How Jax Diener built California's first women's sports bar

Your Women's Sports Business Digest

October 28, 2025

In 2022, the first two women's sports bars opened in the United States. By early 2025, that number reached six nationwide.

By the end of 2025? The market is expected to hit two dozen venues.

The window for "first in [your market]" closes faster than most people realize. Traditional bar openings take 12-18 months. If you're still in planning mode, you're already watching someone else build the community recognition you thought you'd capture.

Jax Diener recognized the California market gap in 2022. Instead of franchising The Sports Bra (an opportunity that wasn’t ready three years ago), she opened her own bar in 10.5 months.

When industry experts told her opening in under a year was impossible, she said: Watch me.

Speed created advantages competitors can't replicate. Want to know how she compressed the timeline? Keep reading 👇

🤿 Below the Surface

Here's what's on deck this week:

  • Signal Strength: The ABLE framework for emerging markets

  • In the Current: Clark memorabilia record, Canada market surge, and new WPBL teams

  • Blue Zone: We’re hiring! 

  • Shark Bite: Jenny Nguyen on the universal demand for women's sports bars

⚡️ Signal Strength  

What Happens When You Stop Planning and Start Moving

Most brands evaluating women's sports investments face a problem: time.

By the time you're ready to activate, the emerging market opportunity has closed.

Jax Diener's approach to opening Watch Me! Sports Bar offers a framework brands can apply to their own women's sports market entry. When she opened her LLC in September 2023, she set one immovable target: July 26, 2024—the Paris Olympics opening ceremony. Her target audience would be primed to engage and she’d enter the field during one of the biggest celebrations of women’s sports. 

The lesson for brands: Jax didn't wait for perfect conditions. She moved to meet her moment, and the market’s momentum.

By the numbers:

  • 10.5 months from LLC to opening day

  • 220-person capacity venue in Long Beach

  • 22,000 Instagram followers in under two years

  • 3x increase in women’s sports coverage from previous decades

  • Over 175+ televised/streamed WNBA games and 160 NWSL matches in 2025

What they're saying: "Everyone I spoke to said, there is no way you're gonna open a bar or restaurant in under a year, it's just not possible, you're not gonna make it work, there's no way it's gonna happen, and time and time again, I used my watch-me spirit and said, watch me. I'm gonna go ahead and figure it out. I'm gonna make it happen." — Jax Diener

How it works: The ABLE framework compressed an 18-month timeline to 10.5 months:

  1. Align launch with cultural moments: Paris Olympics provided immediate demand validation and real customer data

  2. Build community capital before submitting applications: Face-to-face meetings with district council members prevented regulatory delays

  3. Lean on industry networks: Operators from The Sports Bra, Rough and Tumble, and A Bar of Their Own shared technical specifications for TV installations, streaming decisions, and capacity management

  4. Execute cosmetic transformation on aggressive timeline: 56 days from receiving keys to opening, focusing on high-impact changes and existing infrastructure

Why it matters: Every month spent in development is a month someone else spends building the relationships, traffic patterns, and community recognition you'll spend years trying to replicate. The same goes for brands looking to invest in women’s sports – momentum moves with or without you.

📰 In the Current  

We monitor the current so you can ride the wave. Here's what you need to know this week:

🦈 Blue Zone  

Now Hiring

Deep Blue is hiring a Content & Social Media intern for the Winter / Spring season. Know someone interested in developing Deep Blue’s social strategy and making thought leadership content across platforms including LinkedIn, Instagram and TikTok? Please have them apply here. 

On Location

Deep Blue will be on the ground at the 2025 NWSL Championship in San Jose in November. Interested in meeting for coffee or a hello? Email us at: [email protected]

Tune In

Check out the latest episodes of Courtside with Laura Correnti on the iHeart Women’s Sports network featuring conversations with UCLA Women’s Basketball Head Coach Cori Close and SMAC Entertainment Co-founder Constance Schwartz-Morini. Listen here.

🌊 Shark Bite

“Literally, the sky is the limit for women’s sports bars. The Sports Bra unearthed an entire market segment of the hospitality world and not just one that is niche, but one that is universal in its demand, its impact, and its potential for growth. We are on the precipice of seeing unprecedented growth in women’s sports fandom, accessibility, representation, and content.”
- Jenny Nguyen, Founder of The Sports Bra

The women's sports bar market will grow 4x this year. Every month spent perfecting plans is a month someone else spends building first-mover advantages you'll spend years attempting to replicate. 

Keep moving with the current, not against it.

– Deep Blue Sports + Entertainment

Interested in learning what Deep Blue is up to? Have an idea? 
Reach us at [email protected].