Lt. Gov. Kehoe drops by Winding Road for Buy Missouri visit

<p>Photo courtesy of the office of Lt. Gov. Mike Kehoe</p><p>Lt. Gov. Mike Kehoe paid a surprise visit to Winding Road Gifts & Interiors last week as part of his office’s Buy Missouri Week 2021 visits. Kehoe was given the grand tour by owner Julie Bolinger.</p>

Photo courtesy of the office of Lt. Gov. Mike Kehoe

Lt. Gov. Mike Kehoe paid a surprise visit to Winding Road Gifts & Interiors last week as part of his office’s Buy Missouri Week 2021 visits. Kehoe was given the grand tour by owner Julie Bolinger.

Winding Road Gifts & Interiors had an unexpected visitor last week - Lt. Gov. Mike Kehoe.

Owner Julie Bolinger was surprised when Kehoe and his staff showed up unannounced as part of his office's Buy Missouri Week 2021 business visit tour last Tuesday. Bolinger gave the group the grand tour, and they even made some purchases before taking their leave.

The occasion was made possible because Bolinger had joined up as a member of the state's Buy Missouri Retail Partnership program. Bolinger's business is one of six members located in Moniteau County, and is the first retail partner - retail locations around the state that sell Missouri-made products - in the county. Fellow area Buy Missouri members include Burgers' Smokehouse, Gokey USA, Koechner Mfg. Co. Inc., McCall's Candles and Willow Moon Designs LLC.

The Buy Missouri initiative was created to recognize and promote Missouri companies and manufacturers to the public and strengthen Missouri's economy, according to information available on buymissouri.net.

"Our intention with the Buy Missouri program is to encourage Missourians to purchase products that are made here in our state, supporting our friends and neighbors who work at, and own, these businesses," said Casey Adrian, Director of Buy Missouri and Tourism for the office of Lt. Gov. Kehoe.

Bolinger said a friend told her about the program last year, and she tried signing up then only to encounter a glitch she wasn't aware of. Another sign-up later and she and Winding Road were officially a Buy Missouri partner starting this year.

"I honestly didn't know about the Buy Missouri Week," Bolinger said. "(I knew they had) the Buy Missouri website, they have a specific logo if you wanted to put it with your products and stuff like that. We do a really good job of just talking to people about (our products), so I like to not label things necessarily so that way we can have organic conversations with our customers and let them know where things are coming from and who makes them."

Bolinger, for her part, said last week's visit was a pleasant surprise. Lt. Gov. Kehoe was personable and lighthearted, and supported the business before moving on, to boot.

"He walked around the store and he was like, 'I'm not going to let my wife come in here with a credit card,'" Bolinger said. "But he ended up checking everything out and making a good-sized purchase of a lot of our locally-crafted people's (products)."

Posts spreading the word about Winding Road went up on both Lt. Gov. Kehoe's official and personal social media channels, along with the Buy Missouri Facebook page.

That promotion mirrors, in a lot of ways, what Winding Road serves to do for others in the community who sell their products there. Bolinger said having her storefront gives her an outlet to showcase locally-made products to a wider audience on behalf of entrepreneurs with no storefront of their own.

The business has come a long way since it opened its doors a little more than eight years ago, she said, as it first started out as "90 percent consignment" before shifting toward the specific niche of products it carries today.

As part of the small group of Moniteau County Buy Missouri partners so far, Bolinger said she is glad to be getting in on it on the "ground floor," as she said she's sure the program will continue to grow as other businesses learn about it. She pointed to neighboring businesses along Oak Street as an example of area owners she might expect to get on board in the future.

Bolinger said another plus of having area businesses involved with the program is how it benefits California overall. Part of those organic conversations Bolinger said she tends to have with customers from outside the community often involves directing patrons to other places around town she thinks they might enjoy.

"We send them to other areas of the community to see other businesses and stuff, too," Bolinger said. "So not only is it benefiting us and my crafters, it's benefiting the community as a whole."