Graz’n Tables, a charcuterie and bakery shop, held its grand opening Tuesday, Aug. 8, from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m.

This “community block party” had an ice cream truck and a coffee station outside and an inside spread of food sold at the shop.

The 1,400-square-foot shop is owned by Chelsey Barringer and her mother Paula Kovacs, who bought it July 1.

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The products being sold are charcuterie boards, “lunchables,” doughnuts and a variety of other sweet and savory items.

The charcuterie board orders come with a one-of-a-kind charcuterie board that the customer gets to keep. Barringer mainly builds the board herself but will sometimes find them at local stores.

Customers can bring the board back to get a refill instead of buying another board.

“It’s like they get to take a little piece of me that I picked out for them,” Barringer said. “It’s just been my signature thing.”

The building is located at 1996 S. Houston Levee Road, suite 2, in Collierville, formerly the doughnut shop Amazin’ Glaze. The doughnuts will still be supplied from Amazin’ Glaze at Graz’n Tables, with the same recipe.

Barringer said she has customized a few doughnuts of her own, including most recently the cereal and milk doughnut.

“I just went creative with the doughnuts as I’ve done with charcuterie boards,” Barringer said.

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The Amazin’ Glaze owners and mutual friends of Barringer, Donald and Sheila Harold, were selling the Collierville location and asked Barringer if she wanted to be business partners and turn the space into a charcuterie and doughnut shop.

“I said, ‘Sure, why not? Who doesn’t like something sweet and savory at the same time?’” Barringer said.

Since then, there was a “360” remodel, including repainting the previously yellow-colored store and adding Southern home decor.

“My whole vibe on my store is just Southern home,” Barringer said. “I want it to feel like you’re walking back into your grandma’s or your mom’s house.”

The remodel included adding a small family section with a couch, two chairs, a rug and a craft station, which includes a Taylor Swift-inspired friendship bracelet bar and an open library. Barringer also included a local small women-owned business retail hallway to help them sell products.

During the transition, the doughnut shop never closed. Barringer said she didn’t want to take that away from the community because she had a consistent flow of regular doughnut customers. The shop was a staple in the community due to the limited number of doughnut shops in Collierville.

Laura Roberts was a frequent customer for several years at the Amazin’ Glaze doughnut shop and came to the grand opening to see the new place.

“I knew the owners, and It’s nice to see that something has become of this place,” Roberts said.

Roberts’ favorite doughnut is a chocolate-iced old-fashion doughnut, and not many places have it. But Amazin’ Glaze did, and Graz’n Tables is continuing to carry that type of doughnut.

“They’re about the only ones that have it,” Roberts said.

Alongside the doughnuts, Barringer wanted to sell other local foods in her shop such as Brian’s biscuits, Mama Pug’s bundt cakes and a local Canales, a smoked ham business that has been in Collierville for six years.

“I wanted to really tie in the key talent that Memphis offers because we have so much in the food industry to offer that I wanted to open my case up in my store to anybody who has a small business who needed somewhere to sell their product,” Barringer said.

Graz’n Tables offers charcuterie classes during which Barringer teaches people how she eats charcuterie and the bites that she builds. The customers will sit at a table full of ingredients, and Barringer shows them how she would build it.

“My perfect bite is what I do my ‘lunchable’ out of, which would be a piece of coppa cheese, water cracker, apricot preserves, and a praline pecan on top.”

The Graz’n Tables business started as a side hustle for Barringer. Her previous full-time job was in real estate, working with mortgages for 14 years.

“I did the corporate job and finance, and it was great. And I got to meet people,” Barringer said. “But the core of what I love is people and feeding them.”

Inspiration for this business came from the girls’ nights Barringer and her friends would have during the COVID-19 pandemic. They would get together and have a variety of plates of food.

“We literally would say we would sit there and graze for hours,” Barringer said. “Those core memories helped me get through COVID because I got to be back around my friends.”

The “grazing” that she and her friends did inspired the name: Graz’n Tables.

Her signature dish would be charcuterie boards. Barringer discovered her love for charcuterie when she began to see them on Pinterest while they were trending.

One of her friends started posting Barringer’s creation on social media, job offers started rolling in for rehearsal dinners, Saturday night boards and more.

The charcuterie side hustle became a full-time job over the course of the pandemic, as her orders took over her kitchen and her mom’s kitchen.

Christi Keaton, Barringer’s childhood best friend, was one of the friends who helped inspire this business.

Keaton loves the environment of the shoop, but she said her favorite thing it is the “adult lunchable.” She usually gets the “lunchable” special of the day. The vanilla coconut is her favorite doughnut.

“(Chelsey) is very determined and can literally make something out of nothing,” Keaton said. “The owner is one of my favorite people in this whole entire world.”

Nora, Keaton’s daughter, is Barringer’s goddaughter. For the baby shower, her first birthday, family dinners and other events, Keaton will order Barringer’s charcuterie boards.

The family hangout spot in the shop was made for families and younger children, like Nora and Barringer’s five nieces and nephews, to be able to go to.

“She wants to make sure there’s a place for everyone in her store, in her life,” Keaton said.

One of Barringer’s passions is the Memphis community and the 22% rising poverty rate, Barringer said.

“(The statistic) really just hit my heart really hard,” Barringer said. “It killed me knowing that babies were going hungry.”

To combat this, Barringer created a $15 “adult lunchable” where she matches the proceeds and donates them two to three times a week.

The “lunchables” have different types of meats, cheeses, crackers and other charcuterie goods, which take Barringer about 10 minutes to make. Customers can also customize their “lunchable.”

“It’s a double-stacked container with your dried and sweet treats and crackers on the bottom,” Barringer said. “And on the top, it has fresh vegetables, fruits and meats and cheeses inside of it.”

Barringer includes her homemade dips as well to go with the assortment. The dip she is known for is the cookie-dough dip for fruit, Barringer said. The second dip she is most known for is an onion-caramelized dip for dipping vegetables in.

“Every ‘lunchable’ purchased, we actually put it in an escrow fund,” Barringer said. “And we’re creating a nonprofit to then turn to community centers, churches and schools and after-school programs to package up healthy alternative lunches for kids.”

Barringer said her business has taught her how to reconnect with people on a deeper level than just meeting them.

“In all transparency, the doughnuts, the lunch, the charcuterie is really just to fund my mission, and my mission is to feed Memphis,” Barringer said. “Making an impact on Memphis isn’t a quick fix. This is an overfall fix to lower the statistic and stop the bleeding and start repairing and building a solution around it.”

Barringer invites any community centers or after-school programs in need to call her and set up a plan to feed that group.

“In all transparency, the doughnuts, the lunch, the charcuterie is really just to fund my mission, and my mission is to feed Memphis. Making an impact on Memphis isn’t a quick fix. This is an overfall fix to lower the statistic and stop the bleeding and start repairing and building a solution around it.”

Chelsey Barringer
Graz’n Tables co-owner

Barringer comes from a line of cooks in her family, so she’s grown up cooking for and feeding others.

“I’ve seen it for generations in my family of just how that can help somebody when they’re in a hard time or a great time,” Barringer said. “It’s just something that pulls people together. I think after COVID, we really needed that.”

Her grandmother and her two sisters were cooks at a church and owned a tearoom in Columbia, Tennessee. At the tearoom, the sisters fed their community for every funeral, wedding and Sunday afternoon and always had a table full of people.

Barringer’s childhood family table is one of the tables used inside the location.

“There are just some really fun things that have made the space with a little bit of my soul into it,” Barringer said. “Hopefully, everybody feels that when they walk in.”

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For two years, Barringer’s mom and co-owner Kovacs has been looking for a change in scenery from her usual 9 to 5 in the cleaning business. Barringer asked for her help filling orders, and “it just took off.”

“We went side by side,” Kovacs said. “My favorite part is to work with (Barringer) and meet people. We love people and want to give back.”

Through this business, Kovacs has learned the community needs a place like this for people for children and older adults. Families walk in and are happy they don’t have to worry about their children, Kovacs said. The parents will be coloring with their children and sitting on the rug, Kovacs said.

“It touches Chelsey and I’s hearts when people say they don’t want to leave,” Kovacs said.

“Come here and see us, fellowship with us,” Kovacs said. “Come in and be a part of our family.”

The store will be open from 6 a.m. to 3 p.m. Tuesday through Sunday, but if they still have many doughnuts left, they will stay until 6 p.m. Graz’n Tables will also offer in-house delivery services from 12 to 6 p.m. It is closed Mondays.