BY DAN HILDEBRAN
Monitor Editor
KEYSTONE HEIGHTS— The Clay County Chamber of Commerce hosted a ribbon cutting for three of the Lake Region’s newest businesses.
Jennifer Ford opened her community enrichment center called the Learning Wheel last year, and then followed that up with two additional enterprises within the same building next door to American Legion Post 202: The Tea Room and The Party Place.
After the ribbon cutting, Ford talked to the crowd from the Tea Room which she said can host parties from two to 22 guests. She then talked about the other side of the State Road 21 building.
“It’s a brick-and-mortar space for people in the community and surrounding communities to come and teach a class, a craft or a skill,” she said. “So basically, I provide the brick-and-mortar space. You come in and offer something to the community and give me a little something to keep the lights on and pay the insurance.”
Ford added that the Tea Room arose from her original Learning Wheel concept. She also said when the enrichment center is not hosting classes, it doubles as a third enterprise: The Party Place.
“So, what we have here is a three-ring circus,” Ford said, “or what I like to call: A business plan gone wild.”
Shortly after opening her doors in October, Ford told The Monitor that for over 20 years, she had dreamed about opening something like a small café or coffee house, but the timing was never right. She homeschooled her daughters, who are now 23 and 30, and after moving to the Lake Region eight years ago, much of her time has been spent on her family’s small farm.
In addition, she saw that the community already had a successful coffee house operating.
“I’m not about competition as I am about contributing to the community,” she said.
Ford added that she thought she saw a need in the area for an enrichment center, a place where independent instructors like music teachers, yoga instructors, and tutors could meet with students and hold classes. She christened the concept “The Learning Wheel” and began some market research on social media.
“Keystone didn’t have an enrichment center, so I thought that might be a good fit for the community,” she recalled, “I put it out on social media and got a lot of positive feedback.”
However, Ford said she soon realized that most of the interest on social media was from people that wanted to take classes rather than from her potential customers: instructors to teach the classes.
“Without teachers or instructors, I don’t have a business because obviously, there’s only one of me and I can’t teach all of the classes,” she said.
From that point Ford began to look for a way to change the business model while retaining much of her original vision. The result was a meeting venue and Tea Room within the enrichment center.
During the ribbon cutting, Ford said the Tea Room’s business has grown well beyond her expectations.
“I book a lot of parties with ladies in the five-to-10-person range,” she said. “There are parties that come in the two-to-four-person range, but the reservations tend to be bigger with churches, book clubs and other groups.”
Ford said recently a group of Mary Kay consultants met in the Tea Room for a party, then walked to the other side of the building and gave one another facials.
“That was a double-doozie, if you will, and that is exactly how I envisioned this place to be used,” she said.
