Office Furniture and Design Concepts, Inc. back on its feet
Office Furniture & Design Concepts is a source for quality office furniture in Southwest Florida.
_BY EVAN _WILLIAMS ewilliams@florida-weekly.com

Joe Gammons

I n the lobby of Office Furniture Design Concepts, Inc., in South Fort Myers, leather chairs are arranged around a coffee table with conspicuous symmetry and abstract

paintings under a long, svelte desk evoke…

something. OFDC president Joe Gammons said everything you see in here is for sale.

"It's called a working showroom," he said. "Everybody's working with something we sell, so if you like this table…or this flower arrangement … it's for sale."

That's part of the marketing tactic, he said - more sales opportunities and incentives for his reps, better selection and service for his customers.

It's what earned him the 2007 Southwest

Florida Blue Chip Community Business

Award nomination, presented to him by Gary

Trippe, president of Oswald Trippe and Company, host of the business awards luncheon last week. Gammons had rescued the floundering business he and retired Michigan State Senator Glenn Steil bought, in 2003.

"(Glenn Steil) is a gentleman who has been involved in the office furniture industry for 30 years, and afforded me the opportunity to be his partner and move to Florida," Gammons said. "It's been great. I mean, just look at the weather."

COURTESY PHOTO Simplistic beauty and solid construction, provide the most cost-effective solution that blends into any environment.

And outside his office with its big windows looking out on Metro Parkway the weather did, in fact, look perfect - relentlessly sunny, breezy, palm trees swaying.

"That was kind of the draw with Florida," he said. But it was also the Gulf of Mexico. Gammons grew up on Lake Huron, in the small town of Alpena, Mich., and said he's glad to never be landlocked. "With Florida you don't have to leave the water behind. I just like going to the beach and listening to the water roll in."

Gammons appears casually youthful and bright when he says this, an exceedingly normal, standup character, and it's not hard to envision him doing just that, maybe even listening to "Sittin' on the Dock of the Bay." He is 31 years old, married, has a 3-year-old son, and likes to stay home. Gammons said the workday begins for him at about 6 a.m. and generally ends about 7 p.m.

That's nothing special, he claims. "I don't know what a typical day is," he says of his work. "I just try to get up and sell office furniture. There's no magic to it."

Prior to these laid-back Florida days, Gammons interned for state Senator John Pridnia in high school (Pridnia's granddaughter now works at OFDC); was a receptionist for Senator Walt North while attending Michigan State University, where he earned a degree in Political Science; and went on to be a staffer for then Michigan Secretary of State Terri Land.

Gammons also organized the 2000 primary presidential debate, mediated by Tim Russert, at Calvin College in Grand Rapids, Mich. It included Orrin Hatch, Alan Keyes, Gary Bauer, John McCain, and then Texas Governor George W. Bush.

"I put it together," he explained, "from the invitations to the candidates to the choreography, for lack of a better word, of the event … The perception is it's a very highly organized machine, but the interesting thing is, we drew names out of a hat to see who would be asked the first question, and who would be asked the last one. It's organized chaos, not the polished end product everyone sees…Even from the political side, I've always been interested in what goes on behind the scenes."

He said that behind the scenes in business, like in politics, there's always a plan and that one way or another, it's a sale.

"I think running any business is very tactical," he offered. "There are goals you want to accomplish, and plans to achieve those goals. The biggest thing we're trying to accomplish here is, in challenging economic times, to provide exceptional service and a quality product."

OFDC offers consumers a number of brands, such as Steelcase ("the biggest office furniture manufacturer in the world") to furnish the offices of businesses like Robb and Stucky, Alan Systems Group, and Florida Gulf Coast University.