We are excited to welcome our new owner, Katie Pelikan, to the Cat’s Meow team. Want to know more about Katie? She was born and raised in St. Louis. Growing up, she attended Christ Community Lutheran School in Kirkwood and Lutheran South High School. She attended Mizzou where she received her bachelor's degree in business and marketing. After graduation, she moved to Topeka, Kansas where she worked for Payless ShoeSource. Here, she developed her retail knowledge while she earned her MBA from Washburn University. During this time, Katie purchased her first sewing machine and taught herself how to sew. For her first project, she made a t-shirt quilt, sewing her high school and college shirts together to make a personalized blanket. Katie always had a passion for creating personalized things.
Katie moved back to St. Louis and continued to work in the retail industry in sales, marketing and ecommerce at Elan-Polo International. During these years, Katie purchased an embroidery machine and started to make her signature baby gift, a personalized burp cloth, for her friends and family. She also used her embroidery machine to personalize gifts for her wedding. Professionally, Katie decided to pivot the direction of her career and accepted a marketing role for a St. Louis based engineering company, Emerson.
During her 20 year career working at global corporations, Katie learned a lot about business and herself. Ultimately, she felt a pull to try something different, something local. Now, Katie looks forward to continuing the legacy of Cat’s Meow that our founder, Catherine Bennett, built for over the last 17 years.
Katie has been a Cat’s Meow customer for over 10 years, since the original location. In fact, her first purchase was an orange wood pumpkin with a “P” in the center that she still hangs on her front door for Halloween each year. Katie is thrilled to be part of the Cat’s Meow team and bring her passion for personalized gifts to the St. Louis community.
In her free time, Katie enjoys spending time with her husband and 3 daughters. When she’s not driving kids to practice, coordinating or coaching teams, Katie enjoys traveling and listening to Taylor Swift. Katie also volunteers at local organizations through the National Charity League. Katie looks forward to starting a new era at Cat's Meow.
Keep in touch and see what’s new on our social channels.