KC area couple turns a love of bees into an award-winning Lee’s Summit store

A love of learning, working together and being close to nature led Erik and Rachael Messner into a hobby that grew into an award-winning business.

Messner Bee Farm Store recently won Downtown Lee’s Summit Main Street’s Business of the Year Award in recognition of the store’s excellence in business, community involvement and volunteerism.

The Messners jumped right in after opening their local store in August 2024, connecting with others and embracing downtown Lee’s Summit, according to DLSMS officials. They creatively engage with customers during downtown events and throughout the year.

The Messner Bee Farm Store in Lee’s Summit is the couple’s second location. The first Messner Bee Farm Store opened in 2017 at the site of the couple’s home and beehives in Raytown. The business focuses on natural beekeeping practices and manufactures products made with beeswax and honey such as lip balm, beard oil, candles, solid perfume, lotions, paw balm for dogs and cotton candy as well as a wide variety of raw honey.

The Messners’ initial entry into beekeeping was part of the couple’s relationship, including a shared love of making things, working together and connecting to the natural world.

“Our love language is doing,” Rachael said. “We had a garden, we were making soap and pottery.”

Erik added, “It was how we connected, so the bees were just a natural outcropping of that. When we first got into bees, we didn’t expect them to take over our lives. But we’re grateful that it turned out the way it did.”

Both Messners are also naturally curious and enjoy learning new skills, and beekeeping involves so much learning, Erik said.

“We were really fascinated when we began keeping bees,” Erik said. “We discovered how complicated it was, how infinitely interesting. No matter how much we learned, the well just got deeper and deeper. There’s just so much going on in there, and there’s so much we have yet to learn as beekeepers.”

The couple built their first beehive in 2011, a year after they were married. In 2012, they received their first bee colony as a gift with Rachael developing the Messners’ first bee product — their lip balm — in 2014 after their first successful harvest.

“We didn’t get our degrees in business and didn’t graduate from school thinking we’re going to start this company and grow and make this iconic brand,” Erik said. “We were mostly having fun is how we got here.”

When the Messners began looking for a second store location, they were soon drawn to downtown Lee’s Summit thanks to their shared history in the area and the welcoming culture of its business owners along with a bit of pop culture inspiration.

Like many of us, the couple turned to a popular early 2000s television series set in a storybook Connecticut town during the pandemic.

“We watched all of the ‘Gilmore Girls,’ and both of us were like ‘we want to live in Stars Hollow,’” Rachael said.

“We were snooping around Lee’s Summit and the more time we spent here, we realized that this community is just about as close as you can get in terms of that small town feel,” Erik said.

Both are graduates of Lee’s Summit High School and lived near downtown Lee’s Summit during their teen years.

“We spent our early teenage years especially just hanging out around here,” Erik said. “We were in all the nooks and crannies of downtown Lee’s Summit. It was our stomping grounds.”

Now, all the business owners are friends with each other, and everybody knows everybody, they added.

“It’s big enough that you have access to a lot of opportunities but it’s not so big that it has that corporate sterility to it,” Erik said. “Everybody’s a character, everybody has their own sort of dreams and quirks and they’re fun to relate to.”

The downtown area also provides the store with visibility and a steady stream of walk-in business as well as assistance from the nonprofit downtown organization.

“Downtown Lee’s Summit Main Street is so welcoming and awesome and supportive and excited,” Rachael said. “They made us want to be here because they’re good humans and they work hard and are enthusiastic.”

The downtown business district also has an artsy atmosphere that includes public art and eye-catching window displays. The Messner Bee Farm Store features a creative and colorful interior designed by Rachael in collaboration with Erik and their employees.

A large mural featuring bees at the Messner Bee Farm dominates one wall, a hexagon-shaped wooden checkout area — built by Erik — continues the honeycomb theme, and light fixtures adorned with greenery and flowers shine overhead. Furniture purchased from local antique dealers complements the historic building.

“My goal is for somebody to come into any of our spaces and if they say ‘I just want to live here,’” Rachael said, “it means that it is successful.”

This story was originally published October 2, 2025 at 5:00 AM.