CHELSEA — Score one for the boys.
Eighth Avenue sportsbar GYM won a new 10-year lease from its landlord, according to owner Rick Schmutzler.
"We didn’t want to move, I didn’t want to move anywhere but where we are," Schmutzler told DNAinfo New York.
GYM, which proclaims itself "NY's premier bar for balls, boys and beers," has been in its home at 167 Eighth Ave. since 2005, Schmultzer said. The bar is a regular hangout for gay sports leagues that play nearby and its basement "Locker Room" shows the NFL Sunday lineup, according to the bar's website.
Rising rents along Eighth Avenue in Chelsea have been forcing out small businesses for years, and many storefronts are still empty. Recently, a number of gay bars failed to snag the former home of leather bar Rawhide, which closed in 2013 due to a rent hike. In February, porn store The Unicorn closed its doors after 21 years on the corner of West 22nd Street.
But Schmutzler was able to work out a deal with his landlord, he said, partly by convincing him that the store could stand vacant.
"We had a diagram of all the empty storefronts," along Eighth Avenue, Schmultzer said.
Schmultzer would not specify how much his new rent is, but said it was no "sweetheart deal." He was able to freeze it for a few years and get a five-year extension option on the new lease, he said.
Schmultzer is confident that the sports bar has an enduring place in the community.
"When I first tried to open, there were all these people in the gay community who refused to believe that gays and sports mixed," Shmultzer, 52 and a former college football player, said.
GYM has since expanded to Los Angeles and will soon open another location in Florida.
