Pasadena, CA | Restaurant & Cheese Shop | Quarterly Cheese Club Subscription

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Key results
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• A club members trust completely: subscribers report they've stopped shopping for cheese anywhere else, grocery stores included
• A built-in gifting engine, with a steady stream of Cheese Club boxes purchased as presents rather than personal orders
• Full logistical handoff, freeing Vanessa to focus entirely on sourcing and curation instead of billing and customer data
• A proving ground for exclusive, small-batch items, some of which return to the shop only because club members ask for them by name

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Showcasing small producers in Old Pasadena

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Vanessa Tilaka Kalb runs the cheese counter at Agnes Restaurant & Cheesery in Old Pasadena, the restaurant and market she co-owns with her husband, Chef Thomas Kalb. Vanessa discovered cheese almost by accident, through classes at the Cheese School of San Francisco, and turned that discovery into a career: stints at Bay Area cheese shops, a Certified Cheese Professional credential, and now a case at the front of Agnes that she treats less like retail and more like a rotating gallery of small producers' work.

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Her guiding principle is simple. Every wheel on the case represents someone's labor, and her job is to make sure that labor gets seen. When asked about her core value, she responds immediately: "Supporting small producers and making sure that their voices and their stories are heard, so that we can represent the hard work that they do."

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That philosophy extends to pricing, too. Vanessa is unbothered by the idea that cheese is expensive. In her view, that cost reflects everything upstream of the wheel: the land, the animals, the people. Good cheese should cost money, she says, because it's paying for the welfare of all three.

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Justifying the weird wheel

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Running a small market means constantly weighing curiosity against inventory risk. Regulars gravitate toward what they already know, but Vanessa is drawn to items that need a story first. She found a black garlic salami which was a genuinely impressive pairing, saline and deeply umami, but she knew it wouldn't fly off the shelves like a more familiar fennel or spicy flavor.

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The Quarterly Cheese Club became the outlet for exactly that kind of curiosity. Because members have already opted in to Vanessa's taste, she can put something unfamiliar in the box with confidence that it will get tried, not passed over. Some items are held back from general shop sale entirely until after a club release, giving subscribers first access to selections other customers won't see for weeks, if ever. And a few have even proven so popular that Vanessa has had to bring them back into regular rotation simply because members kept asking for them.

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Building the quarterly drop

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Working with Table22, Vanessa launched the Agnes Quarterly Cheese Club: a curated selection of cheeses, cured meats, and accompaniments built around a theme, and often timed to the season. A February release leaned into Galentine's Day and gifting, for example, while American Cheese Month in May became an all-domestic box highlighting U.S. makers.

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Each release comes with Vanessa's own tasting notes that cover who made the item, how it was made, and what it pairs well with. Writing them is one of her favorite parts of the job. It's where the producer's story becomes something a member can hold in their hand at home.

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Table22 handles everything around that curation: billing, customer data, delivery scheduling, and reporting on who's new, who's renewing, and what members have specifically requested. Vanessa says what she likes about the partnership is that, "I don't have to think about it."

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"A report shows up and I see how many people are continuing members, how many are new members, anything special they've requested. Table22 has made everything so streamlined and easy. My hard part is just making sure that the stuff in the box is awesome."

— Vanessa Tilaka Kalb, Cheesemonger & Co-Owner, Agnes Restaurant & Cheesery

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Her members' one-stop shop

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The clearest sign the club is working is what members tell Vanessa when they come back. Some have mentioned they've stopped buying cheese at grocery stores altogether, trusting that whatever Vanessa puts in the box will be good enough to skip the search elsewhere.

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"Everything that they've gotten has been so unique and tasty that they don't feel like they need to go anywhere else, like they've stopped shopping at regular grocery stores for their cheeses. They rely on our expertise to know that they've been happy with every single thing that's come in the box, so when they come back, they know they can get something else that's going to be good."

— Vanessa Tilaka Kalb, Cheesemonger & Co-Owner, Agnes Restaurant & Cheesery

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That kind of trust is exactly what Vanessa hoped the curation process would build. She writes a note card for every item in the box, covering who made it, how it was made, and what it pairs well with, treating each one as a small piece of the producer's story handed directly to the member.

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The reward for that work comes when members arrive for their pickup excited, enthusiastically sharing that they look forward to the notification that release day has arrived. Gifting has become one of the club's biggest unplanned wins, too. Vanessa has noticed a steady stream of Cheese Club boxes purchased as gifts, alongside members who return themselves every time a new release drops.

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What's aging next

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Vanessa is already thinking about how to build on that footprint, from potential add-ons like tinned fish to new seasonal themes tied to the calendar of small producers she works with. The club has become her creative outlet as much as a revenue channel, a place where she can take a chance on a product she believes in and rely on her members to help build out an inventory they'll keep coming back for.

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Our platform, your cheese. Welcome to the Club.