Meet Our Team
Our people are the foundation of everything we do with and for our clients. What unites us all is our passion for serving others, which is what we do each and every day.
Administrative
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Chuck McHale
President
Chuck began his career with the family grocery business when he was 13 years old as a bagger and clean-up person. He continued to work in many different areas and departments throughout high school and college. Chuck assumed management responsibilities after his father’s passing. Over the years, Chuck changed the focus of the family business from a retail food market to off-premise catering and ultimately to on- and off-premise catering, currently operating seven of the area’s finest wedding reception venues.
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Jeff Schachleiter
General Manager
Jeff was raised in the event and catering business. At the age of 13, he started setting rooms in the family event business. After his baseball career was cut short due to a shoulder injury, he started his full-time career. He had one goal in mind, which was to learn every job within the event business. He started as a kitchen manager, then moved into operations, disk jockeying weddings part time and then transitioned into the general manager role, acquiring 14 years of experience. He left the family business and started with McHale’s as the general manager in 2013. His wealth of knowledge and diverse skill set makes for a great leader in the company.
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Millie Woolwine
Personnel Manager
Millie has been in the wedding industry for over 45 years! She started on organ and piano, which led to her love for flowers, making cakes and onto being a server/bartender part time at McHale’s. Millie was then asked to take over the role of hall manager at the Grand, and 1.5 years later, became personnel manager. She loves her staff and tries to do anything to make it the easiest possible work scenario they could ask for.
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Event Planners
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Lindsay Morris
Sales Manager, Event Planner at The Center
Lindsay has been with McHale’s since November of 2015. She has been in the hospitality business for 15 years. Lindsay graduated from The Ohio State University with a degree in theatre and dance. She started out in the business in food and beverage. Once she found her way in the event planning side of events, she fell in love with it. Lindsay loves getting to know her clients on a personal level to make their events more meaningful and memorable.
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Loren Wehrley
Event Planner – Cincinnati Club
Loren has been in the hospitality industry since 2016 where she began working in a restaurant. In 2017 she attended Cincinnati State Technical and Community College where she pursued a degree in Hospitality Management and found a passion for the Event planning side of the industry.
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Megan Cassiere
Event Planner – Drees Pavilion, Devou Event Center & The Gardens of Park Hills
Megan discovered her love for the hospitality industry when she began her career at McHale’s as an Event Planner in 2008. With a number of successes and a strong work ethic, Megan was soon promoted to the Sales Manager position. After seven years with McHale’s she was offered a Private Events Director position for a prestigious Country Club in Wilmington, NC. During this time she had the pleasure of working side by side celebrity chefs such as Emeril, Giada De Laurentiis, Guy Fieri, Tyler Florence, and Robert Irvine.
Megan has returned to the Northern Kentucky Area and, thankfully, to McHale’s! You can trust that you will be in great hands with Megan planning your event, as she has coordinated over 700 weddings and more corporate events than she can count. She looks forward to working with you to help ensure that your event is a success!
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Tessie Warwick
Event Planner – The Grand & Pinnacle Ballrooms
Tessie started working in the catering business 11 years ago. She spent 8 years with a very well-known caterer in the Greater Cincinnati area as a Sous Chef. During that time, she earned a culinary degree and later went on to earn her bachelor’s degree from Northern Kentucky University. She then decided to jump into the front of house operations and found her place with McHale’s.
Tessie joined McHale’s as the Hall Manager of the Grand and Pinnacle Ballrooms, executing flawless events every weekend. After a few years, it was time to start a family. Tessie and her husband were blessed with a beautiful baby girl! Before returning to work, Tessie got the call to become an event planner for McHale’s, which she happily accepted. Tessie knows weddings and events inside and out and she is happy to help you plan your special occasion!
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Celia Blakenship
The Gardens of Park Hills & Offsite Events
Celia grew up with a passion for weddings and events and used this love to pursue a degree in Hospitality Management and Event Planning at Sinclair Community College.
She has been working in the catering industry since December 2021 as a Banquet Server and began an Event Planning internship with McHale’s in May of 2022. She is now an Event Planner as well as a banquet server when needed.
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Culinary Team
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Chris Weist
Executive Chef
Chef Chris, a native of Cincinnati, cut his culinary teeth at age 16, learning to cook steaks to temperature at a local restaurant. He then went on to graduate from the prestigious Culinary Institute of America in New York, worked under talented chefs from New York to California and spent time in Aspen and The Big Island of Hawaii.
Chris has a great working knowledge of many types of cuisine and varied cooking techniques. Among his many accomplishments is cooking alongside Emeril Lagasse in Seymour, Indiana for his Food Network program “Kick your School Lunch Up a Notch.”
Chris lived in Hawaii for two years, allowing him to get in touch with exotic ingredients that found their way to the back door on a daily basis, including fresh fruits and vegetables and, of course, the finest seafood, which he caught and cooked.
For the last 18 years, Chris has been honing his skills on the road and delivering restaurant-quality food at varied locations, including catering in some of the finest homes for future presidents and many off-site events of various sizes.
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Brian Warwick
Sous Chef
Brian graduated from the Cincinnati State Culinary Program in 2011. He worked in various downtown Cincinnati restaurants for about two years honing his skills to enable him to land his first executive chef position in 2013 at the Dearborn Country Club. He worked there for three years. In 2016, he decided to move into catering and has been active in that field ever since.
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Marley Fuller
Sous Chef
Marley has been with the McHale’s team since high school. She has had many different jobs, starting as a dishwasher, then moving to server, where the chefs would let her help with appetizers and salads. Her love for creating food made her make a promise to herself to be a chef at McHale’s one day. She went to study culinary arts at Sullivan University, and after 12 years, she still loves every minute of working as one of the chefs. What she loves most about her job is that there isn’t a better feeling than hearing from a client that you had a part in making the best day of their life possible.
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Jackie Newman
Sous Chef
Jackie was born in Chicago, but due to his dad’s job, he and his family moved to many different states, including Texas, Arizona and Washington. At 15, Jackie started as a dishwasher at a café in Illinois. Due to his hard work ethic and drive, he worked his way up through the ranks. During this journey, he was fortunate enough to work with and learn from many culinary mentors. Jackie became an executive chef of a boutique hotel in Kentucky, creating many delicious house dishes, and he met many exciting guests.
In 2003, Jackie moved to Northern Kentucky and worked at various restaurants in and around Mainstrausse. Jackie became the executive chef and director of food and beverage full service for Holiday Inn. Jackie met his wife there, and the opportunity to come work for McHale’s opened. Since 2017, he has been happy to call McHale’s his home, and he loves that he can do what he loves to do every day.
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Lisa Carter
Wedding Cake Designer
Lisa’s career with the McHale’s family began in 1986 while pursuing degrees in business administration and marketing. In 1991, she accepted Chuck McHale’s challenge to help him expand the business into the wedding industry. Lisa has developed a diverse background in the industry from both a business aspect and hands-on in the kitchen and with banquet venues. She has done it all!
The creative aspect of the catering industry is her favorite by far. Lisa enjoys everything from creating food displays and renovating and decorating the venues to transforming a couple’s vision into their perfect wedding cake.
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Hall Managers
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Phyllis Davis
Drees Hall Manager
Phyllis has been catering to brides for over 30 years! As an original employee of the Town and Country Banquet Center, she was excited to join the McHale’s team in May 2002 when it became the Gardens of Park Hills. Phyllis has worn many hats throughout her career, filling many roles, from banquet manager to personnel manager to hall manager. Her current role as hall manager has proven to be a great asset to McHale’s, facilitating the smooth operation of flawless events.
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Jeremy Emanuel
General Hall Manager
Jeremy started working with McHale’s on New Year’s Eve in 2015. He was a banquet manager at many facilities, mainly the Grand. Shortly after, he was offered the position to manage all of our off-premise venues. He created our systems for all off-premise events and coordinated every event that was not at a facility we own or operate for a couple years. He has worked at just about every venue McHale’s has the pleasure of serving, and has learned a lot throughout this process.
After his time as off-premise catering manager, he was offered the position of hall manager at the Grand Facility. He managed the facility and all events there for another couple years. This allowed him to focus on client satisfaction while still managing staff and all facility needs. Most recently, he was offered a promotion to assistant general manager. He now manages both the Grand Facility and the Cincinnati Club, making sure all needs are met for clients and staff at both facilities.
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Jeannie Wirth
Cincinnati Club Hall Manager
Jeannie started in the banquet and catering business when she was just 14 years old working for Davis Catering at The Cincinnati Club. When McHale’s acquired The Cincinnati Club, Jeannie decided to come to work for McHale’s. She has become a strong member of our staff and says she is extremely happy working for McHale’s.
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Erin Kirry
The Center Hall Manager
Erin graduated from University of Cincinnati with a bachelors in Business Management. She has been in the event industry for over 10 years and is currently the Hall Manager at The Center.
Erin is a huge animal lover and has one adopted son!
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Aaron Clayton
Grand & Pinnacle Hall Manager
Aaron has worked for McHale’s since March of 2016. He started as a dishwasher, later training to be a server and quickly moved up the ranks to Banquet and Hall Manager at the Grand. He graduated with his Bachelor’s Degree in December 2021 from the University of Kentucky and is currently working on his Masters Degree in Business with Northern Kentucky University.
Aaron enjoys going on roadtrips to see new places with his friends and family. When he’s not on the road, you can find him watching his favorite tv show, The Expanse.
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