The Unemployed Life

Lemonade Makers: The Unexpected Impresarios

Brandon Howard and Fisayo Esconsay, both 28, were roommates at the University of Maryland. When the economy took a dive, Esconsay’s law firm, Sullivan & Cromwell, warned associates they should look for other opportunities; Howard, who worked in music marketing for Steve Stoute and Jay-Z, was laid off. In September, they plan to open Recess, a new nightclub located a block from the White House. They talked to Recessionwire about why they’re betting the project can thrive.

Nightclubs are a notoriously fickle business. What makes you think you can pull this off in this economy?

Esconsay: I’ve been promoting events in D.C. this whole time, through the economic downturn. The nightclub business hasn’t realty taken as much of a hit as other businesses. I’m not sure if people are looking for low cost alternative for entertainment or what, but the nightclub business hasn’t missed a beat.

Howard: People have to look at opportunity. In the recession you have people who are trying to move the ball ahead. Those are the people who are going to come out on top.

How much money are you putting into the enterprise?

Howard: We’ve been fortunate to have some great people behind us. Through great friends and great family we’ve been able to raise half a million dollars, as crazy as that sounds. We have good credit history.

What kinds of people do you hope to attract to The Recess?

Howard: We have our built-in crowd, but what we’re looking at is D.C. being so prominent now. We’re really trying to capitalize on the people who are coming here looking to be part of a new movement—all the transplants that can’t find a place that suits them. D.C. is a very format driven space when it comes to nightclubs. What we’re pushing is variety, like bringing in D.J.s from out of town.

Esconsay: Specifically we’re targeting professionals—lawyers, my colleagues and people I’ve worked across the table from. A couple of my classmates are part of the Obama administration. We also want to make our space hospitable to non-profits, especially now. We want to make sure we’re making an active effort to make our space free or low-cost for them.

You say this “opportunity” came up—what do you mean?

Esconsay: I was at my office one day and a guy who had come to some of my parties—I was doing parties on the side—called. He knew about a space that was going out of business and he knew the management there and if I was interested in opening my own place. At the time I didn’t take it too seriously; I figured it was in a bad part of town or just a terrible spot. But I looked at it and it looked great.

Howard: I think the recession has made everybody rethink their plans. I read over and over again people saying, if you’re going to take a chance, now is the time to take it.

Esconsay: That was true for us, yeah.

So could this be your next career?

Esconsay: Absolutely. My initial thought was, I can always go back into practice. But as we’ve gotten more and more into it we’ve realized this is not a side job. And I didn’t realize how much of a toll law firm life was taking on me. I would hear my BlackBerry buzzing even if it wasn’t. This is riskier, but the payoff and the rewards, they far outweigh the risk for me. I have more time to spend with my family. It has really relaxed me as a person. So for me this is definitely the next career.

Howard: A year ago I couldn’t imagine being involved with anything like this. But everything that we’ve been doing up until now has contributed to being able to make this happen. So I’m all about things happening for a reason. Everything from our vendor connections to who we’re using for P.R., to who we’re going to design the logo, to our legal team. Everything has come to this point.

Esconsay: Sometimes we ask ourselves how we’ve gotten so lucky.

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Tags: business, entertainment, Lemonade Makers, new entrepreneurs, The Working World, Washington