Last year, Mike Nichols was visiting Paris when a conversation with his wife led to an epiphany. The pair co-own a St. Louis mortgage brokerage and were enjoying a food-focused tour of the City of Lights when his wife brought the conversation back to their won neighborhood.
“You know, with all the history you’ve got over the Central West End, you could do this there, and it would actually be good,” she told him.
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Nichols wasn’t convinced, but decided to look into the idea. “Really, I think, I set about proving her wrong.”
Fortunately for him, and St. Louis, that proved impossible, because she was right. Nichols’s research led to him launch TourCWE in April, a food-focused walking tour company that’s since led more than 150 two-hour tours throughout the Central West End, with participants from four continents and 20 U.S. states.
Says Nichols, “There’s a lot of folks that like the idea of going to a city and being able to learn a little something about its history, but also taste things that you won’t be able to taste once you leave.” He now has the five-star reviews on Trip Explorer to prove it.
Why It Matters: Explore St. Louis CEO Brad Dean has said St. Louis’ unique neighborhoods are important points of interest for visitors, and increasingly, meeting and convention planners are seeking experiences within them, far beyond the halls of a convention center. “TourCWE is a great example of the larger trend that we’re seeing in how locals are connecting visitors to what they love about their city,” says Explore St. Louis vice president for communications, Cat Neville. “Airbnb ‘experiences’ are a national-level example of that—rather than relying on top 10 lists, people really want to dig into the character of the places that they’re visiting. And that’s great for St. Louis because we have tons of character!”
Maybe too much for some visitors. After getting a three-star review from a participant who felt that Nichols’ storytelling was too “politically charged,” Nichols added a trigger warning to his Food + History Walking Tours, letting people know that “events regarding race and social justice are covered.”
He notes that it’s not just the content involving the city’s checkered history of race relations that may set off some participants, but also a setting that, for better or worse, takes place in a true urban streetscape. “I’m going to give you St. Louis,” he says. “It’s not a controlled environment. Do you sometimes see things that you’re like, ‘OK, this might not be what the Chamber of Commerce would choose to show off St. Louis? Yes. But this is the real St. Louis.”
What’s Next: After originally offering two walking tours—one focused on iconic St. Louis flavors, the other on “hidden gems” in the Central West End—as well as private tours upon request, Nichols recently added a Forest Park picnic basket option for people who want the food sampling without the walking. Each basket contains goodies from 3–4 neighborhood restaurants. Says Nicholas, “I think it’s a way I can make people not just fall in love with the Central West End, but also say, ‘Wow, we have to go to this restaurant because I need more of this sandwich.”
Editor’s note: A previous version of this story referred incorrectly to the conversation that triggered TourCWE. Mike Nichols was chatting with his wife, not his mother. We regret the error.
