The Future Bars Inc. cocktail bar at 501 Jones Street opens its 20th year this August with the same house rules it posted before the iPhone shipped: no phones, no standing at the bar, no Cosmopolitans.

Bourbon & Branch opens its 20th year this August with the same rules on the wall it had when it opened in 2006 — before the iPhone, before the no-phones-at-dinner conversation, before any of it became a hospitality talking point.

The bar at 501 Jones Street in the Tenderloin was opened by Future Bars Inc. in August 2006 and has operated under the same house rules since day one. They are posted on the bar's official website verbatim: "Please Speak Easy / No Cell Phone Use / No Standing at the Bar / Don't Even Think of Asking for A 'Cosmo' / Smokers, Use Back Door / No Photography / Please Be Patient, Our Drinks Are Labor Intensive / Please Exit Bourbon & Branch Quietly."

Brian Sheehy, CEO of Future Bars Inc., told SFGate the phone ban came from watching the experience at fine bars and restaurants erode. "We really [banned phones] because we could see when we went out to other finer bars or fine dining restaurants, you know those beautiful experiences were becoming more and more destroyed by loud ringtones... people taking calls at the middle of dinner," he said. The policy predates Apple's 2007 iPhone release by roughly a year.

The premises expanded from 501 to include 503 Jones Street following a San Francisco Board of Supervisors approval in June 2008. The bar now runs three reservable spaces — the main bar, the Wilson & Wilson room, and Russells Room — plus a walk-in Library Bar whose password is "books." General Manager Anastacia Cortez oversees current operations. The bar holds a California ABC Type 48 On-Sale General license (No. 00463079) issued to Future Bars Inc. Opening-year capacity was approximately 65 seats; a current figure was not confirmed.

Enforcement of the rules has stayed graduated: a polite reminder on the first offense, removal for a repeat, according to reporting by KION Central Coast. The speakeasy format Bourbon & Branch helped establish in the mid-2000s produced many imitators; most softened their rules within a few years. At 501 Jones, nothing has been softened. Twenty years is a long lease on a clear idea.