Randy Clark’s flight plan includes his first furniture showroom.
By Allyssa Baird, YSN
BrandSource dealers often come into their businesses as descendants of a family member who owned or started their companies. Not so for Randy Clark of iDeal Furniture of Tacoma, who began his career in the military.
Clark served as a flight nurse during Operation Desert Storm, caring for injured service members in an aircraft that had been transformed into an emergency medical care facility.
During his deployment Clark had the opportunity to speak with pilots and was intrigued by what they do. “I realized that most of the pilots were younger than me,” Clark said, “but I thought to myself, ‘I can do this.’”
Inspired, Clark began taking flying lessons in 1992 and eight years later took his first job as a pilot in Puerto Rico. Soon thereafter he was delivering packages to small towns for Federal Express and later took a job flying for the U.S. Postal Service in Montana.
In 2005 Clark’s flight path came to an abrupt stop after a plane crash nearly ended his life, and he took a 10-year hiatus from flying. But following a decade in logistics he decided to get back on the horse and began piloting a small plane between upper Wisconsin and Chicago’s O’Hare airport. That led to a job flying film stars about in a private plane, which he pursued until 2018 when a franchise opportunity arose with iDeal Furniture.
iDeal Furniture of Tacoma is presently an online-only furniture retailer. While Clark has secured a location for a brick-and-mortar store, the pandemic brought his plans to a screeching halt, and he now hopes to have the showroom open by the end of the summer.
Clark intends to use a secret sauce to set himself apart from the furniture competition: wine. “I already have the liquor license,” he explained, “so I can offer wine to customers while they are looking at furniture and offer them a space to have a meeting.”
In the interum, Clark accepted an offer from Amazon to fly packages around, which was a good way for him to continue working through the pandemic while getting his furniture business going.
Clark recently joined our group at the recommendation of iDeal Furniture. As inventory can change daily, he needed someone to keep his website accurate and up to date with the proper products and prices. Enter BrandSource.
Looking back on his long and varied career, Clark commented that “I’ve been traveling so much for the last 25 years, I am ready to settle down and work on the [iDeal] business. If things open up and I can get my store open, I will give up flying.”
Here’s hoping he’s not grounded for long once his business takes off and soars!
