If you have not already had the pleasure, please meet TeNeil Hartley. TeNeil is a wedding and event planner and owner of TeNeil Hartley Events. She is a Colorado native and is very active in our community volunteering with the Granby Chamber of Commerce and serving on the board of directors for the Grand County Weddings and Events Association.

In her free time, she loves snowshoeing, hiking, camping and spending time with her family. Only a few know that she truly cherishes her alone time!

TeNeil Hartley Events has two locations to serve their clients throughout Colorado. Whether your event is in Denver, Colorado Springs, Granby, Grand Lake, Estes Park, Fraser, Winter Park or any one of the other incredible towns in Colorado, they are ready to help you make it a success.

Thank you, TeNeil, for your love for Grand County!

Questions:

Q: Are you a Grand County native? If not, where you from and what brought you to Grand County?

A: This is always my favorite question! I am a not Grand County native but I grew up in a small town almost exactly like Granby, which is what really brought me here.  Our family had been coming to Granby for 3 years in the wintertime, we rented a little cabin up County Road 4 every winter so we could snowshoe and do fun things. When I decided I had to get out of Highlands Ranch, my mom and I traveled all over Colorado searching for two months. We went to Creed, Redstone, all my favorite places. I was looking for a place where I could run my business and make the best impact and still be close to Denver.  When we drove through Granby it reminded me of home, my hometown only has 1100 people and is a ranching community and looks a lot like this, but Granby has the mountains. We drove through and went to Steamboat, I thought I was going to stay in Steamboat, but it had changed and wasn’t really a small town anymore. So I narrowed it down to Crested Butte and Granby/Grand Lake. Of course, they are totally on two opposites sides; Crested Butte was in the running because it’s only 45 minutes from where my brother lives. However, the more I looked at how I could feasibly keep my clients in Denver and I realized with Crested Butte was almost five hours from Denver in the wintertime. So, I came back again and stayed here for three weeks and got lucky and found a great place to rent. Two weeks later, I hired a moving company and was here! This was over two and a half years ago, but it feels like it’s been longer than that because this is such a cool little community. Part of wanting to come back to a small community was fiding a cool place to raise a family with a great school system, where it still felt small and people still care about each other, their families and their businesses. You don’t get that in a lot of places anymore and that’s why Granby became a hub for me because it really still has that–the high school is here and you can go to the Friday night football games and volleyball games and I like that.

Q: What inspired you or led you to your current career?

A: I graduated from college at 19 so I was unprepared to decide what I wanted to do with life because I was a little young. I wanted to go to Grad school, but not right away because I was so young. My professor told me to take a year and go do something fun and then come back to school. So I did that and moved to the Bay Area and started looking for jobs. I was an events intern at the Boys and Girls club the whole time I was in college and it was pretty cool, so I thought I would do that. I  just started applying for random event coordinator jobs all over the Bay Area. I got three offers and decided to go with the one in San Jose because she was a cool lady and the building was awesome! I took that job and it just kept me going into events. When I left California, I went to work for Big Brothers Big Sisters in Montrose because I thought I wanted to do events and give back. Then I went to Telluride to be the event manager for the conference center. It just always finds me.  I have tried some other jobs and was I was trying to get out of it, but events always pull me back in. I really do have fun with it and like the people. It offers me the opportunity to work with non-profits, couples, and other organizations. Even though I work a lot of hours, I have the flexibility to dictate my own schedule and that’s what made me decide to start my own business–I get to pick my clients and my schedule and that became more important to me.

Q: What is your favorite restaurant in Grand County, and what do you love there?

A: Mine is a tie between the Bistro 28 at Pole creek and The Historic Rapids Lodge and Restaurant in Grand Lake. It’s a tie because they both have epic gluten-free food. I am 100% gluten-free and have had Celiac Disease for years, so when you find a place that has great food, good customer service and that really cares that my food is gluten-free when it comes to me, that’s important. At Pole creek, I always have a swordfish with a jalapeno tartar sauce, oh my gosh, it’s amazing! At the Rapids, they have a very diverse menu, and 80% of it is gluten-free. They offer good service and a nice setting on the river–which I think people sometimes forget about the river because they are so busy looking at the mountains!

Q: How long have you lived or worked in Grand County?

A: Over two and a half years now.

Q: Who is the most interesting person you’ve met here in Grand County?

A: Carol Morales and her husband. I have always wanted to talk to them more about the history of that farm and what a huge impact that family had on Grand County’s ability to be here and Granby being prosperous. They’re kind of the roots of Grand County and she’s really a neat person–she volunteers for trail maintenance and is always out supporting the community. They’re just cool people and they work really hard. I like what they have to offer in the history of Grand County.

Q: If you could travel anywhere in the world right now, where would it be? And why?

A: I don’t have time to travel but I have a really good friend who is in England and I haven’t been to see him since he moved over there. He has two daughters and I get to see them when he comes back here with them, but I feel like I miss getting to see his kids grow up in England.  It would be so cool to see what their life is like and how different it is there. His wife is originally from England and I think that’s where I would like to go.

Q: What is your favorite movie OR what is the first movie you remember seeing in a theatre?

A: I have a hardcore favorite movie, it’s Remember the Titans. I grew up in the football world, we were only twenty miles from Kansas and Texas and so we grew up with football ruling our lives.  Varsity Blues was always up there on my list because it reminded me of home. But for me, it’s Remember the Titans because the music is good and the story is epic! It’s an awesome movie and a neat way to tell such a huge part of American history. It’s so good!

Q: What advice would you give to people moving in Grand County?

A: Silly advice, figure out the post office! It’s a situation here! If you have lived in the city for a long time and you moved here and you would just change your address and expect the mail to start showing up at your house. That’s not the case here. There’s no home delivery. You have to get a box and pick up your mail there, and sometimes there are no boxes available. Then you realize you have to have two addresses because FedEx and UPS won’t deliver to your box. The best advice I got was from the FedEx guy who told me to use BOTH my physical address and the post office box. Just be prepared for delayed deliveries and some difficulty sorting it all out.

Q: What is something on your bucket list?

A: I would like to do some different traveling, going to New Zealand or Iceland and hiking and camping. I want to spend some time in someone else’s gorgeous outdoors. I’d like to spend time in other countries that are even more pristine because they haven’t allowed so much development. But not a rushed vacation, I want to spend time there.

Q: What is your favorite music/ 3 bands you would like to see (dead or alive)?

A: I worked at Red Rocks for four years so I have basically seen every band I ever needed to see. We had 110 concerts a year and I have seen them all, which was really cool! Most people find it surprising that I am a rock music fan. I am an old-school AC/DC fan, I like Incubus, but Tool is my favorite band!

Q: What is your favorite thing to do in your free time?

A: Hike and be outdoors. That’s what brought me here. When I lived in the city and had a day off, I was always getting in my car and driving to the mountains. But now, even if I only have four hours, I can get a hike in and come back. Or the other day I took an hour and a half lunch and went straight up a hill and back down.

Q: Choosing anyone alive and a non-relative with whom would you love to have lunch? Why, and where would you like to have lunch?

A: Renee Dalo, a planner out of Los Angeles. She has such a progressive way of thinking about our business and how we can make it better for our clients and for ourselves. I think she would get a kick out of visiting here because she is from LA.  I would probably take her to Pole Creek, The Rapids or Grand Lake Lodge so she could get a view of how cool this county is.

Q: What is your favorite thing or something unique about Grand County?

A: There’s a couple of things here, one, it is so unique that this place can feel like home so quickly. I am just here for 2 and half years but it feels like 10 years. It is just amazing how welcoming the community can be if you just get involved. The other one is the outdoors and how close you are with everything, you’ve got water, mountains and, if that’s not your thing, we are just three hours from the desert in Grand Junction. And, we are just two hours from Denver!

Q: Where do you see yourself in 5 or 10 years?

A: Probably still planning events. Eventually, I’d like to do fewer events which would allow me more time to start another business. Lately, I have been thinking would like to start a bakery and I don’t know why. Maybe because I crave baked goods. Maybe in 5-10 years, I will have a gluten-free bakery in Granby!

Q: (Even for friends or family), what is something interesting that most people don’t know about you?

A: I am pretty much an open book. Only a few close friends and my family know that I am not really an extroverted person. I prefer to be at home or to go on a solo hike. I prefer to be alone because of my job where I am out in the public so much and have to be “on” all the time for work, so I just like to be alone.

Q: What 3 words or phrases come to mind when you think of the word HOME?

A: Home for me is always just comfortable, whether it’s my stuff that I bring in to make it feel comfortable, home needs to reflect my personality and I want to be able to live in it. It has to be comfortable and fit my lifestyle. The other thing that makes me think of home is people, good people. Whether it’s the community you live in or the great people you surround yourself with, that’s what makes it feel like home. The other one is probably food, as weird as that might sound. I like my home to always feel like I can cook in it and it smells like good food, or you have something in the crockpot. That’s home to me because my mom was always cooking, multiple meals a day, and I love to have that familiar smell of home.

Q: If you had a full time staff member that was fully paid for, who would you choose? Chef, Housekeeper, Driver, Coach, Physical Fitness Trainer, or Nanny?

A: Fitness Trainer because I feel like I need somebody to push me that way. When I lived in Denver I had one and I loved it. I miss that here. I get too busy and then realize I haven’t worked out in a while. Also, a Nutritionist saying this what you should be eating now and keep on track to be healthy.

Q: If you were cast into a major motion picture and had your choice of anyone to be your co-star, who would you choose?

A: I don’t know a lot of pop-culture, so I don’t know. I don’t own a TV, but the last time I did it always had Friends on, so maybe someone from the Friends cast. The only movies I watch are Avengers movies and Marvel if I go to the theater. So, maybe the guy who plays Thor? I don’t know his name, but he is very fit!

Q: What is one business or activity that you would like to see in Grand County that currently isn’t here?

A: I hinted to that a bit earlier, but I would like to see some more places that cater to different populations in general. Like a gluten-free bakery. Though it’s hard up here because we don’t constantly have tourists to support a specialized restaurant. Perhaps a restaurant that focuses on just hamburgers, a veggie burger, and gluten-free buns!

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