are just going to keep calling it Harbor Lights, though.
Of course, it also got the usual renovation, complete with new equipment and signage.
After the episode airs (I’m writing this the day before it airs on TV), I will come back and update this with some more specific details.
For now, let’s jump right into talking about whether Harbor Lights is still open and how the bar is doing in 2025 and beyond.
Harbor Lights Coastal Sports Bar Update - What Happened Next?
Now that I’ve recapped the Bar Rescue Harbor Lights visit, let’s talk about how the bar is doing after the Bar Rescue crew left Sheboygan.
Is Harbor Lights still open after Bar Rescue?
As of my most recent check, Harbor Lights is still open and serving customers in Sheboygan, WI.
Given that the bar’s history dates back to 1865, this doesn’t really surprise me, as I’m guessing it would’ve stayed open even with Bar Rescue’s help.
The bar is very active on social media, posting multiple times per week.
They still seem to be heavily promoting the Bloody Mary’s.
They also promote other “normal” bar events, such as the Superbowl.
One cool thing is that they also seem to have live music sometimes, as I saw a few posts about that.
Finally, in a massive surprise of a bar event, the bar also seems to host a weekly karaoke night.
Here’s what the bar’s Sheboygan location looks like in the most recent picture from Google Maps street view.
It’s currently from August 2024, so it happened just before the Bar Rescue visit.
I’m mainly including it so that you can explore the area – it’s pretty funny because it’s a very old building next to some new modern subdivisions.
Harbor Lights reviews after Bar Rescue
Next, take a look at some reviews for the bar after the visit from Bar Rescue.
The bar does not have an active Yelp page, unfortunately.
On Google, it has an overall 4.4 star rating on 230+ reviews, but those numbers include reviews from both before and after the Bar Rescue visit.
As always, though, I only look at reviews that were written after the Bar Rescue visit.
Those reviews are pretty much 100% positive, with only one negative review from someone complaining about the prices.
Here are some screenshots of some of the reviews that I found, all of which were written after Bar Rescue.
5 star review from 2024 that mentions the remodel:
5 star review from 2025:
5 star review from 2024:
5 star review from 2024 (with cute dog):
5 star review from 2024:
4 star review from 2025:
4 star review from 2024:
1 star review from 2025:
Final thoughts on the episode
Overall, while I was bummed to see that Taffer wasn’t saving Harbor Lights in person, I still think it’s cool that such a historical bar got featured on the show.
It’s also great to see Bar Rescue exploring Wisconsin more, as the Badger State has a well-deserved reputation when it comes to alcohol (so to speak).
Given that Harbor Lights has been around since the Civil War, I’m not really surprised that the bar is still open.
Regardless, I hope that Bar Rescue’s changes will help the bar stay open for another 160 years and that people will be parking their flying cars their in 2285.
That wraps up my update for Harbor Lights.
If you want to see some other Wisconsin Bar Rescue episodes, you can also read my updates for Interlude II in Kenosha, Nick’s House / Y-Not III in Milwaukee, and Packy’s Pub / Campbell’s Irish Pub in Milwaukee
And if you want to share your thoughts on the episode, you can do so using the comments section below.
As always – thanks for reading!
More Information
https://www.facebook.com/p/Harbor-Lights-Coastal-Sports-Bar-61571492364204/
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Last updated: 2025-03-02 06:22
I prefer to see Taffer on the show. I probably will not be watching if I find he is not on. Jon gives the show the flare it needs and without him it’s not the same
I think Spike did a great job! I really enjoyed the episode. I’d like to see him do a few more.