Hassing is named Wells Volunteer of the Year
The owner of Lacey’s Catering has filled her ‘plate’ with service work
Lacey Hassing has never been afraid to fill her plate with commitments.
From owning and operating her own catering business to serving on the Wells Area Chamber Board, Hassing has certainly been a busy bee since she returned to her home county in 2015.
Hassing received a ‘sweet’ surprise last December when she was nominated for the Wells Volunteer of the Year Award – an appropriate ending to her six-year tenure on the Chamber Board.
Apart from operating Lacey’s Catering in Wells, Hassing has assumed several volunteer and leadership positions in the community.
She can trace much of her involvement back to 2015 – a year where just about everything seemed to happen to her all at once.
Hassing established Lacey’s Catering on Oct. 1, 2015. She also joined the Wells Jaycees and Kernel Days Committee that year, and began volunteering her time with family and consumer science programs at local school districts.
As if that weren’t enough, Hassing also assumed her role as the Little Miss Kernel Chair in 2015.
Crystal Dulas, another past recipient of the Wells Volunteer of the Year Award, encouraged Hassing to chair the program.
“Crystal has this thing called ‘volun-told,’ where you volunteer to do something, but you were also told to,” Hassing explains.
Hassing soon settled into the role, which she is still passionate about eight years later.
An Easton native, Hassing once competed in the Little Miss Kernel program herself.
“I did not win Little Miss Kernel, but I was the Wells Area Distinguished Young Woman, so I had that going for me,” she laughs.
Hassing feels the Little Miss Kernel program is a valuable experience for its participants – area girls who have finished fourth grade the previous spring.
“Fourth grade girls are at that age where they are really moldable,” Hassing says. “It’s just that age where they need to learn it’s okay to be themselves.”
The program asks participants to complete a short interview where they answer get-to-know-you-type questions. Afterwards, the participants demonstrate a talent on stage, which can be anything from a basketball or dance routine to a musical performance to a demonstration about how to make slime.
2015 was a busy year for Hassing. However, she took on even more commitments in the years to come.
In 2017, a vacancy opened on the Wells Area Chamber Board, and, following her ‘volun-told’ policy, Dulas encouraged Hassing to apply.
Hassing’s sister-in-law, Emily, had served as the Chamber director for several years, so Hassing was already somewhat familiar with the Chamber’s role in the community. She decided to become a member.
Hassing served on the board for six years, wrapping up her second term at the end of 2023.
It was fitting that her departure from the board was marked with her receipt of its annual Volunteer of the Year Award.
It all happened at the Chamber Board’s meeting in December of 2023, during which the board was trying to decide who should be the next Volunteer of the Year.
“I had nominated someone else, then Corey Olson nominated me,” Hassing remembers. “I said, ‘I don’t think I should get it,’ but the board agreed, and I was out-voted.”
Despite this, Hassing still argues, “I do truly believe there are many people out in the community who do more. I was honored. I was humbled.”
Hassing accepted the award at the Wells Area Chamber’s Winter Social Event, which was held at Margaret’s Pub in Easton on Jan. 17.
Although Hassing’s time on the Chamber Board has reached its conclusion, she will remain plenty busy with her remaining volunteer activities, and as a full-time small business owner.
Hassing entered the catering business due to the influence of her mother, Sherrie. Her other family members include her late father, Steve, siblings Matt and Jessica, and several nieces and nephews.
“My mom was a restaurant manager for many different places in the county, so I grew up with her in the food service business,” Hassing explains. “I really liked that – I just didn’t enjoy how often she was gone. So I knew I wanted to do something with food, I just didn’t necessarily want to do it in a restaurant.”
Hassing started working for Kim Ernest in 2012 at her catering business, Kim’s Cuisine. A few years later, in 2014, Hassing graduated from South Central College with a degree in culinary arts and business management,
It was Ernest who gave Hassing the push to start her own catering business, shortly after she received her degree.
“I expected to always come back home, but I know I didn’t expect a catering company, or really a business of any sort, that early,” Hassing admits. “But, Kim was going to retire.”
True to form, Ernest did retire in 2015, and Hassing purchased her business – her vans, equipment, recipes and more – to build the foundation for what is now Lacey’s Catering.
Hassing admits she never would have expected to be running a business so soon.
“I thought I was going to be 30, and married, with a big savings account,” she laughs. “I had none of that. There were definitely days where I was second guessing it. I also just knew it was a now or never thing with how good the situation was.”
Hassing agrees that small businesses, like hers, really do enhance their communities.
“You have the bigger companies, but it’s the smaller ones that give back to the schools and prom and all of that,” she says.
For example, her own business frequently donates food items to local events in the community.
Hassing holds the belief that it is not only important for the community to give to its small businesses; it is also important for small businesses to give back to their communities.
“In a small community like this, it’s all one big circle,” she explains.
She suggests that circle extends to communities’ residents, too. In fact, Hassing’s primary hope for Wells’s future is to see more volunteer participation from both its small businesses and its community members.
“A lot of small town celebrations can’t happen without money, but they also can’t happen without the actual people there to volunteer,” Hassing observes. “As much as money is helpful, you also need the people to do those things – more people reaching out to ask, ‘How can I make this better?'”
She concludes, “With more volunteers and more people taking action, and more events, that keeps this a lively town.”