ORION/OXFORD FACEBOOK LIVE EVENT w/ LOCAL SHOPS & RESTAURANTS

I had the privilege of interviewing local Lake Orion & Oxford shops and restaurants to find out how they are serving clients during these unusual times. Many are offering special deals, curbside delivery, and providing great service four our community. Watch the video or see the transcript below!

Thanks to all those who participated to make this a great event!

• I want to say welcome to everybody. I think we’re ready to get started with our “Support Orion & Oxford Local Restaurants and Businesses” and I’m super excited to be here with Tanya from Lucky’s Natural Foods. She’s our first guest today. We’re also gonna be hearing from Patrick from Woodchip’s, Sarah, from Sarah’s Bath Boutique, Jen and Brett Knapp from Red Knapp’s, and Tina from Nutz About Chocolate. Also Sally from Broadway Embroidery, and Joan from Heritage Spinning and Weaving. So we’re really excited to have everybody here. This is Tanya. Like I said, welcome Tanya, and we want you to tell us a little bit about your business, Lucky’s Natural Foods, how you got started, and then maybe you can show us some of the products that are the most popular right now, what’s in demand, and what you have available that maybe some other people don’t.
• Good morning, thank you. So again, I’m Tanya Lukovitz, with Lucky’s Natural Foods, and we got started in 1974. My parents opened the store as a natural food store and a produce market. Today we don’t carry fresh produce, but we do have a lot of grocery items, including frozen and dairy, and I’m proud to say that we are the longest-running natural food store, woman-owned, in Oakland County. So we’ve been here 45 years.
• Awesome, very good! So, in these unusual times that we’re experiencing right now, you’re probably carrying a little bit of different stock than you might normally carry, and we wanted to hear a little bit about what you have available, and what people can come into the store to see, and then tell us a little bit about curbside pickup, placing orders in advance, and how that might work.
• Sure! We’re doing curbside pickup for anybody that would prefer to have their groceries picked up outside. If you just call the store at 248-693-1209, we’ll take your order, get it ready for you, and then we’ll bring it outside curbside for you. Although you can come in the store, but we are encouraging people to stay safe and to utilize our curbside pickup.
• Awesome, fantastic. Do you want to take us inside and show us a little bit about what you have available?
• Absolutely, let me take you in the store.
• Okay, and for those of you who don’t know where Lucky’s Natural Foods is located, they are diagonally across from, kind of the Sagebrush area in downtown Lake Orion. And I’ve been there many times, they have a lot of my favorite things there, and I know Tanya, she’s turning her camera phone around, and she’ll be going into the store. But she’s going to show us some of the things that they have that people are really interested in. When we were talking yesterday, she was talking about elderberry, and zinc, and some of the vitamins that she has available, and it looks like her camera is frozen a little bit for a minute, but she’ll probably be showing us also her fresh foods case, and some things like that. So we’ll give her just a minute to connect back up. Okay, we can hear you and see pretty good.
• Okay, I’m gonna turn it around.
• Okay, Tanya!
• Hey, sorry about that! Bad connection, I guess!
• That’s okay, we can see you clearly, we can see your video, and we can hear you, so now we’re super excited to see your products and have you tell us a little bit more about, oh, perfect, awesome!
• [Tanya] How’s that?
• And what are people looking for right now, and what can they do to stay well?
• [Tanya] Right now, a big thing is vitamin C, vitamin D, vitamin A, and zinc. Those are the things that people are asking for. And so we are ordering daily to keep those items in stock. Other than the supplements, and immune building, different immune building supplements, like elderberry, oregano, echinacea, and the like, we also have a lot of flour yeast, and different grocery Staples that people have been asking for as well.
• Awesome, so we have such a wonderful community resource right here in our downtown Lake Orion. So, if people feel nervous, they go to Meyer or something, and they might not be able to get eggs or flour. Really this is an even better resource. All your ingredients are fresh, you really have a lot of foods that are natural, and then can you show us your fresh case, ’cause I’m not sure that everybody realizes that you have fresh meats there. So not only do you have great supplements, and vitamins, and wonderful things like that, but you’ve got a lot of things in your fresh case.
• [Tanya] Yes, we do, we do. And meat has been a very popular thing, and we have whole Amish turkeys and chickens. And eggs also have been another very in-demand item, and cheeses, butters, things like that.
• Awesome. Very, very good. And then in general, for people to stay well, tell us about how, obviously you’re a store and you provide a lot of really essential goods, but can you tell us a little bit about if people don’t wanna come into the store, if they wanna place an order in advance, how would you–
• [Tanya] Yes, absolutely. All you have to do is give us a call, and we will be glad to take your order. We can be your eyes for you if you don’t want to come in the store, and tell you what we have, and get it together for you. We can process it with a credit card over the phone, or you can give us your credit card when you get here, or cash, and then we will take care of that for you. We can bring it right out to the curb.
• Thanks, Tanya. We’re so grateful. You have a wonderful store there, beautiful. It’s been a great resource for our Lake Orion, Oxford, and surrounding areas since the mid-seventies, so we’re really lucky to have a gem of a store like that. Are there any positive messages you’d like to send out to the community before we say goodbye?
• [Tanya] Well I definitely would like everybody to stay safe and healthy and well. Other than that, I’d like to mention that we are open this week, 10 to 5. We were open 10 to 6, but we’re gonna go ahead and do 10 to 5, Monday through Saturday.
• Perfect.
• [Tanya] We’ll be here for people.
• Awesome, that’s perfect. Okay, very good, we’re grateful for you, we hope you have a wonderful day, and we’ll say goodbye to you for now! And thank you, Tanya!
• Thank you, Michele, bye-bye!
• Bye! So, this is Sarah, from Sarah’s Bath Boutique. Can you hear us? Okay, we can’t hear you yet, but maybe we’ll give it just a second. So, let me just make sure that she’s unmuted, there we go. Oh, and Tanya’s bouncing back in. It looks like Sarah’s connecting to audio, and Tanya’s bouncing back in. So while Sarah is connecting to audio, oh, there she is. Let’s see if we can hear you, Sarah. Okay, she’s bouncing back out. So, when I was talking to Sarah a little bit, and we were getting ready for today, there she is!
• Here I am!
• Okay, wonderful, good. All right, so Sarah, tell us a little bit about your business. How did you get started, and where are you located?
• So, I am located right next to Wine Social, we share the same entranceway, and I’m right across Bitter Tom’s, the new restaurant in downtown Lake Orion.
• Which is a good place to be.
• Oh yes, yes. And about a block away from Nutz About Chocolate, so I got wine and chocolate and good food all around me. Great businesses.
• We started our brick and mortar shop in November 2018, so it’s been over a year and almost a half. And I started this about two years ago, started making these products and started doing focus groups with my friends, and they told me I needed to stop giving it away for free.
• Awesome, that’s fantastic. Well, I have loved some of your products that I’ve tried before, and that’s why we wanted to invite you to be a part of this, to help build up your business. And we know that this is such an unusual time for people, but we want to invite our community to shop with you. So can you tell us a little bit about some of your products, what’s available, and then how can we shop right now? What’s the best way for us to shop with you?
• Well, right now I am taking call orders and email orders, and you can even Facebook message me through Sarah’s Bath Boutique Facebook page. So I’m taking orders that way, I’m offering curbside delivery, along with shipping. So, some of my products I have, I have a wide variety of bath and body products. We’ve got bath bombs, shower melts, and one of my biggest sellers are my moisturizers. I got the all-natural lotion bar, which was really what prompted the store. You’ve got all-natural, super-thick hand cream, we’ve got body cream, and whipped body butter. So different thicknesses, different moisturizing capabilities, but wide varieties to reach out to a lot of different types.
• Awesome.
• And then, we’ve got some cleaning products, and one of my ironic best sellers have been the potty bombs, which are over here. And this was a best-seller my first Christmas, and people who got them came back and started buying more and more, and I usually run out of these whenever I make ’em.
• What are they? Tell us what they are.
• So, the potty bomb, it has a bit of fragrance, fresh linen. And, you drop it in the toilet bowl, after everything’s said and done, and flush. And you drop it in, and it fizzes just a little bit, it’s not a science experiment, but it fizzes a little bit. It cleans and refreshes the toilet in between deep cleans. There is hydrogen peroxide and baking soda in there, so it does actually clean it.
• How fun, that’s perfect. Can you tell us a little bit about, if people don’t want to necessarily go Easter shopping at a big-box store, or touch a grocery cart, or anything like that, what do you have that people might be able to put in their Easter baskets?
• Well, we’ve got quite a few cute little bath bombs and soaps right now. I’ll show you one of these. And we’re offering these jars. This is $30.
• Beautiful.
• And it comes with bath bombs, I’ve got bunny butt bath bombs and soaps, Easter eggs bath bombs, and we can put it all together. We also have some, you know, more for the kid-at-heart Easter basket treats, like this exfoliating Easter egg soap, and some really nice floral bath bombs.
• Awesome, perfect. Okay, so like you said, people can call and do curbside pickup. So that’s a great way that we can support our local businesses right now. And Sarah’s is always great to our community, and we want to be great and support her business. Do you have any special messages about what the community can do to help you, or downtown Lake Orion, and what is your positive message for our community today?
• Well, how you guys can help right now is just remember us. We miss you, as much as I hope you miss shopping down here. And wash your hands. I will have hand sanitizer for sale this week, later this week, we ran out of the first two batches. But continue to wash your hands, use hand sanitizer if there’s no soap available. That’s so important right now. Take care of each other, and we will get through this. It’s been amazing to watch other business owners, support the community and do what they can in their capacity, it’s been a really beautiful thing to watch.
• All right, we love it. We’re grateful for you, and thanks for joining us today.
• I’m back, here I am! Sorry about that.
• Wonderful, welcome so much! Do you want to tell us a little bit about your business, where you’re located, and maybe some of your specials that you have right now?
• Okay, well, we are Red Knapps, we are right downtown Oxford, and we’re at the Northeast quadrant, right at the corner of M-24, which is also called Washington, and Burdick. We’re a full-service restaurant with pizza and pastas, salad, fish, all that good stuff. We’re known for our burgers, I would say. We use the same recipe that they use at the Dairy Bar in downtown Rochester, and they’ve been making those burgers since 1950. So that’s kind of our big seller.
• Awesome, awesome. I love your salads, and whenever we go there, my boys can’t get enough of your delicious bread that you make.
• The bread, yes. That’s a big seller for us.
• Awesome, awesome. Okay, so under these circumstances, we know that you can’t serve food the way that you normally would, but can you tell us a little bit about curbside, how we can order, and you said the other day, you’re offering pretty much a full menu right now, for the most part? Can you tell us a little bit about that?
• Yeah, right now we’re focusing on keeping our whole menu. It’s hard to order, it’s hard to know how to order, what to order, but right now we still do have our full menu. And as far as curbside goes, all you have to do is just give us a call, and we take your order, you can pay over the phone or you can pay when you get there, but I just give us a call. You can pull up to the back curb, and there are signs that say 15 minute parking and curbside, and then give us a call when you get there, and we just run it out to you.
• Perfect. So, for those of you who may not have been around the back, if you’re going north on M-24, you just hang a right on Burdick, and then immediate left into your parking lot, is that right?
• Yup. Yeah, and the signs have actually only been there about a week and a half now. The village just went and put up the signs that say “carry-out, pick up” so hopefully that makes it a little easier for everybody.
• That’s awesome, that’s just perfect. And we have been talking a lot in our area, in North Lake Orion and Oxford, about the construction. Can you let us know what’s going on in front of your building, or in that area, anything that would prohibit us from being able to do a easy pick up?
• As of right now the cones are down, the barrels are down, it changes, usually a little further south of us is where they start putting the cones up right before the Oxford Bank and the movie theater. But, as of right now, it’s been really easy to get in and out of Oxford, so I don’t know any changes in the construction plan. They haven’t really told us anything. But it’s been a breeze getting in and out. So hopefully it shouldn’t hinder anybody from getting down there.
• Awesome, awesome, very good. All right, any positive messages or anything else you’d like to share with our community today?
• I just wanna tell everybody that they’ve been so amazingly kind and patient with us. This is a huge learning curve, but it’s been such a good experience because of the people. They’ve been so nice and so great, and it’s such a great Community, they love where they live. I’d like to ask everybody to like our Facebook page, ’cause that’s the best way to see any changes in our hours and any specials we might offer down the road, and to let everybody know to spread the word that we are open. ‘Cause we still get a lotta calls asking if we’re doing carry-out. So we just wanna say stay strong, and we love you, Oxford.
• Awesome, thank you. We love your restaurant, and thanks for being a great part of our community, and thanks for being a part of our call today. And then in the messages below, when you’re done, if you want to put any extra information, because this won’t only be on your awesome Red Knapp’s site, this will be on a lot of other websites too, so, on other Facebook pages, too. So if you wanna put your contact information in the comments below–
• Okay. Great, thank you so much.
• Okay, have a good day, bye-bye!
• Bye!
• All right, perfect, okay. So, one of my favorites. Now we’re gonna go to Nutz About Chocolate. So we have Tina here. Tina, can you hear us? I think we can hear you. Okay, let’s make sure she, okay can you hear us, Tina? Sometimes it takes just a second, so, while she’s getting set up and while we’re waiting for her audio to connect, let’s just make sure she’s unmuted here. So one of the great things about today, as we have all this awesome technology, but that also can do challenging things sometimes too, so while she’s waiting to get started up, she owns Nutz About Chocolate, and that’s also kind of across the street from Sagebrush in downtown Lake Orion area, and I know she’s got a lot of great Easter specials to share so, we’re going to, okay, we’re gonna, I think we’ll just go to the next person here and–
• I think I’m on!
• All good! Okay, Sally, I’m gonna put you on hold for just a second, and we’re gonna talk here to Tina at Nutz About Chocolate. So awesome, very good. So, as I was explaining, Nutz About Chocolate is in right in downtown Lake Orion, and can you tell us a little bit about your business? What you do, and how can we order from you right now?
• Well, what we are is we are a small chocolate shop. We make all of our own products right here in-store. 98% of everything you see on our shelves is made right here in-store by me and my husband. We don’t have a team, it’s just us. And you can order through us right now, through Facebook messenger, my email, which is, nutzaboutchocolate1@gmail.com or you can call me at 248-690-7345.
• Awesome, perfect. Can you show us some of the delicious things that you have in and around your store?
• Yes! So, I’m hoping you can see this, ’cause I’m very new, so here are my bunnies, can ya see the bunnies?
• Yeah, we can see ’em! Awesome!
• We’re making these every single day. You can special order them, or you can come in, and what’s nice is we are offering right now, we are doing curbside delivery, we are doing shop by appointment, for private shopping, so there’s no cross-contamination. And at that point, I pick all the products for you, so no one else is handling my products, other than myself.
• Okay, awesome.
• So much more difficult than what it seems. Some of our regular, everyday goodies. We are offering local delivery. And it’s a minimum of $25, and we are not charging a delivery fee.
• Wonderful.
• [Tina] And then of course, door service for walkers out there, ’cause it is spring you know, and everybody needs some sunshine. It’s the best cheer right now.
• Perfect, wonderful. So you said right now you don’t really have current hours that you’re open, but you are available for pickup, for delivery, you can be there for certain hours for walkers. What hours, generally, are you kind of in and around the store right now?
• Right now, for this week, yes it is Easter week, we are here all week long. And I’ll be posting my hours on Facebook. So, today I’ll be here until 3:30, tomorrow we’ll be doing 11 to probably four. Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday, we’re just playing it by ear, but I will post every single day what hours I’m going to be here. It’s a hard call right now.
• Yeah. So, if you were to say something that the community can do for you, and then give a positive message out to our community, what would you say?
• I would say the best thing you can do for all small businesses right now is, to like their posts, and support and share. If you can order from them, do so. Small businesses, we go above and beyond for all of our customers, always. So if there’s something that you need to make arrangements for, those arrangements can be made. So reach out and support.
• Awesome, awesome. Wonderful. Thanks for joining us today! Have a wonderful day! I’ll be by to get some chocolates later!
• Thank you, Michele!
• Bye-bye!
• Bye-bye!
• Joan, we’re so excited to have you join us! So, Joan owns Heritage Spinning And Weaving. We’re really lucky to have something very specialty like this in our community, because I think, I’m not an expert, but I would guess that most communities don’t have such a wonderful resource like this. So tell us a little bit about your business, and where you’re located.
• Well, we’re in downtown Lake Orion, and we’ve been here for 20 years. This is our 20th year in business. We specialize in traditional knitting yarns, traditional weaving yarns, and they can be used for crochet, as well. In normal times, we are known for strong education program. In fact our regular staff has over 1200 years of experience in these areas. That’s a lot of experience! That’s really neat!
• It is, it’s really amazing when I pooled it all together. We’re known for our Fair Isle yarn, which comes in 225 colors, some of which you can see behind me.
• Beautiful.
• And I make, design, I create designs like this.
• Wow.
• This is one for a more experienced knitter, but we also have beginning knitting patterns, beginning in that style knitting patterns.
• Beautiful, that’s fantastic. So, tell us right now, how can people purchase your items, what’s available? You were telling me about some kits, which I thought was really neat. Because then people don’t need to come in, and shop around, they can kind of order a kit, or you can put together something very special to fit their needs. So can you tell us a little bit about that?
• Well, a couple of the favorite things that we have in the store during normal times, is a “second chance nook” where people bring in things, yarn that they’ve decided they don’t love so much anymore, or used equipment, and because that has been hard to put online, we haven’t put it online. But this week, if you follow our Facebook page, you’ll see some of those items appearing. So, local people will be able to purchase them, call, make payment, and do a porch pick-up and have access to these super great deals. And we also have our original pattern designs for the hats like I showed, as kits. So all you have to do is go online, heritagespinning.com go to the store, find the kits, and pick one that suits you.
• Perfect. That’s really neat. So, I think it’s awesome that you do a lot with education and things like that, and there are a lot of people with down time right now who might normally not have had time for knitting, but it’s been in the back of their minds as something they wanna do, or they wanna teach a child or a grandchild. Could you still out a kit together for somebody who might be a little bit newer to knitting?
• Well, that’s funny that you asked that, because I’ve been thinking about this, and I know that once you’re past the learning curve of knitting, it is an incredibly relaxing hobby. So my special for the duration, is that you will get a skein of yarn, and the appropriate needles, and our original pattern that we will include free in your package. I can’t put a price on it, because you may choose different yarns to make your hat or your scarf. There are plenty of online resources that are very good to learn the basics. And these have the hat and the star pattern, are simple and easy to do at home.
• Awesome. That sounds like a wonderful opportunity, and I like that you mentioned that it’s relaxing, because we need to do things right now that are stress relievers. So, fantastic. All right, well thank you very much. Is there one last thing you’d like to say? A little something to our community before you go?
• Well, I would. I’d like to do a quick little advertisement for our charity that we run from here. Knit Michigan. And Knit Michigan collects chemo caps and blankets that are crocheted around, but right now we’re also collecting face masks. And these are all directed to cancer units. So these will be going to patients that are undergoing infusion therapy, and there’s a shortage of masks for them. So we would love if we can help get them to the right people.
• Love that! Thank you so much! Thanks for all you do for our community, and we will look forward to supporting you. Have a great day.
• Thank you.
• Okay, we’re over at Broadway Embroidery!
• Hi.
• Hi!
• Hi, how are you? We’re good.
• Oh, that’s perfect! Okay, you have an amazing story to share about your business, and about what’s going on right now, and I think the whole community is behind you, and we just want to hear more, and and we want to know also more about what we can buy from you now to keep your business going, ’cause you are donating so much time and so many of your resources right now, and paying people to do good things. So what can we buy from you to help keep your business going? And then how can we help with your GoFundMe? So tell us a little bit about your story.
• So we started about, I think about two and a half weeks ago. My sister and I, we discussed making a few masks for the community, and some of our friends and family, and it turned out to be a lot more than a few. We’ve done a little more than 3,000 now, and we still have about 1,500 to fulfill. We started a GoFundMe because it got so big, and we were really in need of fabrics, and elastics, and things like that. And the community came together, pulled together, and we have so much of it now that we can probably get through maybe another week. We do have the GoFundMe though, because obviously we do have other costs involved other than the fabrics and materials. We are not open in the store, but we do have an online website that you could go to to purchase things. We have a bunch of baskets available. They’re foldable baskets. Here’s some of the ones that we have available that you can purchase online. And we will deliver up to 10 miles, so if somebody doesn’t want to leave the house, you know, for safety purposes, we can deliver it for you. We offer all of these Easter baskets online for you to purchase. We did get two new ones in today, if anybody’s interested. I don’t think that it’s been posted yet. The chevron and the polka dot. These are brand-new today, that we just received, and we can embroider on them, and all of the price of the embroidery is included. We also offer spirit-wear. We have Lake Orion and Oxford designs available. So anything you purchase from us, embroidery’s included. So that would be helpful, if anybody is in need of anything for Easter, or for spirit-wear.
• Perfect. So, one thing I wanted to tell everybody is I went onto your website over the weekend, for Broadway Embroidery, and it was so easy to use! You just click the one you want, and you selected it. It’s set up very well, like a very professional website, very easy, and I was able to order a couple of things. So, for anybody looking for something, I also love the fact that you’ve got these soft baskets. ‘Cause that’s always the question, what do you do with this giant wicker or wire basket for 11 months out of the year? For something that you use for a short time? So I just love–
• They collapse down, and you can put it right in your closet.
• Or I could see a child just really enjoying putting toys in there or carrying–
• Oh, yeah.
• Keeping it safe, it wouldn’t get broken, it’s soft. So that’s a really good solution. So, tell us about how people can support you with your GoFundMe page.
• We have that available on our Facebook page. If you go on our Facebook, we have the GoFundMe posted there, and any other phone numbers or emails are posted on our website at broadway-embroidery.com all of our information is posted there as well. Our GoFundMe, like I said, is on our Facebook.
• And do you need fabric right now, or is it better for people to donate via GoFundMe for the masks and all the things that you’re doing? I know you’ve done some hats and a variety of things, all the things that you’re doing for our healthcare workers, to protect them. What’s the best way to help you?
• Right now we’re okay with fabric, but it really is day-to-day, because the the requests are so so large. So if that’s all that someone can donate, that we will take it, and we will use it. Yes, fabrics, the elastics, and the GoFundMe, yep.
• Awesome. What kind of fabric is best, if somebody has a stash of fabric?
• Cotton.
• Cotton? Okay.
• Yeah, 100% cotton is the best.
• How many people are you keeping busy, at any given time on making masks?
• Two, four, six, six to eight, and it’s mostly family. We do have a few volunteers that are willing to come and help, but it’s mostly family. Up to eight people at one time.
• Awesome. So, I just love that you are helping our community so much, and I know our community loves and appreciates you. We love and care about our healthcare workers, and all the people who are working at our grocery stores, and supplying us with all the goods that we need during this time, and it’s such a positive message that you’re sending out to the community, and we’re grateful, so, anything else you’d like to say before we go today?
• No, I think that’s it! Thank you very much for everyone’s support, and all of the contributions, and it’s just been, it’s been amazing. It’s really been amazing.
• We have an awesome community, it’s really heartwarming.
• It is. Wonderful, okay! Well thank you, thank you so much!
• Thank you!
• Have a great day, good luck!
• You too, thanks!
• All right, fantastic. So again this is Michele Shinedling, just wanted to say thank you so much for all those who have joined us, and for everybody in our community. We have an amazing community. We had one more participant, and that is Woodchips Express Barbecue. They are not on with us, they haven’t shown up in our waiting room for our link today, so unfortunately I won’t be able to put them on now, but I’m gonna try and connect with them later, and I’ll try to do a Facebook live with them, because they are a great business to support, they owned the ‘Wiches sandwich shop in Oxford, kind of in the North part of downtown Oxford. And they have switched over to barbecue. So, they own a barbecue restaurant in Lapeer, and they’re doing an express restaurant, and it’s kind of a favorite style that people like. Think of it kind of like, maybe like a Chipotle or something like that, but for barbecue. So you could add your own things that you want, your own meats or beans or rice, or different toppings, and it’s really fantastic. They also own a cookie bakery, and they have cookies there for sale. So I know that they are doing a lot with their pick-ups, and they have a fantastic business going, they support our community, so I encourage you to support them too. So I’m gonna log off for now, but I wanna thank everybody who joined us today. Thanks for watching, the fact that you’re here helps us to know that you love our community, and are supporting our downtown businesses. If you’re a business, and you would like to get into a forum like this, and do a Facebook Live where we can talk a little bit more about what you do, or if you’re a healthcare worker, or are anybody who has advice for our community, we would love to help spread the word, and to help you out. So feel free to contact us. Have a great day! Make it a wonderful day, Orion and Oxford! Bye-bye.