The Cobra Lounge A Hookah Lounge Hideout for Rebels, Bandits and Adventurers
About Us
We are two guys who have always liked to shake things up...
In 2007 we had saved up (what we thought) was enough money to open up an awesome place for people that was anything but mainstream, we were 19. We now run this sweet little hookah spot in downtown Bellingham, it is the LAST LEGAL SMOKING ESTABLISHMENT in Washington, which means we have a good lawyer…
We are really quirky guys
(ask anyone) who shudder at the thought of normalcy and a status quo. When we decided to open, our first step was to make a list of all the things we hated about hookah bars. Instead of the usual overpriced pseudo Middle Eastern bullshit we tried to build memorable experiences for the members… from the nationally recognized graffiti art, down to the custom cobra hoses. We put fun little details into everything which is probably just a result of our personalities. Our non traditional way of going about business, has gotten us to over 4000 members. Every type of person feels comfortable kicking it at the lounge, which is exactly the idea. Our regulars understand the awesomeness and originality of the lounge as more and more Starbucks spring up. Fashionable people, college kids, artists, thugs, indie rockers, skaters, young adults, and sneaker heads all come down in droves to support this effort to resist conformity. This all didn’t happen over night, we didn’t get lucky with some random idea, we got off our asses and started something we care about.
Our names are Erin and Paul, at The Cobra Lounge it’s just us and a couple of our friends who like the idea that mainstream is boring.
Here is the full story…
A lot of things happened, then we were born. We had awesome childhoods filled with adventures, after a while those ended. We met in our junior year of high school while running for ASB positions. After we were elected, our deep seeded hatred of social norms and youthful desire to constantly test boundaries came to fruition. We had all kinds of fun with the schools money including The Cage, starting our own dodgeball league, and renting elaborate animal costumes for school assemblies (we once placed a friend amongst the crowd in a giant “Gandolph” costume just to add some confusion/excitement!) After all of the fun ended we split ways for a bit as Erin headed off to school and Paul entered the workforce. We both learned some things and decided to start a clothing company, our customers were awesome and we had some fun. After a bit we realized that most people have a “corporate headquarters”, ours was the back seat of Paul’s VW Rabbit. (I think people bought shirts because they felt bad for us). As young t-shirt “moguls”, smiling at passerby as we sold T-shirts out of the trunk of a Rabbit, we never thought we would have a place of our own.
With 9,000 dollars and a youthful ignorance about the challenges that lie ahead we set to work renovating a decaying old building downtown. Our only real asset was the fact that we were too dumb to realize the many reasons you don’t open a business at 19. Working 18 hour days that sweaty summer of 2007 and sleeping in the buildings’ loft, we lived off of rice and hot dogs for 3 months. Try to picture two smiling 20 year old guys showering in Whatcom Falls with camp soap, that’s us. After 2 additional months of legal wrangling, we called in a favor, pooling together our last $400 for a well known Seattle graffiti artist. Excited and out of money, we opened the doors before the paint was dry…
Come meet us,
Erin & Paul
