Bulls, Business & Community: Inside the Waconia Rodeo Experience

What does it take to bring one of Waconia's most exciting annual events to life?

In this episode, host Christine Fenner, President of the Waconia Chamber of Commerce sits down with Ted Slathar, Owner and Operator of Extreme Events MN, rodeo clown Nick Kaup, and photographer Chloe Hatzenbeller of Chloe K Photography to talk about the passion, planning, and partnerships behind the Waconia Rodeo. Together they discuss the growth of Extreme Events MN, the impact these events have on local businesses and tourism, and what goes on behind the scenes to create an unforgettable experience for competitors, families, and the community. 

Whether you're a rodeo fan, local business owner, or simply curious about what makes Waconia such a vibrant community, this conversation offers a unique look at the people and purpose driving one of the area's signature events.

Learn more about Extreme Events MN: Extreme Events MN

Stay connected with Destination Waconia:
Visit us at www.destinationwaconia.org and follow along for more stories, events, and community highlights.
Facebook: @DestinationWaconia
Instagram: @destinationwaconia
YouTube: @destinationwaconia8711

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:07

Welcome to Destination Waconia, the podcast. This is the debut. This is sort of a brainchild that's coming to life. I can't believe we're we're doing it and we're we're we're amateurs, but I think this is fun. How did this start? I think just some conversations and history and how did it start for you?

SPEAKER_00 0:26

Well, I just um really wanted to know the Macinton story, like where it came from, where did they start? Where did Kim's grandpa and brother come? Where did and how did it go from Plato to Waconia? And just that history is just so important, and it starts to lose as generations go by when people s don't remember as much.

SPEAKER_01 0:48

So this is our first debut episode, but we should probably back up and explain who we are. Um, I'm Christine Fenner, president of the Waconia Chamber, and we have a tourism bureau as part of the chamber, and so I think it started those conversations started with the tourism bureau. Maybe we should go around and introduce ourselves.

SPEAKER_02 1:07

So I'm Dee DeLang, and I was president of the tourism board for quite some time. I think this whole situation came about because Ted brought it up one day at a meeting, and we all just thought, what a fabulous idea. And there's so much history in Waconia that we need to get on video, get on, get down, wrote down somewhere that before it's lost. So that's kind of how I see it was happening.

SPEAKER_00 1:32

And I'm Ted Slyther, and I just really think it's great to document this stuff and Extreme Rodeo, we're at your place, sitting on saddles.

SPEAKER_01 1:40

I mean, that should be noted.

SPEAKER_00 1:42

We're we're saddled up for the conversations.

SPEAKER_01 1:44

So you got it. I I think of you when you think of Waconia's favorites, you know, things like Coney Island and Nickel Dickle and Macinton's fine foods come up. So one of I think all of us share that one of our favorite people is is Kim McIntoon. And so we're gonna bring him out in a minute and and ask him all kinds of questions and history and what do things look like today, what did they look like back then? But curiosity from you two. If you could describe Kim in one word, putting him on the spot, what would it be?

SPEAKER_02 2:12

Definitely putting this on the spot.

SPEAKER_00 2:14

Um He's the godfather of Waconia.

SPEAKER_01 2:16

Kind yeah, there you go.

SPEAKER_00 2:19

He's just great, and yes, very genuine, uh just a great, great person. His whole family's great, and I'm anxious to hear his story.

SPEAKER_01 2:26

Genuine was my word too.

SPEAKER_02 2:27

Genuine, genuine, absolutely walking into Macintosons, as soon as I see Kim, my face lights up, his face lights up. He's always got a smile for everybody, and just an all-around great family. We're lucky, very, very lucky to have Macintosons inponies.

SPEAKER_01 2:42

All right, you've known Kim a long time. Is there anything that we should know that you know that behind? You know, what what point people not know?

SPEAKER_00 2:50

So Kim's a rodeo buff, and he and I have been to quite a few rodeos together, and and this is our 15th year of the Waconia rodeo, and Kim has been with me, and the Macintosh has been with us for all of those 15 years, but he's traveled to Las Vegas with me. We've gone to Suit Balls, and so if there's anything that people may not know about Kim, that's it.

SPEAKER_01 3:11

I like it. Any other you you can throw them out there if you think of them later. All right, I think that's a good intro. Kim McIntosh started the Tourism Bureau 26 years ago, has been part of the Chamber of Commerce for a long time, long time community member, advocate. So we want to get a little history and and dig into some of the the things that we should all know about. Um or ask him some questions. Thank you for kicking this off. Debut Destination Waconia the podcast. Here we go. The godfather, godfather of Waconia. That's a pretty big title.

SPEAKER_04 3:43

That makes me feel pretty old though, Christine. I don't know about that one or not.

SPEAKER_01 3:46

I like it. I think that's pretty impressive. Okay. Kim, thanks for being the guinea pig for this debut. It's always fun to talk to you. It's always fun to hear stories. Um, dehydrated earlier, uh, genuine, loyal, you know, to Waconia, long history. You've shared little bits throughout, you know, the time that I've gotten to know you. And I think this is a fun time to talk a little bit more. You know, what's what are the early days of Waconia? Macintosh fine foods over 100 years old. What are the early days of of the grocery store? And we just want to sit and chat and have a conversation. And yeah. So I kind of want to start with the Waconia roots. You know, what what's young Kim McIntoon? What was your earliest memory of Waconia in your family?

SPEAKER_04 4:27

I think one thing that Ted had brought up before, he wanted to see how we ever got here, even before my time, probably, and uh how Macintons got to Waconia, and then maybe get into me as a little kid. I guess the way that went was that we say Macintosh find food since 1917, like we just saw in 1917. Well, that's not quite right, because my great-grandfather, August MacIntoon, he had a meat market prior to Arthur McIntoon, my grandfather in Laconia. And I remember, and he was in Plato, about 12, 14 miles west of Laconia. So I remember working with my grandfather and my dad, and I I asked my grandpa once, when did your dad ever start in uh in Plato? And he said, you know, I don't know. It was probably sometime around 1900 shortly after. He said, the only reason I can tell you that is because my grandpa remembered working there at his dad's place as a young as a young man, too and a young kid. And and then when my grandfather got married in 1916, great grandpa said, well, there's not enough business in Plato for two families, so my grandfather moved to Oconia. And he uh he opened his first store in 1917.

unknown 5:43

Wow.

SPEAKER_01 5:44

So even longer than we we thought.

SPEAKER_04 5:46

Yeah, it's uh but in Waconia we've been there, but but the family has been in business. I mean, our kids, Jane and Jessa, they're the fifth generation of the family now. That's pretty awesome.

SPEAKER_01 5:56

Yeah. So when you think about Waconia, so you were born and raised in Waconia. Yes. So when you think about for people who have never been to Waconia, how would you describe it in a few words? What does it mean? Aaron Ross Powell, Jr.

SPEAKER_04 6:06

You know what? I don't know. It it it's one of the loveliest communities you can find anywhere, the peaceful lake, you know, the people have always been a little bit more laid back and a lot friendlier too. You walk down the street and you can say hi to everybody and whatever. You don't get that in every town. You feel safe, the schools are good, the hospital's good, you got a great golf course, you got all the amenities, you got parks, you got walking trails. It's uh quite a place. Yeah. And it's close enough to the big city if that's where you want to go. I've been pretty happy in O'Konney. I do remember when I was back in high school, you know, all my friends would say, I I want to get to the big city, or I want to move here, move there, want to rest. Even as a kid, I just thought, God, I love it right here. I'm I'm happy here.

SPEAKER_01 6:46

Yeah. Well, I think I've seen a lot of people leave and then come back, or there there's a long lineage of um Carver County residents that they they're happy here, they stay here. How about you? Were was it always in the cards for you to be in the grocery business? Was it sort of expected of you, or did you say, yeah, this is for me, this is where I want to be? No, or both.

SPEAKER_04 7:08

You know, I actually started out going to college to be a veterinarian.

SPEAKER_01 7:12

Oh, wow.

SPEAKER_04 7:13

I could do an awful lot of that work and all that stuff, but boy, there was some of the chemistry and things like that that were just tweaking me. And so I uh I just said, you know, I can kick back a little bit. And I always liked working with my dad and my grandpa and all that. And I think that business degree sounds just fine as far as I'm concerned. So I kicked back and I finished my business degree and came to work at the store.

SPEAKER_01 7:35

So maybe there's that connection between rodeo and horses and animal. I don't know. It definitely.

SPEAKER_04 7:40

I when I was younger, you know, before the stores got as big as they are now, I had my own farm and I raised cattle, I raised a lot of horses. And so I I've always had my finger in agriculture. I can't anymore. It's just too much going on.

SPEAKER_01 7:53

But so what about the store? It's more than a grocery store now, you know, it it right? I mean, it was there a moment that you're like, this is bigger than than, you know, when your grandfather had it, and uh you know, how has it evolved over the years?

SPEAKER_04 8:10

When I was a kid, well, both my great-grandfather and my grandfather, um they would do the processing. They slaughtered every hug and every cow that went in the case that people would buy, you know, steaks from and whatever else. They also did custom slaughtering, you know, if uh farmer needed to fill his freezer, or if he had a brother or a sister that wanted a quarter of side, they'd slaughter it, package it, wrap it, freeze it, and put it in their freezer. So it's a big change today, yes, it is. Um back in those days was in a service meat case. He waited on people. My background was all in the meat department starting out. I started when I was so young in the meat department, I would be hopping the case. The other older meat cutters would keep the case full and I'd go out and I'd sell it to the customers. So I was so small. I'm talking about maybe seven, eight years old, nine years old. And uh I had a wooden crate back behind the counter that I'd step on so I could see over the counter, talk to the customers, go down, pick out the sticks they wanted, put them up, weigh them, wrap them, and then on the crate again and hand them over. That's how I started. When I was a kid, I found out that if I wanted to spend any time with dad, I had to go to a store with him, and that's what I did.

SPEAKER_01 9:20

I can imagine that. It just this cute little, you know, okay, sure, I'll keep buying from you. I I can imagine.

SPEAKER_04 9:28

You know, I also have to remember that back in those days, Wilkoni wasn't 2,000 people. Everybody knew everybody. And they knew me from the time I was born, so it was no big stretch.

SPEAKER_01 9:39

So how as the community has evolved and grown, you know, what what role do you see yourself playing in our community today? You know, what is how do you support local producers and partners and you know what what is 2026? What is what does that look like?

SPEAKER_04 9:57

Okay, that's you know, that's what I'm all about, really. And uh starting out, you know, being a bee butcher and being a meat department manager when we were still downtown and all I had managed to meat department for many, many years. But I got to have a passion for for that and other things perishable is my cup of tea, really, but uh I do the meat meats to produce. I actually went to school to bakery school, first bakery that we ever opened, just so that somebody knew how to run a bakery. And I started the deli myself and passed that on. When it comes to the meats and stuff, I I've really been very particular in that I love good beef, and I know most of our customers do. Uh so I have found a certified Angus line of beef is the best, but I found one spot that I can buy only local certified Angus beef, which I don't think too many other people can claim. I know nobody else in this market does, but all of our cattle have been raised within 250 miles of the Oconia store, or the Lonzale store and the Metatrista store. And they're all processed uh on the Iowa-Minnesota border and shipped to us. One of the closest producers who feeds many, many cattle, and they raised the baby cattle, are the sheffle binds up in Kimball, which is very close to us. I've taken our marketing crew up there, you can find it in our website. But so that along with the pork that we sell at the store is uh wholestone pork. It's all fit from family farms in southern Minnesota. So it's it's the pride that everybody else has in it that gives me the pride to be able to sell it to our customers. So that's the beef side for me to go on.

SPEAKER_01 11:42

Yeah, well, I know you have all the produce and it you know, local um vendors there as well. But yeah, I think people, especially with meat products, like to know what they're eating and that that it's local and uh that it's produced in the right way. And and so I think uh I think like you said, there's a lot of pride in that and and knowing what you're you're purchasing and and feeling good about that. So but I know there's more, so you sh you keep it.

SPEAKER_04 12:06

Moving from the meat department and having them start on the homemade sausage and stuff, that too. But you know, moving on to park, we've been the Minnesota ground retailer of the year as named by the Minnesota Department of Agriculture and the Minnesota Grocers Association so many times I can't count them all. And uh we're very proud of that, but we also want to protect that. And we we buy, when it comes to summertime, we buy for probably 40 local uh producers that are very proud of their products. Our number one producer is the Untied family between Waverley and Montreaux, they're only about 20, 22 miles from us. Everything is grown there. I was just up at their farms last week, going through their cropping. Uh kicking the dirt with dairy untied and looking for the asparagus. We'll be having asparagus over the next couple weeks and all locally grown, but all they've got tomato plants right now that are over my knee planting their high tunnels, and when it's warm enough they'll raise the tunnels up and they're all outside. But they can plant them early and uh get them going early and get tomatoes earliest. But when you go on these high tunnels to take a look at it, they've got their beehives for the per uh pollination and everything, and drip irrigation along everyone. It's it's amazing. One high tunnel with the tomatoes in was 900 feet long and there's six rows within that. They have 40 acres under high tunnels to grow melons, onions, and all this stuff is planted now already, because they can heat it when it's too cold. But uh Jerry and his family produce the best product out there. Uh they buy their seeds where it is the best. Most of their seeds for the vegetables and crops come from Europe, where it's uh all non-GMO seeds, and uh you can taste the difference, uh, be it their sweet corn, their watermelon, their melons, everything. It just I can't wait for their tomatoes. The tomatoes look beautiful, but they don't taste them because of cherry.

SPEAKER_01 14:06

So yeah. But uh you you've really raised the bar for grocery store and the grocery store experience, and customer service is always top. And and you know that my own dad um came from the grocery industry, and so I feel like I grew up as having a standard level to, you know, so it's it's fun to see um the the store grow and evolve. But Kimmy, you've been doing this a long time. I know you spend some time, you know, down south in the winter, but you probably could hang up your hat anytime. But you keep coming, you know, you I see you in the store, walking in, you know, greeting me at the door. Um, what keeps you motivated every day to, you know, to to keep doing what you're doing?

SPEAKER_04 14:46

I think that working with our kids pretty damn magical. And all the customers that I've known, as much as that the employees, we have like 450 employees right now. It's uh kind of blows me away. But I know so many employees. We do have a lot of employees that started out uh in high school, but a thermore manager in Laconia started out as 14 years old, I think, from Laconia High School, and he's managing the Laconia store now. We have have a lot of those. But there's so many times that, you know, a few years ago I had to have surgery, and then laying on the table and the head nurse in the surgery suite comes up to me and she says, Kim, we get to work on you today. She was the head surgical nurse. You know, and I I know so many of these people from the last 40 years, you know, that started out working with us and they keep coming back. And I mean, that's I don't know, it's pretty awesome to see how, you know, and they'll say that I learned how to do this working at Macintos. Yeah. You know, and it that really makes me feel pretty good. So it's kind of hard to quit. You know, and I so maybe I try to go home at three or four o'clock in the afternoon instead of five or six o'clock at night nowadays. Um when I wake up in the morning I can't wait to get there again.

SPEAKER_01 15:59

Yeah, that's pretty amazing.

SPEAKER_04 16:01

It's you know, working with Jane and Jessica, like I said, something else. Jamie is probably one of the best operations guys in the country. I mean the way he teaches our team to buy merchandise, to display, to do ads and all that, and it's amazing. And Jessica, well, she's just so great with all of the team that works there, and we got a whole human resource department to do that too, but Jessa directs it all. And she's a computer genius too. Thank God for something else that I'm not. But you know, uh I always think back to COVID, you know, how horrible that time was. And so before COVID hit, Jessa had uh internet grocery shopping all online already before before it never hit. So when COVID hit, all we had to do was go hire an army of people to go select orders and or have Jessa train how to select orders correctly and whatever else, where all the other retailers in the world were trying to figure out how am I gonna service my customers because they don't want to come to the grocery store. So I I mean she's always kept us uh, you know, ten steps ahead of most other people.

SPEAKER_01 17:07

Yeah. So I well I can attest to that too. That was about the time that I had just started in my role with the chamber, and I was just so impressed with one, the customer service level that you guys continued to maintain, even though it was such a stressful time. And two, that you were still able to keep your shelves stocked and your, you know, everything was still in place because you did work with the local farmers and the local producers. And so that was that was just a a time too that I think that we all got to really be, you know, we were grateful and and got to see um Macintosh Fine Foods really be showcased and uh look at how you can, you know, weather that awful storm of uh time, you know.

SPEAKER_04 17:51

You know, the that's that's another big piece of it though. Macintoson's fine foods is a hundred percent independent. We're not corporately owned by anybody, we're not a target, we're not a Walmart or whatever else that has to buy everything to get from Target, that has to buy everything from Walmart. We have a wholesaler, it's UNFI. We can go buy from anybody. I mean, and so if UNFI was out of something, our buyers would be on the phone calling here, there, and everywhere. And you know, because we've got the three stores on, if we have to buy a side mode out of something just to make sure that all stores have something on the shelf, we'll do it. And so our out-of-stock conditions were minimal compared to a lot of the other big stores.

SPEAKER_01 18:32

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 18:33

And it that kind of makes it fun, doesn't it?

SPEAKER_01 18:35

Yeah. Well, JB and Jess are are fantastic, and your whole whole team is really good at what they do. And so, yes, it shows, um, and you get to to showcase exactly what you're doing. All right, I have some I have some more Waconia questions, and you can you can pop in with more on this tour too. But if somebody's never been to Waconia and they're just visiting for the first time, what would you tell them? What what would you share?

SPEAKER_04 19:00

I think it's pretty easy. Yeah, well, only Mark will just drive around a little bit the lake, of course. You know, I was born and raised on the South Shore like Waconia. So as a kid, I could paddle the boat over to the island and walk around and back in the days. That was that was when I still knew Shorty Devoruk, who used to own the island out there with that kind of history. But I could walk through all the buildings that were out there that were when I was a real young kid, I remember laying in bed listening to the dance halls going on out at the island. I mean, it it was pretty awesome. They there was uh steam ships, uh paddle wheels that take took people back and forth over. I didn't know it, but I was told that, you know, back in the day, Coney Island of the West, as they called it back then, served a lot of Minneapolis-St. Paul, and uh and uh passenger trains would come to along Highway 5, they'd park and people would walk over to Surrey Divorx, which is Mesa's Intown Marino, and they'd take a boat over. They had there was cabins out there and whatever else. There was there was two dance halls I know of.

SPEAKER_01 20:06

On Coney Island?

SPEAKER_04 20:07

On Coney Island.

SPEAKER_01 20:08

Wow.

SPEAKER_04 20:08

There was a Duwark one, and over on the west side was Monsieur Amblards, who developed the whole west side of the island. He also his house is still in Waconia. Wishing well apartments, I think they call it.

SPEAKER_03 20:20

Uh-huh.

SPEAKER_04 20:20

But so it's a little more history of Waconia, but there's a lot of history. So, anyhow, it you come to Wakonia and what do you do? Well, drive around the lake and just say, you know, that's really neat. Look at look at schools, look at the golf course. I mean, everything's pretty darn pristine around here and the homes and just walk down the street and talk to the people. Walk down Main Street. For sure you've got to come to Macintosh. I look at all the shops in Waconia. Beautiful theater right on right in the downtown. Great restaurants. What more do you want? I don't know. You're still here.

SPEAKER_01 20:50

I know. I love it. It came about 20 years ago, 20 plus years, and love it and and stayed and seen it change a lot in 20 years, but you've got a lot more history of of the change. And I still feel like you're growth-minded of, you know, let's grow but still keep that small town history and heritage. Uh, what what do you think about that?

SPEAKER_04 21:09

That's the other thing, you know, the city of Waconia and Planners and whatever else, I think everybody does. But when you take a look at all the housing developments around Wilconia, they all have national parks for the young kids and whatever else. It's been laid out so well. And that's the other thing. I think I just heard recently Waconia's population now in mid term of population uh census is about sixteen thousand five hundred, I believe. Fifteen thousand six hundred and fifty, that's it. But uh it's grown really fast. Like I said when I was a kid, it was maybe two thousand if that. But it doesn't feel that big. It still feels like a small, quaint town. And it's it's comfortable. And everything you need is here. You don't have to go to the Twin Seeds if you don't want to, but boy, if you want to see great concerts, everyone else or there or anything. You don't have to go that far. You can go to Shakapi and they're gonna be opening up the big new amphitheater that is what, 20 minutes away? Sure.

SPEAKER_01 22:07

Yeah. So is there anything else that what does Waconia mean to you? Is there anything that we haven't talked about that is really special about Waconia and and its meaning to you?

SPEAKER_04 22:18

You know, I think there's all these great things. You know, I I talk about schools, I talked about uh medical centers, I talked about um, you know, just everything is all right. I think about all of the people, you know, who I grew up with, friends of my dad, who helped shape Waconia to what it is today. Um I was thinking about people like Will and Stan and John Yetzer and today their next generation. Steve Yetzer is still out there promoting Waconia and building hotels, and I mean, taking big chances, uh taking big chances to make Waconia better than it ever was. And we got uh Paul Melkert is still with us, thank God. And I mean the things that all of these people did to help shape Waconia and give it what it is. Dave Delurie, he had the old theater in Waconia. It was beautiful. Uh I'm sure I'm forgetting some people, but there's my main lore. And it's those guys, I think, that really Oh, and John Devitt. He ended up being the uh hospital president of the hospital, Ridgeview Medical Center, but it was my dad and all these other guys that they're the board of directors of the Ridgeview Medical Center, and they built it or they started building it into what it is today. I mean, that was a group of downtown business people that did it, and I I wish uh I wish we had videos of the old Yetzers and the and the old Dubers and all that, you know, and times change and that stuff you got you get the big nul multinational corporations and Amazon and whatever else that make it easy to do business elsewhere. But we still have a core of good downtown business people, and I'm just proud to be part of it. I'm I'm really proud to to have known those older guys. I mean, that's I learned a lot from them, and hopefully that's helped us survive, and luckily it helps us survive in the future.

SPEAKER_01 24:15

Kind of going back to the store, we talked about Plato, but I we didn't really set the timeline. Um I know there's a couple places downtown, and then Highway 5. You know, walk us through the timeline of of growth.

SPEAKER_04 24:29

When where we started out there in that building on Elms, I think it would be right across from the Catholic Church. That's where I started, and it was just a little corner meat market to start with. And then my dad started adding groceries when he got back from World War II. And then we just couldn't add on anymore. And there was a whole slaughter facility in the back of that store and whatever else. So and once we got out of that business, you know, and we could buy everything all slaughtered and and uh inspected in what else we moved 236 West First Street. I remember the address yet. Uh the year I don't really remember when we built 18,000 square feet there. And then that was starting to get a little bit too small, and so I went and I talked to the city, and this was a major feat. I got the city to let me close the alley. I bought up the houses on the the the north side of that street, and just to put everybody in in context, that building today was Wafonia Brewing Company and that whole building there and all the other build businesses that are in it today. So we closed the alley. The biggest problem with that was getting the electric company to move, but they were all buried power lines and gas lines were buried in the alley. But we got that all done. That lasted a long time, and about that time, uh gentleman came to town and he bought 40 acres of where we currently are. So he went to what was then SuperValue, who later turned into UNFI, but and he was a Cub Foods operator, and he said, I I want to build a Cub Foods out in Oconia. And the president of Supervalue, who well, was kind of a friend of mine, but we were also on the board of directors of the Minnesota Grocer Association together and all that. He just said, I'm sorry, but you don't have that option. We have a retailer in Oconia, and we're gonna stick with them. And he said, No, he said, I own the land, I want to build that. And uh and so he said, told this guy Bob was a name, you got two choices here. You can either buy out the Macinton family, and then you can take that store and you can move that store to the highway and build your cup foods if you want to, or you can uh build a store and let McIntoon run for you out there. And so Bob asked for a meeting with me. We had a couple of lunch meetings, and I have never been so put down before in my life, and he just said, You don't know how to run a store that size. What are you thinking? Just sell me your store and let me get out of my way. And I just said, No, it's not a choice. No option here. My kids both ought to be in business. My family's been in business for four generations. No, they're the fifth. And I said, It's not an option. You can't buy the store. So after being really beat up verbally, we got to be good friends after that. And he just said, Okay, you win. And so he's my landlord to this day. And uh I've helped him try to find other people that have built buildings around us.

SPEAKER_01 27:33

Yeah. The the development over just the last 20 years has been incredible.

SPEAKER_04 27:37

And that happened in two we opened that store on the highway in 2023. And I think that we found that you know, while we've done well on the highway to downtown, have done well too, and I think that's 2003? 2003 we opened that store. So believe it or not, it's uh 23 years old where we are. That's great.

SPEAKER_01 27:59

I love the resilience. I think that's a strong message, and you see that from a lot of business owners, the resilience and um determination, passion. We're gonna do this. Okay, I'm I'm kind of curious about like young Kim McIntoon. I, you know, you're well respected, run an excellent grocery store, but what was like Teenage Kim like? I feel like there's a wild rebellion side that the listeners might want to hear hear more about. Cowboy, Cowboy Kim. I don't know.

SPEAKER_04 28:27

Yeah. How far do I go with this one?

SPEAKER_01 28:29

Uh we can edit out anything.

SPEAKER_04 28:32

You know, I I think that I was eager to try just about anything, everything. And and honestly, you know, I I'm talking about I went to college back in 1969. I graduated in 69, so I was in college 69, 70s, early 70s. Uh Vietnam War era, it was ugly. I mean, I remember going to classes uh in Mankato where I went to college, and I remember the professors coming up, and they were more stoned than most of the students were. It was it was a joke, is what it really was back in those days. Never got into the make love nut war and all that stuff. I I do remember sitting in my dorm room watching all the people marching down down the hill and whatever else. It was a real interesting, interesting life to be brought into. But I, you know, my dad was pretty tight on I had to adjust my schedule so that I could be home by noon on Fridays and go to work, you know, for the weekend. And so I got out of college loan-free and whatever else, but I earned it. I worked all summer, I worked every weekend, and but you know, and other than that, I loved hunting and fishing and stuff like that. If I snuck away, that's I got out of the mancato rat race.

SPEAKER_01 29:46

Yeah. Work hard, play hard. Yeah. Anything else that we should know, or that do you got notes? You got history?

SPEAKER_04 29:52

There's you know, I I think that one of the interesting things was yeah, I told you how my dad had started uh the groceries when he got back from World War II. Well, after World War II, my grandpa and my dad also imported a sausage maker from Germany. His name was Reinhold Scholz. I do remember the man never learned to speak one word of English, but that was okay. Uh you know, Wakonia was a pretty German town back in those days. My grandfather spoke as much German as he did English, and my dad knew how to a little bit. But to this day, Reinhold's recipes are the base of all of our recipes that we made today for all three stores. And we that's another whole thing, how we manage that. It's cool hard next figuring out how to do it, but except for the new things like the different flavored brats and things like that. But the old summer sausage, the baloney, the wieners, one delivery sausage we still make. But that is all the recipes that Reinhold Schultz brought from Germany, from his family's meat market. So that's quite a claim to fame, and I think that's why our homemade sausage has been as big of a deal as it is. You know, playing off of that a little bit to fill you in on this one. So we had the Lonsdale store for quite some time, and just it's a little smaller store, and we were able to supply that with the sausage that we needed. Once we built Minetrista here a few years ago, that was going to be a whole different thing. So and to build a sausage kitchen is the most horrendously expensive thing you can imagine, putting in the smoke houses and the mixing stuff and all that. But what we decided to do was Waconia will do all the smoked sausages, Minatrista will do all the fresh brats and pork sausage and things like that. So we do have a sausage kitchen over there, and then we got a truck now that goes from there to Waconia, to Lonsdale, back to there, and so we're out constantly mixing that. And it it's really worked out well. The Minetrista store was built so that they could handle that kind of work. Mena Trista in the wintertime now does um all of like our homemade candies, the homemade peanut brittle, uh, fruitcakes and things like that. They got their own to do it and they got personnel to do it. And so it's taken us a couple years to really get this worked out so that it's all balancing and meshing together right. And, you know, and I think I just have to go back a little bit, you know, to our director of operations, to all of our store managers and to all of our uh department heads and stuff like that. I don't think anybody can believe what it takes to get all these people working together, meshing together. But it's fun. When it works, it really works. And it's really working well now. And uh but they're on the phone constantly. You know, I'm running short on this. What do you have? You know, and so uh one of my bigger jobs, other than saying hi to Christine when she walks at the store, Jamie or Jess will say, Dad, we need this online sale. Can you get that down there? Or would you go over and pick up this in miniature? We need that here. And so we're shuffling food all the time. But we do have a regular route of uh two days a week, a big truck taking pallets back and forth.

SPEAKER_01 32:56

So it seems like your staff, I've uh noticed it, you know, I I'm a shopper, right? But I've noticed people stay there a long time. And so do you feel like your career can really grow there? Or do you have people coming in that I don't know, did did you go to school to be in the the bakery industry? How d what is the career path? What is a your workforce? They seem to like working for you and stay a long time, but what does that all look like?

SPEAKER_04 33:21

You know, it's a team, and we have regular meetings, and I mean, we're open and Jamie, Jessa, and I we'll all go down and work on the meet partner or the bakery or the deli or whatever else, and we work with that team. Well, and they're short, we're part of the team, you know, and of any of the teams that are in. And so we depend on each other and and we like it. Like we're telling you, Cole, store director in Okonia, started working for us when he was 14. Well, his father worked for some big ag company in South Dakota and said, If you go to school at the University of South Dakota, I can get you a really good job here. And so he worked with us through his whole college thing, weekends and summers and all that, and he finally graduated and he had to go to his dad and say, you know, dad, I I really like the grocery business. I'm sorry. And uh he came back and he worked for us, he manager for a while. He worked in a couple of other departments, and and he's probably the youngest store director in the state of Minnesota, but he had a hell of a job. We've got a lot of those. You know, his brother came back to work for us. No, he's the the frozen dairy manager. And you know, that's one little thing about expanding. Being another grocery store, you've got to give your people an opportunity to do more. You know, and there's always many to it and stuff like that, and we we work on it. And there's so many people that we have that'll work part of their week and calling you a part of the week in the trust. Uh our floral and gift manager. I she does a beautiful job, number one. But you know, so we challenged her. You've got to run the Mino Trista floral and gift department too. I get to hire more people, don't I?

SPEAKER_03 35:00

Of course you do.

SPEAKER_04 35:01

You gotta you gotta do the training though, too, and whatever else. And so that was like I said, you know, our Lonzo store is a little bit smaller, but it's a nice store. We own that building, we own property around, we can expand it when we want to. And when the town grows and it's growing down there now. But uh so I told her about a year ago, I said, Sarah, I want to have a nice floral gift department in Lonsale. She's like, Are you kidding me? That's an hour away. And I said, No, I'm not kidding you, number one. And I uh I took her down there and uh I took some pictures of a couple of NCAPs and a couple of showings, and I talked to the store director down there and I said, This is gonna be floral gifts. Whatever you got on there, find another place for it, okay? And so Sarah did it. And uh so you know it started out kind of slow, but she's doing five times her sales now that she started a year ago, and people are just finding what they like, and I mean it's kind of fun when you can when you can take a department manager like that and show her what you can do. My wife, Lori and I took her to Girton's greenhouse that we can buy wholesale from. I mean, look at what we can do. You know, we walked around, we got to meet the Girton family, and we met the sales personnel down there and and she said, Oh my god, I don't think I didn't sell that book when you ask. You sure as hell can let's do it. You know, and right now it's just gangbusters that we do with that company. And uh, you know, I was talking to you about the untides before. The untides do are greenhouse. So I mean that that stuff was all started out of seeds in the middle of winter, just 20 miles from here, and they do produce some of the nicest flowers and vegetables. Our greenhouses are all local, local, local, also family-owned. And so I don't know.

SPEAKER_01 36:46

We've grown something very special, and you've grown a lot of people, and they've been able to stay with you a long time and grow the the business, and it is a team atmosphere. It's fun to fun to watch. You're a huge part of Waconia, you're a huge part of the chamber, um, your whole family, and there's a lot of history. And I think you know the Macintone family has helped Waconia be what it is today. And so for you to debut on this first, you know, destination of Waconia podcast is pretty special.

SPEAKER_04 37:15

And um, so the along with that though, I want to say that what you and your team have done for Waconia too, the Chamber of Congress has come a long way, and I've known every chamber director for the last 40 years, probably. And I've worked on it, I've been on the board of directors a number of times and and the president a few times, but uh you and your team are doing a hell of a job too, and we all appreciate you and the direction you take us in. And so thank you and and your team.

SPEAKER_01 37:41

Well, I appreciate that, Kim, and the partnership. And we started out with uh Ted and and Dee here as well, who have been part of the tourism and and strong partners. Um we'll keep growing and keep developing and making it a strong community with those strong partnerships. And uh thank you for kicking us off. And I don't just mean the podcast, but you know what what you've done in the community in 100 plus years, that's unheard of. And I know you're the longest brochure in the state of Minnesota. So we have something special here and and we're proud of it. And and thank you for doing this today.

SPEAKER_04 38:13

Thank you, Christine.