Once a month, we would get together and have these special hangouts called The Finer Things Club, like from The Office. We would make a charcuterie board, drink wine and catch up. 

People started saying, ‘You should start a business!’. One day, we invited a friend over and she brought it up. We brushed it off again, saying that we didn’t want to take the magic out of it. It was our thing; it was fun and we didn’t want to lose that. 

But two bottles of wine convinced us! We started designing our business cards. We got excited about the idea and every day after that, it was Fig & Honey, nothing else. We knew this was something we needed to do. Ever since that first day, I feel like it's just taken off so fast. We haven't had a chance to get bored. It's just been one thing after another.

We got our LLC back in October 2020. After that we started selling our boards and one day we woke up and we had 1000 followers, and we called each other and said, What happened?! 

Originally, we thought we were just gonna get pity orders from family and friends like, ‘Oh, yeah, look at what they're doing. That's a cute idea.’

Kayla and I got dinner from Pasong’s one night. We brought them a charcuterie board, a couple of bottles of wine, and I've known Tina for quite some time and I've always looked up to her as an individual and as a friend.

We got to talking with Tina and her sister, Nonnie, who was also a big pivotal person in the process of getting this space. Tina has held this space tightly to her heart for a long time. 

It's hard to put your dreams on the backburner in order to let somebody else's begin. Tina has been an absolute saint when it comes to that. Nonnie did a good job of saying the things that a sister would typically say. Things Kayla and I couldn't say, so it was nice. 

It was really nice to be able to talk with them and go over what this space could be and what energy and life we could add to Old Town. In addition to all of the old town businesses that are already here. 

It was a lot for her to take in. But, that next morning, she texted me with high hopes and said, Let's talk about it, let’s think about it. 

I just like the people in Old Town. Everywhere I go, everyone is friendly. Everyone down here is like family. I think of Tina, I think of how everyone supports each other down here. I think how the business owners and different people in Saginaw really support each other, and that is really cool.

There is so much heart in Old Town. The people, the architecture, the buildings. You walk into a building like this, and you remember Guido's in the 90s, you remember the cupcake shop, you remember the Polish pottery place. 

It's nice to be able to walk into a place and feel the energy of all the past places. 

It's really nice to be able to have people that respect that type of thing in the city. 

We’re really looking forward to getting to know everybody in Old Town. Everyone's been so welcoming already. We’re so excited.  We can't wait to see people in here, enjoying their charcuterie and we can't wait to see where we'll be a year from now. We have a lot of hopes and expectations.

What we’re looking forward to most is living out the dream of owning a storefront in Old Town. I've always looked up to the bar/restaurant owners here. Just admired their ability to bring people together and not really worried about the negativity that people sometimes bring to light.

I'm excited to be able to add to the positive energy that’s already here, and enjoy what I've always thought of Old Town growing up.

Every board we make, even the board itself, we choose locally sourced products. 

The actual boards come from Self Serve Lumber in Saginaw. They have been awesome, delivering anything that we need. 

Each of the products we have on the boards are all locally sourced, as well. We get a lot of our cheese from The Cheese People in Grand Rapids and Artigiano in Bay City. They've been awesome with overnighting us bulk orders.

To make a good charcuterie board, we believe you have to support good people and businesses within your immediate community and state. 

Flavor wise, we really like to complement each flavor that's on the board. We try to incorporate many different, unique items that you wouldn’t just go to the store and buy. We try to take you outside of your comfort zone and pair different things together you wouldn't think of.

We like pairing things together and experimenting with how things taste. We'll put things on the boards next to each other whose flavors will pair well, and as cheesy as it sounds (pun intended!), having fun with it! 

No two boards are the same. They are all different. I feel like still today, each one we make, we feel like we come up with something new.

We have three different sized boards for different sized parties and we also offer grazing tables. You can't travel with those. We actually go to your house or wherever your party is and we set up on a countertop or a table. We build it right there for you. Those are the biggest ones we do.

We call the smallest size we offer the Millennial Lunchable. Everyone has seen those memes all over Facebook: Millennials like charcuterie because they grew up on Lunchables. We thought we would own it!

We also offer charcuterie cones, which are a COVID friendly party option. They're a single serving cone, but with charcuterie. Those have been really popular. We are hoping to break into the wedding scene, cocktail hour, stuff like that. We're really hoping that that takes off. 

Once we open, we’ll have charcuterie toass, as well. Three different toasts that we will have all the time, and a one seasonal option. A list of what we offer and little samples will be available, once we open, so you can decide what you want to put on your board, to make it a little bit more personalized. 

- Alexis Peake and Kayla Pietrzak, Fig & Honey Cheese Co.