After reopening last year, this midtown Kansas City bar has closed again
The Drunken Worm has closed — again.
“We are Closed” signs have been posted over the midtown bar’s windows for two weeks.
Manager Levi Keefer said owner Ronald Struminger shut down The Drunken Worm Jan. 28.
“It was out of the blue,” Keefer said. “He owes our back-of-house kitchen staff for a month’s pay. And now he’s not returning calls or texts. It’s a big mess.”
Struminger did not return phone calls from The Star. Courtney Yager, another manager at the bar, said she couldn’t talk when reached by The Star.
The bar management company Krown Concepts originally opened The Drunken Worm at 1405 W. 39th St. in 2014, expanding in 2022 into the space to the east formerly occupied by Mo Brew.
In September 2023, Krown Concepts abruptly closed The Drunken Worm. Six months later, Struminger, who lives in New Jersey, purchased the building and teamed up with Yager and Keefer to reopen the bar.
“We’re trying to return it more to what it was when we opened in 2014,” Keefer told The Star in April. “A tequila-focused bar with traditional street tacos and kind of a Day of the Dead theme. I think we got away from that there toward the end, so we want to get back to basics a little.”
As of Monday, the bar’s Facebook page had been updated to say The Drunken Worm was permanently closed.
This story was originally published February 18, 2025 at 1:29 PM.
