Nicole, 16, of Waterford, was directly helped by Suite Dreams

Nicole, 16, of Waterford, was directly helped by The Suite Dreams Project.
Photographer: Vaughn Gurganian

Suite Dreams Project gets big lift from local mattress donation

by | Oct 10, 2014 | Uncategorized

(L-R: Lauren Tonne, Kris Appleby, Rory Karpathian and Kay Ponicall; photographer: Vaughn Gurganian)

 
By MIKE SCOTT
Local Business News

Kay Ponicall and Kris Appleby can’t help but come to tears when they think of hundreds of kids, their non-profit The Suite Dreams Project have helped since being established in 2001.
But it is that emotion that has helped The Suite Dreams Project to thrive. The organization provides children with various medical challenges a custom-designed bedroom created to meet their specific needs, tastes and preferences – all at no charge to their family.

Think of “Extreme Home Makeover,” only focused on a child with special needs throughout not just southeastern Michigan, but the entire state of Michigan. That child will describe their dream bedroom and Ponicall and Appleby work their magic – and the magic of their vast array of volunteers – to make it happen.

“You see the courage that these children have. And you see what their parents are going through and what we’re just trying to do is create a healing environment,” said Appleby, a Bloomfield Hills resident.

“For these kids it is a space that gives them a voice,” said Ponicall, who is also a Bloomfield Hills resident.

“Many of them are spending most of their time in their bedrooms and in their own beds so it’s not just their refuge. It is really where they spend most of their time. We want to do something to help add a layer of peace for them and their families.”

The children who have been helped by The Suite Dreams Project, such as 16-year-old Waterford resident Nicole whose challenge is spina bifida, are forced to deal with a range of serious illnesses such as cancer and neurological diseases that have a direct impact on quality of life. The rooms can be designed to help address the need for certain medicines that is required. One of the specific needs that the organization has is mattresses for children’s beds that are comfortable and high-quality.

Nicole, 16, of Waterford, was directly helped by Suite Dreams

Nicole, 16, of Waterford, was directly helped by The Suite Dreams Project.
Photographer: Vaughn Gurganian

That’s where Rory Karpathain and his team at Rochester’s Beds by Design come in. As owner of the Beds by Design location that just opened this July in Rochester, Karpathian was looking to work with a local charity that supported children’s needs given his recent entry into the community. Since Beds by Design handcrafts mattresses made of natural fibers in northern Michigan, they are ideal for children with special needs. After Karpathian heard about Nicole’s needs, he offered to make and donate a perfect mattress for her.

“The thought of Nicole getting a better night’s sleep every night felt so good that I wanted to do more,” Karpathian said.

He added that now through the end of the month, any purchase made from Beds by Design’s master bed collection at its Rochester location will result in a twin mattress being donated for a child helped by The Suite Dreams Project.

Families and individuals are referred to The Suite Dreams Project by area hospitals such as Children’s Hospital of Michigan in Detroit and C.S. Mott Children’s Hospital in Ann Arbor. Social workers and physical therapists are also great resources for Ponicall and Appleby to help identify families and children that have specific needs.

Besides Ponicall and Appleby, the real heroes are the volunteers: those that volunteer supplies and their know-how to projects; and those that donate their time. There are a large group of committee members who have been a part of the organization since its inception. In addition there are artists and designers; skilled trades people in such areas as plumbing, electrical work, and more; and those that can help with transporting goods and items to the sites where new magical bedrooms are created within a period of weeks, not months or years. Their assistance has been invaluable.

Furthermore it includes generous business owners like Karpathian willing to pitch in.

“If you are handy with some tools and around a house we could really use you,” Appleby said. “I mean we really rely on these people and their skills because we would be lost without them.”
Since The Suite Dreams Project has just one employee, project coordinator Lauren Tonne of Shelby Township, (Ponicall and Appleby don’t take salaries) it has virtually no overhead, and practically all donations go directly to families in need. And in the end it is that need that keeps the two mothers of a combined six kids going with this organization.

“We do it because it makes a difference. It’s more than just the physical ability to make a room look pretty. The redesigned bedrooms make the kids feel special. And the parents and the family need that,” Ponicall said.

Often, The Suite Dreams Project will also provide some design services for siblings of sick children, who often may feel left out because so much of their parents’ attention is directed toward the child with special needs, Ponicall said.

“We started this because we wanted to set an example for our own kids and it has just grown and grown,” she said. “Now our kids are in high school or older and they are still involved. It has become this family effort, not just of our family but those who have played such a major role over the years.”

For more information on The Suite Dreams Project, visit suitedreamsproject.org. To learn more about the twin mattress donation promotion being held by Beds by Design, call 248-923-2153 or visit bedsbydesignmi.com.

 

 

Photographer/Videographer: Vaughn Gurganian.

 

Short Story

Suite Dreams Project gets big lift from local mattress donation

An agency that provides children with various medical challenges a custom-designed bedroom created to meet their specific needs is getting a boost from a local mattress maker.

The non-profit, Rochester-based Suite Dreams has helped hundreds of children in Southeastern Michigan at no cost.

“For these kids it is a space that gives them a voice,” said Suite Dreams’ Kay Ponicall.

“Many of them are spending most of their time in their bedrooms and in their own beds so it’s not just their refuge. It is really where they spend most of their time. We want to do something to help add a layer of peace for them and their families,” Ponicall said.

Beds by Design, which just opened a Rochester location in July, is working with the agency by donating mattresses. Now through the end of the month BBD is donating a twin mattress to Suite Dreams for every mattress sale it makes. BBD handcrafts mattresses that are ideal for children with special needs, according to BBD owner Rory Karpathian.

After Karpathian heard about Nicole’s needs, he offered to make and donate a perfect mattress for her.

“The thought of Nicole getting a better night’s sleep every night felt so good that I wanted to do more,” Karpathian said.

For more information on The Suite Dreams Project, visit suitedreamsproject.org. To learn more about the twin mattress donation promotion being held by Beds by Design, call 248-923-2153 or visit bedsbydesignmi.com.

 

Brief

Suite Dreams Project gets big lift from local mattress donation

An agency that provides children with various medical challenges a custom-designed bedroom created to meet their specific needs is getting a boost from a local mattress maker. The non-profit, Rochester-based Suite Dreams has helped hundreds of children in Southeastern Michigan at no cost.

Beds by Design, which just opened a Rochester location in July, is working with the agency by donating mattresses. Now through the end of the month BBD is donating a twin mattress to Suite Dreams for every mattress sale it makes. BBD handcrafts mattresses that are ideal for children with special needs, according to BBD owner Rory Karpathian.

For more information on The Suite Dreams Project, visit suitedreamsproject.org. To learn more about the twin mattress donation promotion being held by Beds by Design, call 248-923-2153 or visit bedsbydesignmi.com.

 

Michigan Mattress Manufacturer Opens Store in Downtown Rochester

Michigan Mattress Manufacturer Opens Store in Downtown Rochester

by | Jul 18, 2014 | Uncategorized

Michigan Mattress Manufacturer Opens Store in Downtown Rochester

By GLENN GILBERT
Editor, Local Business News.net

Rory Karpathian was at the top of his game but something didn’t feel right. He was a highly successful executive making a six-figure income in the mattress industry, and his services were in demand.

“I actually had a great job,” Karpathian, 53, recalls. “I had worked for all the major companies. But I just got sick of the changes in the industry.

Rory Karpathian, owner of Beds by Design

Rory Karpathian, owner of Beds by Design

“You just saw so many changes that really bothered me. Everything was planned for obsolescence. It used to be you bought a mattress and they never wore out. You’re lucky to get three years out of a mattress anymore. “They’re all foam, they’re all synthetic. Nothing is natural anymore. Everything is petroleum-based,” said Karpathian, who has worked in the industry for 30 years. Karpathian felt he could do better. He wanted to take a step backward and make something he could feel good about.

So in 2005 he bought and renovated an old 12,000-square-foot facility at 8643 M 119 in Harbor Springs, a resort area that sits on Lake Michigan, and started making high-end mattresses using a process he believed in. He named the company Beds by Design.

Today its five employees are producing nearly 800 mattresses a year and Beds by Design has just opened a new retail outlet with three employees at 111 W. 3rd St. in Rochester, Mich.

Karpathian said that what’s different about his handmade mattresses is that they rely on old-fashioned box springs, natural materials — wool, cotton and natural latex and very little foam. Each two-sided mattress is custom made for the customer. Prices range from about $1,000 to $4,500 for standard sizes.

Beds by Design also custom makes bedding for boats. The “older generation remembers when this kind of stuff was around,” Karpathian said. “I didn’t invent this. I just brought back all the old-school stuff. I wanted to go back to the healthy way of sleeping and build something that lasts, something I felt good about .”

The mattress industry has seen significant consolidation and contraction in the past decade and the number of small, independent manufacturers — once the bedrock of the industry — has declined, according to a report in Bed Times, a publication that covers the sleep industry.

Beds by Design offers a lifetime warranty. A sign in front of the Harbor Springs location says it is the last bed you will ever need to buy. That caught the attention of David Marvin, vice president and chief operating officer of Stafford’s, which operates three lodging facilities in northern Michigan.

Marvin walked into the store on a day when he needed a replacement bed in a hurry. Karpathian and his crew dropped what they were doing to meet the need in two days. It was the beginning of a lasting relationship between the two companies.

“We saw the way he made his mattresses,” Marvin said. “His mattresses cost quite a bit more than ours,” Marvin said, but with the lifetime warranty and no need to keep replacing beds, buying from Beds by Design made sense, Marvin said. Marvin said Stafford’s had been replacing beds about every five years.

Worker at Beds by Design

Worker at Beds by Design

Beds by Design now furnishes mattresses for all of the Stafford locations. “We put our name on it,” Marvin said of the beds made for Stafford’s. Stafford’s calls it the Pineapple bed — actually it is Beds by Design’s Moonbeam model.

“The guests responded to it. We can get more money for a guest room. It’s one more amenity for our properties,” Marvin said. “Almost half of the time you spend in a hotel room you’re spending in a bed,” Marvin notes.

Many of Karpathian’s customers have been guests at Stafford’s and want a similar mattress of their own. Marvin said Stafford’s now has an interest in the survival of Karpathian’s business.

“We need him to be around.” That suits Karpathian well. He wants to eventually open three more stores in Chicago, Indianapolis and Naples, Fla.

Karpathian said his typical customer is 50 years old or older, and usually wealthy. Seventy percent of his customers “have bad backs, bad hips, bad shoulders,” Karpathian said.

Beds by Design showroom/workshop in Harbor Springs, Mich.

Beds by Design showroom/workshop in Harbor Springs, Mich.

“People expect our mattresses to cost $20,000 to $30,000” and his audience could probably afford that. Typically, he said his customers might live in Birmingham, a wealthy community in Michigan’s Oakland County, have a summer home in Petoskey or Harbor Springs in Northern Michigan and a winter home in Naples. The health issue could provide a niche for bed makers as the Baby Boom generation matures. Getting a good night’s sleep depends on factors such as comfort, stress level, room temperature, but the first essential is a good mattress, according to the Sleep Disorders Center of WebMD.

“If you wake up in the morning and have some low back pain and can stretch and get rid of it in 15 or 30 minutes, that means you’re on an inappropriate mattress for you,” sleep specialist Michael Breus states on the WebMD web site. “The right mattress, on the other hand, is one on which you feel no pressure, almost like you’re floating in air,” Breus said.

Stafford’s Marvin was experiencing back problems himself and Beds by Design customized a bed for him and his wife. The company built him “a left-and right, his and hers bed. And I’ve never slept better,” Marvin said.

Karpathian said local chiropractors send their patients to him and want him to set up a booth at their conventions. Karpathian said launching out on his own “was a dream of mine five or six years before I started this company. I just had something driving me to do it. “There’s nothing like this on the planet. I’ll stick by that.”

Beds by Design is reachable by phone at 248-923-2153 in Rochester and at 231-347-0696 in Harbor Springs.