By: Deborah Johnson Wood
Kathleen Fagan Riegler, owner of The Cheese Lady, doesn’t waste time—she closed on her new building in downtown Muskegon on a Friday, moved her shop into the new space over the weekend and reopened the following Tuesday.
The 5,000-square-foot-plus building at 808 Terrace St. has 13-inch-thick poured concrete walls, and gives Riegler some 2,000-square-feet instead of the 900 she had in her old space on Clay Street. She leased another 2,000-square-feet to a new bakery that opens next month. In addition, Riegler and her husband, John, hope to renovate a rear 1,600-square-foot space into an urban apartment for themselves.
“Our long-term plan is to live downtown, and we wanted to keep the store downtown,” she says. “The building was considered a bomb shelter in the 1950s, so it’s really solid.”
The Cheese Lady offers over 100 cheeses and an eclectic selection of wines to go with them. In addition, the shop has fruit preserves and other treats, and recently expanded its product lines to include delicacies such as duck and rabbit.
Riegler says the store is doing so well she needs the larger space to accommodate groups for her “Cheese Talks”—informal tasting sessions where participants learn about cheeses.
“A lot of people are interested in cheese but they don’t know why cheese is a big deal,” Riegler says. “They’ve been buying cheese at the grocery store for years, but when they start coming in here and tasting things they discover the cheese world is a way bigger world than they thought.”
Riegler plans a Grand Opening celebration November 6, 7 and 8, featuring wine experts, demonstrations on the Michigan-made product lines she offers, and specials on cheeses.
Source: Kathleen Riegler, The Cheese Lady
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Deborah Johnson Wood is development news editor for Rapid Growth Media. She can be contacted at [email protected].
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