Dec 16

Dec 16 Long Beach is home to California’s first women’s sports bar

Watch Me! Sports Bar owner Jackie Diener (right) with a staff member. Photo courtesy of Watch Me! Sports Bar

One night, Jackie Diener and her friends entered a bar ready to watch one of her favorite sports: Sunday night football. Her night quickly became uncomfortable when men in the bar doubted the women’s understanding of the sport, “...making us feel like we weren’t welcome there and that we didn’t understand football,” Diener recalls.

This encounter only stirred her dream to open up a women’s sports bar.

Just in time for the 2024 Summer Olympics, California’s very first women’s sports bar opened in Long Beach in July of this year. Watch Me! Sports Bar on Pacific Coast Highway is an all ages sports bar that prioritizes streaming of women's live sports.

As one of the owners, Diener, or Jax as she also goes by, was inspired by an all women’s sports bar in Portland, called the Sports Bra. Now, Diener hopes to grow her business to provide a space where anyone feels welcome to come in and feel safe in celebrating female athletes.

Diener’s inspiration for her bar’s name was motivated by the feeling of being doubted, whether in sports or just everyday life. This doubt “fueled her fire” to prove herself and show all that she is capable of, using the phrase: “I'll show you what I can do, ‘Watch Me!’”

Diener says that the recent rise in popularity of women’s sports was a sign that this was her chance to do what she had always wanted.

The surge in popularity of women’s sports was seen in the 2024 Summer Olympics. According to a YouGov survey, 60% of respondents said they watched more women’s events than men's events in the Olympics this year.

“The media rights and equity gaps are closing and women are filling arenas and stadiums to the point where they’re moving to bigger ones due to large numbers of people actually wanting to watch their games,” says Diener. This year, the Summer Olympics had an equal number of women and men compete for the first time in history.

Some hurdles do remain in the industry. Male athletes earn 21 times more playing salary than women athletes, according to the Collective, a women-focused sports and entertainment business group.

Even if Watch Me! shows mostly women’s sports, Diener says that her interest in sports wouldn’t be complete without men’s games, too.

“I love the NFL and I love the Dodgers so there was no way I could open a sports bar and not show them, too,” she says.

Now that women’s sports has become a major movement worldwide with surging views and ticket sales, Diener hopes that more people will watch women’s sporting events and recognize their importance as well, stating that they are just as competitive and interesting as guys' games.

“We want everybody to come in here and celebrate women’s sports,” says Diener.