Old ag facility turned into event center
OLD MILL - Joe Hoehn is pictured above. He purchased the old feed mill, repurposed it and renamed it the Mill Event Center. Following his wife's suggestion, Hoehn used the mill as a place for a wedding reception and decided it would be great place for more events. )Star Eagle photo by Melanie Piltingsrud)
By MELANIE PILTINGSRUD
Contributing Writer
When Joe Hoehn bought the old feed mill on SW 2nd Street in Waseca, he planned to lease it to other companies that needed warehouse space. Then one of his nieces had a wedding that changed all that.
The wedding and reception were supposed to take place at the family farm, but when Hoehn’s wife, Deb, saw the warehouse, she thought it would be a great location for the dance and reception. Making use of his talents as a general contractor in construction, Hoehn quickly built a stage and a bar, and his niece’s dance and reception were accordingly held at the old feed mill. “The next week we had four phone calls from different couples that were here,” says Hoehn.
Since then, The Mill Event Center has become a popular wedding venue with couples coming from as far away as La Crosse and Sioux Falls. But The Mill hosts other types of events as well. Johnny Holmes played there on Oct. 26, and there was an estate sale there on Nov. 2 and 3. This weekend, Radioactive will be performing there, and on the night before Thanksgiving, IV Play is scheduled to play. “We can seat up to 670 people in here,” says Hoehn.
That’s an amazing change from the original purpose of the feed mill. “A year and a half ago this place was stacked to the rafters with animal feed,” says Hoehn. The feed company, United Feeds, which is headquartered in Sheridan, Ind., decided to close their northernmost plant in Waseca. and Hoehn negotiated for two months to buy the location. “I did not tell anyone,” says Hoehn. “I didn’t tell my wife even.” Hoehn finally let the secret out when a price was agreed upon.
Hoehn was dubious about turning it into a reception hall at first. “I mean, it smelled like a feed mill in here,” says Hoehn. But after the building was cleaned and lights were strung, many agree that it makes the perfect setting to celebrate a wedding. Hoehn reiterates frequently, “The place took on a life of its own.”
Just like the feed mill itself, many items within the mill have been repurposed. The wood for the stage came from a neighbor’s granary. Hoehn says, “They were tearing his granary down and they were going to burn it.” When Hoehn expressed interest in acquiring the wood, his neighbor said, “Help yourself.” When Hoehn wanted to add bathrooms at the back of the warehouse, he discovered another neighbor who was disposing of the wood from a granary. “So we reapplied it to the outside of the bathrooms and put polyurethane over it,” says Hoehn. The ceiling fans above the main hall used to be windmills at his brother’s ranch in western Nebraska, and the wood for the bar came from another granary and the third story of the older, original feed mill building, which was built in 1888 and now houses Zinnias Bourtique.
Rather than disguise the antique qualities of the 1950s era building, Hoehn and his wife capitalize on it. For example, four wooden carts hold stuffed seed sacks that decorate above the dance and reception area. “The carts came with this building,” Hoehn explains, “and I got the seed sacks from a good friend of mine, and all those seed sacks are from the 1950s. So my wife went out and got four pillows. We put them in the feed sacks and set them up there.”
Whatever the Hoehns are doing with the event center, it’s working. Several events are already scheduled for next year, and Hoehn says, “We’ve already had people contact us for 2020.
“It’s really a family affair,” says Hoehn, whose five kids, ranging in ages from 19 – 28, run the bar during events. His nieces and nephews help, too. “They all work together well, and it’s really fun to watch.”
Hoehn isn’t finished renovating the feed mill. He has plans to turn the old office overlooking the main warehouse area into a bridal suite, so couples can spend the night. On the mezzanine, which also overlooks the main floor, Hoehn plans to create more seating in addition to the 60 five-foot round tables they already have. Hoehn will construct a stairway leading up to the mezzanine.
Hoehn says the event center has limited the time he can spend on general contracting, but he says, “This is kind of fun because it’s different. I’ve been in construction almost 40 years of my life and it’s kind of fun doing something for yourself once.”
If you’d like to schedule an event at The Mill Event Center, you can call (507) 461-1434, or email This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.. You can also look up their website: www.milleventcenter.com and their Facebook page: The Mill Page.