and Men
( ... and wives want to kill!)
By Harry Kirsbaum
lan Markovitz has the fighter-
pilot-swagger-thing going on.
Yeah, he's been shot twice
— once by a drunken off-duty
police officer and another time
by one of his dancers. He's
also survived a contract put
on him by a former partner
and almost became the hood ornament of
an ex-girlfriend's Fiero; but the 50-year-
old Oak Park native has survived — and
thrived — on his journey to become De-
troit's own sultan of skin ... or sin, or both.
He enters the Flight Club during lunch
hour, wearing his designer jeans, knit
shirt, dark-gray overcoat and Ferrari-logo
cap — with a glint in his eye that says,
"Hell, yeah!"
And, why not? Besides the Flight
Club in Inkster, he owns the All Star
Club in Detroit, Penthouse clubs in both
Detroit and Philadelphia and a soon-
to-be-opened club in Aventura, Fla. His
book, Topless Prophet: The True Story of
America's Most Successful Gentleman's
Club Entrepreneur (AM Productions;
2009) has been optioned to Hollywood.
Thus, the swagger.
"I'm not quitting my `day job,'" he said
in a small conference room adjacent to
his office. "I'm having fun with it, and I'm
making a couple of bucks."
That's been his mantra since he first
set his sights on redefining the strip club
industry as a weekend bartender at La
Chambre, a strip club — in a strip mall —
in Redford Township, owned by Sol Milan,
a neighbor.
Markovitz didn't necessarily set out to
be a purveyor of women's assets. He had
passed up a chance to qualify for fighter-
pilot school in the Israeli Air Force —
realizing he'd have to move to Israel, learn
a new language and face a 90 percent
washout rate.
He tried going the typical "Jewish,
Oak Park guy" route — first as a pre-med
major at Wayne State University, then as a
liberal arts major there. But, he says, all he
wanted to do was start his own business
and make some dough.
With his father, Max, a Holocaust
survivor, and Milan as business partners,
he opened the Booby Trap on Eight Mile
Road in Detroit, an upscale topless club
inspired, he said, by the pioneer in casual
chain-restaurant dining — TGI Friday's.
The rest is history — and in hardcover for
$24.95.
"My dad told me whatever you do, be
the best at it," Markovitz said. "You could
be a garbage man with one truck; but as
long as you're doing your best, you're go-
ing to be a success. That's why I'm always
improving."
Zest for life was something Markovitz
always admired about his father, noting
that rarely was there ever discussion of his
dad's experiences in the Holocaust — until
the entrepreneur's ghostwriter called the
old man for Markovitz's book.
"I hope that people got the message that
he was my rock as far as where I get a lot
of my strength and stamina, or whatever
you want to say — 'balls," he said, the
adulation for his late father apparent.
"I don't take any shit. I always look
back to what he experienced in his life,
any minute of any day you literally didn't
know if you were going to live or die. How
crazy is that?" he said. "So when I feel a
little apprehensive about something, I
think about him and it comes right to the
www.redthreadmagazine.com
forefront?'
The Flight Club, open for 14 years, has
been redone three times, said Markovitz,
and the Flying Aces Casino will be added
to the club in April. Beyond the glitz and
glamour the clubs try to present, the
personable Markovitz — with a Clark
Gable-esque moustache and the panache
of a Vegas casino host — has been an in-
novator in every facet of the business.
He stretched the law to allow private
dances for customers; originated the idea
of hiring dancers as independent contrac-
tors instead of employees; and brought
in high-tech glitz, great food and pretty,
topless women within the confines of a
safe viewing environment where security
is key. All patrons check their vehicle with
the valet and check their coats, and the
bathroom attendants are as imposing as
the doormen.
At the Flight Club, amid the neon lights
and loud music played by a DJ, two danc-
ers, one topless, the other about to be,
dance slowly on the main stage that con-
tains a staircase and three poles. Between
20 and 30 girls work the lunch crowd, and
30-40 work the night shift.
Six tables and 10 booths are on the main
floor; a cigar bar and 14 private, curtained
booths occupy the balcony. About every
two hours, a 1967 Corvette convertible
descends from the ceiling, and two danc-
ers writhe together in the car to the beat of
1960s hot rod tunes.
At the larger and glitzier Penthouse
Club, with six tables, 20 booths, seating
for 16 by the stage, and a cigar bar and
private booths upstairs, two custom mo-
torcycles have replaced the Corvette. Four
dancers are in rotation on stages or on top
of the bar at the same time.
"We're always looking to push the
envelope because you can't be status quo,
especially in today's economy. Under
Reagan, we were flying; under Clinton, we
rocked" he said. "If you were No. 6 out of
30 clubs, you were still going to do well;
but now, you gotta be No. 1 because it's a
long way down to No. 2. There's no real
room for error."
RECESSION HAS HURT BUSINESS
"It's trickle-down economics. We're
getting the same amount of customers,
but the average guest check is down,"
said Markovitz. "We're not as bad as the
other businesses, but if you shave 15 or 20
percent, you feel it. Certain fixed costs are
still there?'
He said he hasn't laid off any of the 750
employees who work in his four clubs.
The food menu is like any high-end eat-
ing establishment, but it's the drink prices
that shock and awe. Perusing the bottle
menu placed at each table and booth
reveals that the most expensive cham-
pagne will set you back $700. Wine runs
between $38-$300 a bottle, and a bottle
of Absolut Vodka costs $225, Patron Gold
Tequila, $325, and Johnny Walker Blue,
$725. (Unfortunately, you can't have the
booze wrapped to take home.)
Markovitz isn't the only Jewish gentle-
men's club owner. He said there's good
camaraderie among the 10-15 others
around the country he keeps in touch with
as they try to "do good" for the industry by
trying to catch up to the popularity of the
gaming industry.
"Our industry is lagging behind but
gaining on the gaming industry — where
the perception was that the 'fellows' ran
the casinos. When I got in the business,
there were a lot of wannabe gangsters.
There were a few real ones, too," he said.
"As the gaming industry becomes more le-
gitimate, regulated and corporate, which it
should be, we're following the same path.
"I don't get the visits I got in the '80s —
threats about injury and paying protec-
tion," he said. "It's getting better."
The vision of the prototypical strip club
owner — shady, overweight, replete with a
half-chewed cigar resting between fleshy
fingers and flanked on either side by sul-
try, scantily-clad bimbos — is one Markov-
itz acknowledges still exists.
"I still think we're fighting that percep-
tion — that we're doing or dealing drugs. I
haven't done drugs in my life; I work hard
to try to be a little more conservative," he
said. "I like to live well, enjoy the fruits of
my labor."
Those fruits include a Grosse Pointe
Farms home built in 1926, owned origi-
nally by the Ford family; a new home in
Florida; and cars — a Ferrari 360 Modina,
a Lamborgkini Gallardo and his favorite, a
2007 Dodge Charger SRT8 Super Bee.
He's also married, to Lea, a Czech
Republic beauty. The wedding ceremony
in August 2010 was a
private one at Grace-
land in Memphis
because Marcovitz is
an Elvis fan. There also
are the recently started
golf lessons in Florida,
with a female golf
pro, of course. And, at
one time, he was part.
owner of both Allie's
Flash Dancer, a thor-
oughbred racehorse,
and of a plane.
He's also giving back
to the community.
"[I was] just at an
AIPAC meeting," he
said. "We have relatives
in Israel, and you have to be generous
there. A lot of people come to me for dif-
ferent causes. [The] Humane Society is
dear to my heart?'
Not that it's always been that way.
There was a time, Markovitz says,
that people were far more reticent to ask
for his financial assistance due in large
measure to the industry where that money
came from. But, it seems, things have
changed.
"When people ask me to give, I take it
as a compliment because in the old days,
with my business — it's unfortunate, but
I understood — they shied away," he says.
"But now, I'm viewed as a businessman-
owner because I've been at it so long —
I'm a veteran."
Nor has he received much flack from
the Jewish community. "Lots of my cus-
tomers are Jews," he said. "I get nothing
but support."
And, not having fallen off the turnip
truck, he understands what works and
what's allowed — so there's no fear of
seeing a Penthouse Club in downtown
Birmingham.
"It's too close to home," he said, laugh-
ing. "You don't want the wife to drive by
and see your car. Our Eight Mile location
has worked out really well for us. From
Telegraph and Long Lake, it's 10 minutes
outside of rush hour."
Markovitz tried to go "legit" once, but it
didn't pan out; he built the Avenue Diner
on Woodward Avenue in Royal Oak — a
chrome and glass building fashioned after
the Buckhead Diner in Atlanta.
"Those were the days when all my bars
on Eight Mile were rocking and I was
in my 30s, and I was thinking of doing
something 'legitimate," he said. "I was in
Atlanta doing a deal. I was in the Buck-
head Diner, and I thought it was beautiful.
So I spent a fortune on this local joint. We
opened, and I had a chef that turned out
to be a whack job. A lot of chefs are tem-
peramental, but this guy was out there.
Markovitz said he was successful when
the restaurant opened, with patrons wait-
ing upward of two hours to get seated. Of
course, he adds wryly, there's no money to
be made by "waiting" customers.
"You work all day and all night and
at the end of the day, I'm looking at the
grosses, going, 'I can make this in two
hours in my club,"' he said, noting there
was no love lost when he finally shuttered
the place. "I didn't lose my shirt, but I lost
a couple of sleeves. I like that old saying,
`Stay with what you know.'"
One thing he knows is that his business,
like any other in the service industry, is
interconnected — and one of many cogs
in the wheel of an economy that reaches
beyond the walls of his clubs. "It's a
$200-million industry that includes the
beer distributors, meat vendors, cham-
pagne vendors, agents who support the
girls," he said.
Markovitz also understands the motiva-
tions of bloviating politicians when they
slam his industry. But he also knows his
place in making Detroit a cosmopolitan
city, confirmed for him in a conversation
he had with Detroit's then-mayor Cole-
man Young as Markovitz was trying to get
his business off the ground.
"He told me he wanted to build up the
Renaissance Center, he wanted to build
the convention business and he knew that
our business was necessary," Markovitz
said. "The guys aren't coming to go to the
symphony. When they're done with Cobo,
they're not going back to their hotel room
to read a book. They're not going to an
opera or a play. They're going to a titty bar.
He said as long as I didn't bring it down-
town, it was all right with him."
After meeting him, it's hard not to come
away thinking Alan Markovitz is on top of
his game. But, just like the time he tried
to go "legit," he says he would walk away
from it all should the party cease.
"If this becomes a grind and I don't look
forward to coming in to work every day,
I'm outta here," he says, "I'll say, 'Just send
me the check once a month."
RED mum I March 2011 17