Down to Business: WenDesigns offering lunch options

WenDesigns Home, Apparel and Design has expanded to offer full service lunch options.

“There’s not a lot in this area, in Brentwood,” owner Wendy Winstead said. “There’s not a lot to offer for a quick lunch that’s good, other than fast food. In the Brentwood area, and really this whole side of Wilson, there’s not a lot of mom and pop type restaurants that are serving whole, fresh food that’s not made out of state somewhere and shipped in frozen, then thawed out.”

Winstead’s offerings include soup, sandwiches, salads and specialty items, including baked potatoes.

“We’re getting ready to start the signature spuds,” Winstead said. “We have a 1-pound baked potato we salt crust that we put chili mac in or ham and cheese or barbecued chicken with smoked cheddar and sour cream. You can take it home, heat it up at night and eat it as a meal. If we don’t sell out of potatoes, we’ll make twice baked potatoes, and they’ll be in the case as a take home meal.”

Winstead said she’s wanted to offer food for years since the closure of another Shoppes at Brentwood restaurant left a void.

“Inner Banks Market used to be here many years ago that many people know,” Winstead said. “They were on this side of Brentwood. It was very popular. That void has been missing ever since they left Wilson. Immediately after we opened, we were doing the coffee and the desserts and people started asking us, ‘Well, when are you going to do lunch? We need some sandwiches, soup.’ There was a void.”

Winstead said the pandemic made her pump the brakes on launching a full-sized kitchen.

“We had a building on Nash Street for 20 years,” Winstead said. “I’d been wanting to do it there and we couldn’t get the zoning to do it, so it just never really worked out there. Here, we wanted to try to start before COVID. When COVID hit, we kind of just had to rethink everything. There’s people that closed. There’s people that stayed open and they fought. We stayed open and we fought. We kept hearing it more and more, and I felt like the time was right for me to step away from big design projects and only take on smaller ones. That opened a door for me to be able to concentrate on this.”

Winstead, who’s owned the Brentwood boutique since 2017, said the goal has always been to make the business a place where everyone feels welcome.

“When we moved here, I knew I wanted it to be a family atmosphere where guys could come in and feel like they could enjoy a drink and not worry about the clothes being feminine,” Winstead said. “It’s a family-type atmosphere. Design is a little more upper scale. You don’t really think of it as a family thing. It’s more independent, working one-on-one with a client. We wanted that more community feel. Both of these spaces were available, so we did the boutique on one side and the home goods on one side and decided to do a small coffee shop.”

Winstead said people are surprised when they walk into WenDesigns.

“Everybody, when they come in, go, ‘Oh, I didn’t know you had all this,’” Winstead said. “It’s a very comfortable environment. Just come in and see. We had kids. We have men. We have something for everybody. It’s not an intimidating type of store. Sometimes when you walk into a boutique, it’s intimidating. I feel like we carry lines that don’t make it intimidating. Seeing some of the things, like the bowls and the cookbooks, we have everything that embodies home and comfort — anything to make you feel good at home; that’s what we’re about. The food is the same thing. It just makes you feel good.”

Along with doing made-to-order meals, WenDesigns is also offering take home meals.

“We’re calling those WenMeals,’ Winstead said. “You can come if you’re single or you’ve got somebody sick or your wife just had a baby or if you work all day. It’s not frozen. You can go home, put it in the over for 30 minutes, and you’ve got a hot meal. We have proteins, vegetables. We have a little bit of everything. The grab-and-go, you can just come in if you’re going somewhere and take it with you. That has become really, really popular.”

Winstead said meals range from $8 to $15 depending on the item.

“We try to be very cost conscious,” Winstead said. “We want to give you enough and feel like you’ve got your money’s worth, but we want to stay very value friendly as well for today’s market. Just come in and try it. When you walk in, immediately you’ll know it’s more than a boutique. It’s just panninis, soups and salads. Everything’s fresh. We’re cooking everything. You can get in and out of here in a quick 35 minutes.”

WenDesigns is open 9:30 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. Monday through Friday and 10 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. on Saturday. The business is closed on Sunday.

Christopher Long is The Wilson Times’ business reporter. If you have ideas for this weekly column, reach out to him at 252-265-7821 or clong@wilsontimes.com .

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