San Francisco’s first ‘entertainment zone’ hosts Oktoberfest celebration

For the past decade, Schroeder’s on Front Street in San Francisco has been hosting Oktoberfest celebrations. But this year, the party is not just bigger – it’s taken over the entire block.

“We just thought this was the perfect opportunity to show that downtown is back and is evolving and changing and we wanted to give a reason for people to come down here,” said Andy Chun, the owner of Schroeder’s.

A section of Front Street has now been designated one of the city’s new entertainment zones, meaning they’re allowed to close off the street to cars and host events where people can drink outside.

It’s part of a push to try and get more people to come back to the city’s downtown corridor and Andy Chun, the owner of Schroeder’s, thought what better way to kick off the new zone than with Oktoberfest.

“The idea that you know we can kind of mimic some of the European cities and take advantage of not only the small spaces that we have inside, because we all have small apartments, we all have small condos, but you can use all of this and have fun and do it in a responsible manor I think is going to be really incredible,” said Chun.

The festival featured live music, games, food and, of course, beer.

“I think that’s amazing because it’s, like, the financial district, but yet we’re still getting some fun here,” said Sasha Hefler, an attendee.

“I think there’s a lot of opportunities for different types of events both drinking and non-drinking opportunities out there that could bring a lot of different communities together and help rebuild downtown,” said Teresa Eccleston.

In total organizers, say more than 5,000 people RSVP’d. That’s a crowd Andy says will definitely make a huge impact on the area.

“I think in past years we’ve probably been 6-700, so this is really going to be unprecedented,” said Chun.

And they’re not stopping there. Andy and his fellow business owner across the street, Ben Bleiman, say they’re already brainstorming a list of ideas and they’re ready to make events like this one a monthly occurrence.

“It used to just be go to work, go to happy hour, go home; but downtown’s a canvas right now and we can do amazing outdoor events, indoor events. We can make this a thing,” said Bleiman, the owner of Harrington’s Bar and Grill.