Downtown Moberly features many different small businesses, but the two that occupy 517 W. Reed Street have an interesting upbringing.
Pat Myles runs a tea room with her sister, Joy Roberts, called Tea and Treasures that is open on weekends. Since early December, they have served tea and pastries while also providing a place indoors where people can sit and interact.
“We haven’t been here long enough to actually make a salary for us, and thank goodness our husbands don’t expect that,” Pat said.
Pat and Joy’s business is not open every weekend because they share their space with a bakery called Addi Lea’s. Pat and Joy operate the space every first, second and fourth weekends of the month, while Addi Lea’s takes up the third weekend of each month.
Main Street Moberly, which is an office that assists small businesses downtown, wanted to fill the space with two businesses to help decrease startup costs by sharing the space. The fact that the space had originally been a bakery intrigued Pat to move forward, but her biggest motivation came from her granddaughter being one of the masterminds behind the project.
“I helped to make advertising for them, I came up with all of the liaison agreements and I had a large part in decorating the shop as well,” said Magdalena Myles, a junior student at Moberly High School.
Magdalena is a member of DECA, which is a national organization that gives students real-life experiences in marketing, finance, and entrepreneurship. For her annual DECA project, Magdalena decided to build on Main Street Moberly’s idea of putting two businesses in one place and helped her grandmother’s dream come true.
“Finally, one night she came down to the house and she said, ‘Grandma, I thought you wanted to do a tea room,’” Pat said. “I said, ‘I would love to do a tea room,’ and she said, “well, this is your perfect opportunity.’”
So Magdalena got her grandmother in touch with Diane Richardson, the executive director for Main Street Moberly. Richardson said Magdalena’s involvement helped the idea for a tea room come to life and she saw it as a selling point for the shop.
“The outside of your store needs to look good. The inside needs to look good also. But what keeps people coming back into our businesses are the people in the businesses,” Richardson said. “It’s the stories of Pat and Joy. It’s the stories of [Magdalena]. And so, to me, that’s the way to kind of keep the momentum going.”
Magdalena became an integral part of the planning process for both businesses. She took the lead on designing the interior of the space and getting food licenses and other health department approvals.
Pat said she and her sister had to adapt to some changes while first starting up, including learning how to use the convection oven already located in the facility. Both businesses use the oven to cook different baked goods, but neither sell the same thing. Pat’s business, Tea and Treasures, usually bakes scones and banana bread, while Addi Lea’s bakes cakes and pies.
Pat said she also had to get used to packing up some of the things whenever Addi Lea’s was set to open the next weekend.
“It takes an extra two hours or so. Our serving platters and our display pieces all have to be put away into plastic tubs and stacked out of the way,” Pat said. “But all of that became a process of learning, trial and error, to see what was necessary to get out of sight.”
Pat said she hopes one day to be able to open the shop four days a week. Roberts said during the week, when the store is closed, they have enjoyed using the space for various family get-togethers.
“When we have an occasion to have a party, like a birthday dinner or a high tea or any kind of a party, my husband will come in and do dishes or the nieces and nephews will come in and help us and so we’re kind of family-supported in that respect,” Roberts said.
Pat said she also enjoys how her granddaughter has become such an integral part of the shop’s success.
“She’s encouraging. For 16 years old, you know, she’s really forward-looking,” Pat said. “She has kind of an unusual understanding of what it takes to do a business.”
Magdalena’s project has also caught much more than just local attention. DECA holds annual competitions where students can show off their projects to industry professionals. Magdalena’s project earned first place at both the district and state competitions and she will travel to Orlando, Florida to compete in the international competition in late April. She said she is proud of her project’s impact on the community.
“I think it’s important that small businesses have a way to really thrive, and the way that the economy is going right now, it’s hard for them to get the loans that they need and then be able to pay them back,” Magdalena said. “But doing it this way, it splits the costs up between multiple liaisons, and so it’s a lot easier.”
Magdalena’s project has worked out so much that the property owner asked Richardson whether or not this idea could work at one of his other buildings in the area.
“Well, yeah, it probably would, but we need to clone [Magdalena] and myself to make that happen or it isn’t going to happen,” Richardson said.
Magdalena said after high school, she hopes to attend the University of Missouri business school. She said she doesn’t know what her DECA project will be next year, but she hopes to improve the process of starting a small business just like she has with her grandmother and great aunt.
“It really is our ultimate goal every day to make somebody’s life better [and] happier by what we provide here,” Pat said.