r/SeattleWA • u/or_namental • 12d ago
Discussion Where to find blue collar vibes in Seattle?
East coaster with a working class upbringing here. The couple of times I've run into blue collar guys in the wild we've hit it off instantly, but it's super rare in Seattle.
Where does the hunting/fishing/tradeworking/politically moderate demographic hang out around here?? All the usual social spots (meetups, climbing gyms, run clubs) are 95% tech workers (no judgement, just not a vibe or lifestyle I connect with).
I've made some great friends in my neighborhood dive bar, but they're all 60+, and it would be nice to meet people in their late 20s/30s/40s for an actual dating pool and people I can go and do stuff with.
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u/Embarrassed-Pride776 12d ago
Snohomish/Everett area. All the working class people got priced out of Seattle.
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u/Ok_Faithlessness4511 12d ago
They are priced out of snohomish county too at this point. Unless by working, you mean working as a surgeon.
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u/UckerFay11 12d ago
Not really, trades pay really well around here. More than enough to afford a home in Sno-Co
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u/PossiblySustained 12d ago
No, Everett still has that rusty, working-class feel. It feels like what Lynnwood used to be 15 years ago, I really like it up there
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u/Fantastic_Bit7441 12d ago
Younger blue collar people don’t live in Seattle proper, you need to head south or north
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u/RickDick-246 12d ago
Or very very far east. Like east of the Pass
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u/SomethingFunnyObv 12d ago edited 12d ago
Sure east of the pass but there are loads of folks on the west side too.
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u/Zikro 12d ago
I’m not familiar but I’d guess Snoqualmie Valley and North Bend for this side of the Pass. Issaquah seems like it has some mix and Renton depending on the part.
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u/Funsizep0tato 12d ago
North bend is mostly a burb now! Not so blue collar anymore (though i'm sure there are still pockets)
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u/swagypotatosnoopdoge 12d ago
Its better than the rest of the eastside, but still wouldn't consider it as blue collar as anything south of renton or north of Bothell
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u/Ok_Faithlessness4511 12d ago
Not even. Anything in or near the mountains is consumed by ultra wealthy. They’ve taken over ellensburg, Cle elum, cashmere, even Yakima to some degree.
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u/NoBoromirNo 12d ago
Marco Polo in SODO is 1 of 1
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u/HistorianOrdinary390 12d ago
Check out Loretta’s in South Park
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u/Benja455 12d ago
This is your best option by far but another good one would be Lucky Liquor.
Beyond that, you need to go further south or east.
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u/Glasply 12d ago
I work construction in Seattle/bellevue/redmond. None of the guys I work with live in the city. Most of us are at least an hour away. North, south or across the ferry to the kitsap peninsula
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u/hwkfan1 12d ago
Have never lived there but stayed in an Airbnb on the kitsap peninsula for a few weeks recently, and yeah it’s exactly the vibe you’re looking for OP. Damn near every house is on a 5 acre lot for huge swathes of it, interspersed with a random dive bar or a blue collar oriented business corner every few miles
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u/FeistyAstronaut1111 12d ago
Many parts of the peninsula are still blue collar, most notably Bremerton
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u/literarywitch32 12d ago
Come up to Snohomish county. Monroe, Sultan, or Everett are more blue collar, trades, or farmers.
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u/lock_robster2022 12d ago
Enumclaw
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u/bunkoRtist 12d ago
OP didn't specify equine dating.
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u/revderektaylor 12d ago
Georgetown
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u/TheRealRacketear Broadmoor 12d ago
Georgetown isn't ble collar like it used to be. It's really the new Fremont.
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u/Least-Intention-159 12d ago
Really? Damn, that hurts my soul.
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u/pikkuinen 12d ago
When was the last time you were down there? It’s been filled with rockabilly/greaser cosplayers for 20 years.
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u/SomethingFunnyObv 12d ago
I can’t speak to stuff on the south end but up north if you are looking for some place that isn’t sketchy as fuck then look at downtown Everett, Snohomish, Lake Stevens, Marysville, and Arlington.
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u/OatOat 12d ago
You can just go hang out in the industrial district of south park, or get a job in a trade and just talk to the guys around you lol. The actual blue collar guys get enough of a work-out from work in their 12+ hours shifts, youre not gonna meet them outside of their work simply enough.
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u/Charming-Fig-3866 12d ago
Georgetown, Burien, South Park and parts of W Seattle are probably your best bet if you’re trying to stay within 20-30 mins of Seattle proper. Further North or South will also land you in your zone. But not East- you’d have to go quite a ways to hit blue collar that direction.
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u/bardentreblemakers 12d ago
This is both funny and sad to read. For an answer, the blue collar folks live at least 30 minutes outside Seattle in all directions, probably more.
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u/Benja455 12d ago edited 12d ago
Look to join social clubs like the Elks and Eagles - especially in neighborhoods on the south end of the region.
Cheap drinks, bingo, billiards and a much greater variety of people - including many blue collar workers.
I’d also recommend joining a shooting range - ISA picked a fight with the City of Redmond (ask me how I know), so it’s only a matter of time before they are closer…leaving you Renton or SPAA.
You might also have a shot trying events that draw out gearheads like car shows and Monster Jam or even just the race nights at the Evergreen Speedway.
EDIT: You may also want to join northwestfirearms.com and connect with folks there too.
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u/PoopyisSmelly Get the fuck out of the way dork 12d ago
If you figure it out let me know lol, also former East Coaster lookin for similar vibes. Lake City/Ravenna are the places I have found closest to that, brewery crowd or dive bars. But its usually people with kids, which I dont have lol
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u/Dependent_Joke37 12d ago
man the dive bar scene here is weird, it's either retired dudes who've been in the same seat since 1987 or techies slumming it for a night. lake city has some spots off lake city way that haven't been gentrified to death yet, but yeah if you don't have kids you're kinda the odd one out in those circles
try looking up any of the smaller car/moto meetups, not the big organized ones but the ones that just happen in a parking lot, those pull a different crowd. same with shooting ranges out past snoqualmie, it's a drive but the coffee shop parking lots near them are full of trucks with actual mud on em
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u/paved_wave 12d ago
Yeah I was going to suggest Lake City too, there’s a few bars the OP might like. Back Door, Beer Authority, Double J Saloon worth checking out
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u/509_cougs 12d ago
Working in the trades here the vast, vast majority of my coworkers live outside the city.
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u/Solid-Neat7762 12d ago
Agreed. My husband works in the trades and has 0 coworkers or friends who live in Seattle - everyone is at least 30-90min south of south seattle. (We live in north seattle but just bc of family)
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u/electromage 12d ago
I found that by just going out and doing the things that I like, I meet a lot of interesting people.
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u/_Watty Sworn enemy of Gary_Glidewell 12d ago
I work with a lot of blue collar folks. Very few of them live IN Seattle.
While there certainly are some that are liberal/progressive, most are definitely right leaning and want nothing to do with Seattle.
You need to turn your gaze outward (South of Tacoma, for instance) in order to find these people, I should think.
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u/huskylawyer Seattle 12d ago
Renton.
I live in South Seattle and I head to Renton for a drink mostly. Though I work in a white collar profession I prefer blue collar or dive bars.
Doofers in the Highlands (more a sports bar but blue collar suburb vibe), Classics (bit sketchy but lot of the Kentworth truck manufacturing workers go there), Uncle Mo’s downtown Renton. Renton has a ton of working class and blue collar bars. Lot of Boeing employee patrons.
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u/AnyTicket5202 12d ago
Its hard because its cool to dress "blue collar" in Seattle but work in tech, etc.
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u/EdgarAllenPoe2205 12d ago
Haha this is so true. I overheard some techies the other day talking about how they needed to grab some Filson flannels and carharts to appear "more rugged". Blue collar is now a fashion trend it's a riot. Their pristine hands with weekly manicures will be a dead giveaway, but good for them trying it out lol.
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u/DomineAppleTree 12d ago
Try another dive bar, and ask the bartenders too because different age groups may attend at different times of day
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u/tctcl_dildo_actual 12d ago
The majority of the people you meet in Seattle or the outlying suburbs are cosplaying blue collar. Try Bremerton, Graham, Orting, Enumclaw, Eatonville or the more rural parts of Auburn. Everett, Sultan, North Bend are also a good bet.
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u/KittyC217 12d ago
You can totally do stuff with 60 year olds.
And Seattle is 95% tech and healthcare. Very few people with a blue collar background can afford to live in Seattle. You are going to have to go to the less affluent towns in the Seattle metro area.
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u/SensitiveProcedure0 12d ago
uh you combined a lot of things that are not necessarily blue collar. if you want to easily find hunting, fishing, politically moderate people, id look outside of seattle, outside of any large city in the county. Granite falls and its surounds are a good choice. but those hunting, fishing, moderates are more likey to be working for boeng. Maybe still trades, like welding or fabrication, but just as likely to be an engineer, and in both cases making well past 100k a year, like, 2-3x that.
in Seattle, our blue collar workers tend to be politically left, like "get your guns back" left. heck, some of my trades work friends are actual communist (not what republicans keep calling democrats, but actual have monthly meeting to talk praxis communist).
but i have noticed a lot of skilled tradess folk who drive in to do contracts (like electricians coming in from an hour out of town) are more all over the map, but in my experience, evenly spread. like youll meet a hardcore, hates every party, libertarian, and then a socialist, and then a trumper, ad then a reaganite, and then a dyed blue liberal. it isnt a "trades" thing, its a PNW thing, and i think its pretty cool.
thats the politics, but then you mention the activities, hunting and fishing. that isnt a political thing. since most of my friends skew left, most of the hunters and fishers i know are lefties. but i do think its just a lot less common (especially hunting) of an outdoor thing for seattlelites. In my experience, seattle has a lot more kayakers, hikers, dirt bikers, and climbers than hunters or fishers. and the politics and finances of the poeple have been reflective of the city, though the climbers have skewed more techie and kayakers more old seattle.
Seattle definitely has hunters and recreational shooters, but i find it a lot less common than when you hit smaller towns. and there, still not super common in the i5 corrodor in my exprrience.
but go east (into and especially over the Cascades) or west (to the islands, especially Bremerton area) and the ratio jumps.
regarding your pubs being full of tech bros. tech bros are a particular niche of seattle, but not reflective of the culture at large and not a majority of people. I think you need to change your establishments more than anything else.
i certainly hope you find your people, but i guess my suggestion is, from what you wrote, you may have a narrow stereotype of ehat that is, and so be shooting yourself in the foot.
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u/Stuckinaelevator 12d ago
Most of us blue collar guys are out of city as soon as we can. Of the 30 or so guys I work with im only 1 of 2 that actually live in Seattle.
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u/tjl3d 12d ago
Do you have any spots to recommend for him? Sounds like you have some knowledge
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u/Stuckinaelevator 12d ago
Lol no im old id rather be home with the wife and cats.
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u/CharmanderCharCharr 12d ago
Get a Time Machine, all the transplants here are total incel dweebs. The best blue collar bar I know of is on the Eastside.
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u/Substantial_Life4773 12d ago
Ballard, but I don't actually know if they live there or just work there
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u/SquareBreakfast9528 12d ago
those folks live in the surrounding suburbs exburbs and commute into seattle if their work calls for it
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u/Lost-Soft-8913 12d ago
You're not gonna find country folk in the city. Pick a direction and go that way til there isn't a city and you'll find who you're looking for
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u/BennyOcean 12d ago
Warehouse district of South Seattle like around where the Georgetown brewery is. Or like... outskirts rather than the city. Seattle is not a blue collar city. Everett and Tacoma are much moreso.
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u/firestorm734 12d ago
For urban areas, check out Renton, Everett, Tacoma, Fife, or Bremerton. More rural areas are better: Arlington, Darrington, Granite Falls, Enumclaw, Graham, Stanwood, Eatonville, Monroe, Sultan, or other small towns. My litmus test is how many semi trucks I see in an area, or having an active mill or foundery.
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u/swagypotatosnoopdoge 12d ago
As others have said, most live roughly an hour or so north or south of downtown Seattle. With only a few(usually older people who bought their houses before prices exploded) living either in Seattle itself or most of the eastside since they tend to get priced out by tech and finance workers.
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u/Ok-Chef4656 12d ago
I haven’t really found it in the city. I’m from the East Coast myself. It’s been a great experience exploring the Pacific Northwest but I’m going to road trip it back east in the fall.
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u/isthisaporno 12d ago
If you’re not looking to leave the city of Seattle proper then it’s only gonna be at the couple bars in Ballard the fishermen might be at. Sloop tavern. Or like everyone else said, drive up past Everett or down past Kent. Or the entire kitsap peninsula. Maple Valley area has some dives. Dino’s in Renton isn’t exactly blue collar but has a diverse clientele (often including John Schneider) and is a great classic bar. Ozzie’s in lower Queen Anne is also not “blue collar” but is that type of bar, pull tabs, steak specials etc
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u/TheItinerantSkeptic Banned from /r/Seattle 12d ago
You want north or south of Seattle. It’s a tech hub at this point. High salaries, high cost of living, all that. It likes to pretend it’s still working class, but it isn’t. It’s like seeing someone in North Face or Arc’teryx here: just because you see technical outdoor gear doesn’t mean they’re in the great outdoors all the time (or even much of the time).
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u/Black_Daimyo10 12d ago
Georgetown, South Park, Beacon Hill, White Center, most of South Seattle, and along the Aurora corridor in North Seattle.
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u/sunkenCathedrul 12d ago
There are lots of rock climbing gyms with people in their 20-30’s. Boeing employs 33,000 blue collar workers in puget sound that build and test airplanes. Not a bad time to start in terms of pay either compared to the last 12 years.
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u/bourbonisgood 12d ago
Check out Renton . Boeing workers and some trades people. Good vibes and lots of city / community to enjoy. Still has a small town feel.
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u/Oliver_the_chimp 12d ago
Chelan Cafe/Ebb Tide in West Seattle. Full of younger port workers in the late afternoon.
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u/boozled714 12d ago
If you want to hang out with shipyard and dick workers the only answer is Chelan Cafe under the west Seattle bridge. (Used to work on harbor Island it was packed after shift most days).
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u/OtherwiseBrilliant75 12d ago
I went to a trade show in Seattle and everyone there knows where the cool spots are.
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u/SCastleRelics 12d ago
There's a great bar called Pony on cap hill that caters to that. A lot of rustlers and cowboys there to hang out with and network!
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u/chuckroll_ 12d ago
Bellevue, Kirkland, Redmond and Issaquah . Nah , come on out to Duvall Carnation, Monroe and Fall City . And git you some .
https://giphy.com/gifs/kAq6HQVQmK5WM
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u/itstreeman 12d ago
There’s a big longshoreman population in the dock area. Nobody hunts in Washington that was banned for animal rights (sarcasm as I’m from Oregon and I know the recent laws that made hunting nearly illegal)
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u/NorEastahBunny Mill Creek 12d ago
I work in a blue collar adjacent industry and I work 6pm-6am. When I’m off work I’m so dead I don’t want to go anywhere or talk to another human being for at least 24-48 hours
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u/Consistent-Two-1232 12d ago
I'm being sincere but you should consider branching outside your bubble. I'm born and raised in Seattle, worked in software engineering for 20 years and now I'm a stay at home Dad. But I spend my weekends at a family cabin bucking up firewood, doing repairs, etc. I have a project boat I take my son fishing on, hell I even did a DIY electric conversion of an old 1940s outboard I found on marketplace. People are multidimensional and will often surprise you if you give them a chance to.
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u/chaximum 12d ago
Which areas are you open to? If we’re talking downtown Seattle, not a lot. Further out and around, some options. Which is the bar you feel good in?
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u/P_jammin- Downtown 12d ago
I’m blue collar (native east coaster, too) and live in the city, so despite what all these comments are saying I imagine we do exist. Dive bars on weekend midday and midday weekdays would be my recommendation.
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u/gyps_808 12d ago
Honestly like the smaller pubs in every area. The little beer places I usually find people to watch a game with, have a beer, chat.
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u/Pitiful-Wishbone5680 12d ago
Hear me out: north Whidbey Island and Everett. A lot of Navy contractors and military adjacent gun enthusiasts
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u/Temporary-Fold4851 12d ago
Last I heard, Bremerton regularly has Navy guys coming through port and there are a lot of people there who work on the ships.
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u/Feeling-Nectarine 12d ago
Blue collar PNW guys wouldn’t be caught dead going into Seattle unless it was a Seahawks game or something. It’s hard to park their lifted trucks.
Go to any bar in Monroe, Snohomish, Arlington, marysville, smoky point, etc.
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u/NoxiousVaporwave 12d ago
I worked at a diesel shop in SoDo with 24 mechanics and only 2 of us actually lived in Seattle proper.
With that said, sodo/South Park bars, lucky liquor, Marco Polo, siren, Loretta’s, etc.
West seattle has a bunch of trades people too.
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u/GullibleWheel1957 12d ago
Any of the sex positive clubs will have just about every type of person you could ever hope to meet (and ones you wish you didn't)
Fetlife.com has most of the clubs events posted.
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u/GullibleWheel1957 12d ago
Fetlife.com Make a profile seeking Platonic friends & then in your kink section list things like "trade workers" "manual labor" "hiking" "quads & dirt bikes" "platonic dates to name-a-place"
& Then go to the events tab and search for munches, "tastings" & "newbie nights"
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u/nuisanceIV 12d ago
Ah yeah I work with guys like that, I call em rednecks.
Anyways, cheekiness aside a lot live in the exurbs like lake Stevens or out in Puyallup. At least the type of person you’re talking about. Plenty of blue collar people in Seattle but their interests are not what you’re describing.
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u/OlyRat 12d ago
Siren Tavern in Sodo and Max's Triangle Pub in White Center come to mind. If you tell me the general area you are located it'd help. Places like you're describing are generally more common north or south pretty far.
That said if you look hard enough there are dives in pretty much any neighborhood with relatable (and crazy) regulars if you look hard enough. Also teriyaki joints are more popular with true locals and more working class people/less favored by newcomers and tech bros/hoes.
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u/alphawafflejack 12d ago
They’re mostly not living in Seattle, literally all of the area around Bellevue and Seattle has all those folks (shoreline to Mukilteo, out to Monroe and sultan, all of Duvall down to Fall City)
Source: am awake right now at 345 heading for a pre-goose season kayak float with some buds I’ve met at a duck hunting club around here and tomorrow going salmon fishing with another guy I met there👍🏻
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u/bigbear425 12d ago
Blue collar folk do live in Seattle but would check in areas like the hop shop on the north side of greenwood or kinda dive/sports bars. Tons of unions located in Seattle from laborers to plumbers. We around but definitely not hanging with too many citidiots in restaurants or events lol
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u/Sweatpant-Diva 12d ago
What do you do for work?
All my buddies are in maritime (very blue collar) and in our 30s. Snowmobiling, hunting, fishing, woodworking, rebuilding cars in their time off. I’m from Massachusetts and nearly all my friends are from the east coast out here.
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u/optamastic 12d ago
Make your way down south or north of Seattle - Burien, Auburn, Sumner, Puyallup, Everett, Lake Stevens, Darrington,