Who has time for a power lunch? The real business happens at 4pm ‘power hour’.

This may seem like a familiar ritual: happy hour. But the trappings of that antiquated American workplace tradition — drink specials from 5 to 7 p.m., chicken wing platters, and an “everyone’s welcome” atmosphere — are nowhere to be found at Four Twenty Five. Here, the mostly male finance industry crowd sips $25 olive oil-washed martinis and eats sea urchin crostini with yuzu and serrano chilies. There are no two-for-one drink or snack bar offers. Also: It’s only 4:15.

This is not happy hour, says Vongerichten Wealth. This is the Energy Hour.

Vongerichten has started opening the venue earlier to accommodate this high-powered bar in the afternoon – which, he says, more than makes up for the drop in crazy MEN– Alcohol-style power lunch.

“It’s all about creating a buzz—a scene with cocktails and delicious food,” says Vongerichten. This buzz is more like a buzz at Four Twenty Five, where it’s hard to find a seat at the bar after the markets close at 4pm.

A similar scene unfolds before 5pm at Le Pavillon, chef Daniel Boulud’s airy outpost across the street from Grand Central Terminal and below the offices of real estate giant SL Green, Carlyle Group and TD Securities.

Anthony Diamandakis, co-head of Citi’s global asset manager franchise, takes a $27 bite jamón Iberico and gestures with his wine glass across the sun-filled atrium at Le Pav (as its regulars call it). “He runs a private equity group,” he says, pointing to a friend and then another: “He’s an M&A banker at Citi.”

The after-work drinking spree has also moved to the Financial District, where the comfortable Bar Room at the Beekman Hotel is packed by 4:30 p.m. “Drinks definitely start earlier and end earlier since COVID,” notes bartender Pape Konte.

Before the pandemic, happy hour was a declining institution. Bowing to the pressures of #MeToo and calls for a clearer separation between work and personal life, leaving work behind seemed to be going the way of the three-martini lunch. But to the relief of downtown bars and restaurants, weekday drinking seems to be making a comeback — with some subtle differences.

Across the country, early-night weekday drinking is actually up since before the pandemic, while weekday lunch spending is down, according to data from point-of-sale system Square. This push and pull is “more pronounced in cities highly indexed for office workers and knowledge economy workers — people who work from home more often,” says Ara Kharazian, a head of research at Square. This makes sense, he says: “If you’re at home all day, you might actually be very keen to get out of the house at 5pm and have a drink somewhere.”

The same seems to be true for hybrid workers who go into offices two or three days a week. Many are finding that those limited personal hours are quickly swallowed up by meetings and collaborative work, making a power lunch—or sometimes any lunch—impossible. “After COVID, my days got so full,” says Peter Bazeli, a managing director at a real estate firm who goes to Le Pav for afternoon drinks a few times a month. “The most protected time I found was at the end of the day before going home on Metro-North.” When diners come to his restaurants for lunch, Vongerichten says, many these days opt for a turmeric tonic, green juice or kombucha instead of a martini. “It’s rare to see someone with a glass of wine at lunch at Four Twenty Five,” he says. “In 1986, there was a bottle of wine on every table at lunch.” But in the exclusive dining halls and clubs frequented by bankers and businessmen, the spirits and wine start flowing shortly after 4 p.m.

That’s true whether the mood is happy or not, says Matthew Niles, a bartender at Four Twenty Five. wealth: “Sometimes it’s just been a bad day in the markets — or a really good day.” At either extreme, the bar is packed, so one of the bartenders usually checks the Dow to predict foot traffic, he explains. “It seems to affect us.”

“Drinks are great and they’re expensive for a reason… which is a natural filler.”

Peter Bazeli, regular at Le Pavillon

However the markets have performed, Energy Hour is generally a civilized affair, nothing like the raucous celebrations described in of The Wolf of Wall Street or the sweaty dance floors and the pillbox of HBO’s New Dealers Industry. “Finance guys moderate themselves a lot more than the stereotype suggests,” says Niles. “They should go home to their wives and children.”

Still, Bazel, a Le Pav regular, says his Energy Hour bill is “comfortably over $100” per visit, with a generous tip on top.

“The truth of the matter is: drinks are great and they’re expensive for a reason,” he says. “You’re dealing with people who have expense accounts, or are within a certain stratum of whatever their industry is—that’s kind of a natural filter.”

Upstairs from Le Pav is Centurion New York, one of a slew of new private clubs where well-heeled members can unwind after work. Exclusivity — whether enforced by a door policy or high cocktail prices — is part of the draw for today’s expired Masters of the Universe, says Eugene Remm, co-founder of Catch Hospitality Group, which owns Manhattan restaurants Catch and Catch. Steak. At traditional happy hours, young employees would follow their bosses to a local hangout for a pint, hanging out for some informal time. Nowadays, says Remm, that executive “is going to a members’ club where the twenty-year-old can’t get in.”

Leaving the office at 4pm may be frowned upon by some, but the performative presentation culture that kept many in the office late into the evening before the pandemic has faded somewhat in the era of hybrid work.

And for those who have the freedom to do so, a tight hour of booze-lubricated conversation before boarding the train to the suburbs can be a pretty efficient way to do some top-notch networking..

Basel spends his bar tab, which he sees as a good investment. After all, it’s not just the drinks that are premium at Power Hour, it’s the people you meet too. Basel recalls, for example, talking to the CEO of an AI company in Le Pav. “We talked about how AI is changing the way real estate is traded,” he says. “I just love it.”

To be sure, not everyone is eager for a return to business networking in bars. More than a third of the US adult population does not drink for one reason or another, and millennials and Gen Z are increasingly choosing partial or full sobriety. But those in the big crowd still looking to partake in Power Hour can find some help in the rise of another high-end bar trend: the non-alcoholic cocktail list.

At Beekman, for example, teetotalers can enjoy a $16 zero-proof rum, passion fruit, aquafaba and lemon mix — any time of day.

This article appears in the October/November 2024 issue of wealth with the title “Who has time for a power lunch?” The real business happens at 16:00 ‘power hour’”.