Jack’s Place Bar Rescue Update (The Regan Lounge) – Still Open in 2024?

Episode Recap

Jack’s Place, later renamed to The Regan Lounge, was a Las Vegas, Nevada bar that was featured on Season 5 of Bar Rescue.

Though the Jack’s Place Bar Rescue episode aired in July 2017, the actual filming and visit from Jon Taffer took place a few months earlier at the beginning of 2017.

It was Season 5 Episode 24 and the episode name was “Mother Doesn’t Know Best”.

Jack’s Place is in Las Vegas, NV, which is a regular location on Bar Rescue.

It’s located on Bonanza Rd, which is about as Las Vegas of a street name as you can get.

The bar is part of a strip mall and is about 15 minutes from the Las Vegas Strip.

The next door tenant is a dentist, which will become more important later on in our Jack’s Place Bar Rescue update.

Corinne Vaughn is the owner, and she bought the bar in 2008.

That means she’s owned it for a little less than a decade at the time of Jon Taffer’s visit.

She had spent a lot of time at the bar and bought it for sentimental reasons.

The bar was in decline when Corrine bought it in 2008.

The staff calls Corinne by the name of mom, and she has four children of her own at home.

Because Corinne is a softy, she lets the team get away with a lot.

That’s why the title of this episode is “Mother Doesn’t Know Best”.

The bar is in severe debt, and Corinne has never taken a paycheck.

That’s a horrible situation to be honest.

Imagine owning a business for almost a decade but never having been able to draw a paycheck in that period.

Issues like this are why the Jack’s Place Bar Rescue episode exists and why I’m rooting for Jon Taffer to help Corinne.

Phil Wills, an expert mixologist, joins Jon Taffer to help rescue the bar.

The bar is named for the previous owner, Jack, who was also a state senator.

Phil and Jon see that the bar is very outdated, and the inside looks like it is still the 1980s.

The video footage shows Caryn and Ernie, who are the managers.

Corrine’s son Travis also occasionally manages the bar. 

Jon recruits Jon Mac and his friends, a local, to spy on the bar.

Bartender John takes their order and forgets to shake their drink, which tastes sour.

John, the bartender (not Jon Taffer), is tossing cups and trying to catch the bottle and doesn’t stop till Corinne tells him to.

He thinks he’s a flair bartender but he doesn’t have the skills. 

You can see John in the picture above.

He then begins bad-mouthing the management of the bar. 

Jon enters the bar and confronts John (the bartender) calling him disruptive.

Corinne is then told to step up and act like a boss and not a mom, as Jon will not help her until she does.

John refuses to apologize but eventually does. 

The following day Jon Taffer comes for a meeting.

It is revealed that Corinne doesn’t pay herself, but she does pay her staff.

Again, it’s just a really bad situation.

Jon tells Corinne she is partly to blame for the bar’s decline since she mothered her team instead of managing them.

A Partender report reveals that the bar has lost almost $40,000 the last year from missed liquor sales on the weekends alone (over a whole year), and Corinne has a breakdown and starts crying. It’s really sad.

Phil Wills is introduced and inspects the bar.

He notices the cooler isn’t working, and the bar is dirty.

The ice is moldy, so the staff is forced to clean the ice bin, and they go to the store to purchase more ice.

Pro tip – the ice bucket is often one of the grossest places in a bar because it never gets cleaner. Be careful with your local bars as you might be getting a nice dose of mold with your ice.

The bartenders are shown how to make a cocktail made with lemonade.

Jon reveals he will send two employees to the Jack Daniels Distillery in Tennessee at the end of the stress test (product placement much, right?).

The bartenders are generally doing well during the stress test.

However, the bartenders ignore one end of the bar, and customers begin to leave.

Customers wait almost thirty minutes for a drink, so Jon Taffer is forced to shut down the stress test.

Corinne chooses Ernie and John to go to Tennessee.

Jon tells Corinne he wants her bar to specialize in Jack Daniels.

In Tennessee, Ernie and John are shown the distillery.

At the bar, Phil trains the rest of the staff on more Jack Daniels drinks.

The next day the team gets together to see the renovations. 

As part of the many changes, Jon Taffer decides to also rename the bar.

He changes the name from Jack’s Place to The Regan Lounge.

Inside, the walls are decorated with Jack Daniels advertisements and decor.

The bar is gifted a new ice machine and POS machines.

The bar opens for the relaunch.

The bartenders are keeping up, but Caryn looks lost in a corner.

She tells Gordon she can’t get the attention of the bar and leaves and locks herself in her office.

Other than that, the night was a success. 

So was the Jack’s Place Las Vegas visit a success? Keep reading our update to learn what happened next and if it’s still open in 2024 and beyond.