In Berlin, the best bar might just be your corner store, complete with lasers, smoke machines, pumping techno and cheap beer.
Words & Images Kate Bettes
In Berlin, the best bar might just be your corner store, complete with lasers, smoke machines, pumping techno and cheap beer.
Words & Images Kate Bettes
In Berlin, the best bar might just be your corner store, complete with lasers, smoke machines, pumping techno and cheap beer.
Words & Images Kate Bettes
and more than under the influence, I beg the bemused man behind the counter to hit the button again.
and more than under the influence, I beg the bemused man behind the counter to hit the button again.
He grins at my horrible German. His mate laughs and says something I’m probably better off not understanding. Finally, he leans down and slaps the invisible button for a third time.
Instantly, the lights drop. Smoke hisses out from behind a rack of vapes as green laser beams crisscross bags of paprika-flavoured Chipsfrisch and Ritter Sport chocolate bars. My friend and I squeal in unison as we lift our iPhones to capture this hot mess of a night.
We’re not in one of Berlin’s nightclubs (I’d have been thrown out and blacklisted if I were that tragic). This is my local corner store: a Späti.
Welcome... to the Späti.
While it might seem odd to be tipsy at a shop, in Berlin it’s more normal than you might think. This is because Spätis hold a special place in the hearts of many Berliners.
Spätis hold a special place in the hearts of many Berliners.
Time for a quick history lesson. Späti is short for Spätkauf, which means “late purchase”. These small, independently owned shops first appeared in East Germany to serve workers on the night shift. After the Wall fell, they spread across the city. Today many are run by immigrants.
You’ll find them on nearly every street in the city’s central districts. Each has a fridge-lined wall brimming with drinks, with caffeine-loaded Club Mate, cult-favourite Fritz-Kola, Berliner Weisse beers, and fizzy Weinschorle. Each has an owner, often chatting on the front stoop with friends, rising occasionally to help a customer.
Spätis are the one-stop shop for Berliners on the go.
But Berlin’s roughly 1,000 Spätis have one thing in common. They function as the city’s most unassuming—and most colourful—neighbourhood bars and unofficial community hubs.
On my block, you’ll find old men on benches under the shopfront windows year-round, sipping pilsners (around two euros, cash only). Come summer, crowds spill onto bottle crate seats. On the sought-after tables and chairs, a younger set—sunglasses on, cigarettes in hand—deal cards, and pass joints. There are even Späti crawls: budget bar-hopping, where the drinks are cheap and the dress code is non-existent. And with the cost of entry at Berlin’s clubs hitting €30 in recent times, having a good time on a handful of coins is nothing to sniff at.
Along with beer and wine, non-alcoholic Club Mate and Fritz Cola are super popular here.
Spätis are a place to meet up with mates—spontaneously or otherwise.
For Herr Murat, a born-and-bred Berliner of Turkish heritage from Kreuzberg, opening his own Späti was all down to local democracy.
“This used to be a full corner bar, and I took it over in 2009,” he tells me. “People kept saying, ‘Open a Späti here!’ I said, ‘I want a bar.’ They begged me—‘No, please, make it a Späti.’”
He folded and Spät Campus was born. Since then, he’s been featured in magazines and newspapers and has welcomed people from all around the world. All without a single ad or even a TikTok, he adds proudly.
“The people here are so multicultural—I love that. Italians, English, French, Spanish, Kurds, Turks, Arabs,” he says. “If a woman is walking home late at night, she can stop here and feel safe.”
Späti-owner Herr Murat has been featured in the press throughout the years.
Among those welcomed, it turns out, was the American pop-rock band OneRepublic. Murat has the receipts, pulling up photos of him meeting the band, right where I’m standing. Apparently, they did a spontaneous performance among the Pringles.
Spät Campus is his pride and joy.
Shop—or international music stage?
For me, it was the 2024 UEFA European Championship that showed how much the Späti adds its all-encompassing spice to city life.
The 2024 UEFA European Championship showed how much the Späti adds its all-encompassing spice to city life.
With Germany hosting, around 2.5 million visitors packed out Berlin, cramming into fan zones like the one under the Brandenburg Gate. But out in the Kieze, the city’s neighbourhoods, locals took to the streets. Späti owners rolled out flatscreens, strung up bunting with German and Turkish flags, stacked crates into viewing rows, and created spontaneous street-side stadiums.
Cars were blocked from elbow-to-elbow streets, where real fans grabbed a Club Mate (sometimes topped with vodka) and claimed a seat. Or, if that failed, a kerb.
A Späti rocking the "Berlin Bear"—the symbol of the city.
Are the salty snacks of the Späti under threat?
Despite their beloved status, Spätis face threats to their 24-hour reign. The biggest? The quiet Sunday rules—the so-called “Sonntag laws”—prohibit shops from opening on Sundays and public holidays. Spätis aren’t supposed to open on the day of rest, but Murat is scathing of the concept.
“It used to be totally normal,” he says. “Then someone complained—and suddenly it became a big deal. The authorities woke up. The Ordnungsamt started cracking down.”
In response, Späti owners formed an association. “One person handles all the paperwork to make it easier to stay open.” Still, he says, politicians are starting to see Spätis as a cultural institution. And for now? “No more problems.”
With clubs becoming unaffordable, I’ll cling to my holy Sunday smoke machines, techno, and two-euro beers for as long as the Berlin authorities let me.
get in the know Thanks to Germany's Freikorperkultur (free body culture), it's perfectly legal, and not unusual in the slightest, to sunbathe completely naked in Berlin parks like Tiergarten.
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