Twice Upon a Mattress

Many of our most inspiring origin stories begin with a guy frantically trying to get out of L.A. This is one of those. “My dad and his best friend were doing life transition,” Garret Gustason neatly summarizes. 

This is an article about a company called The Furniture Gallery by Mattress Mike, which is the mature iteration of an outfit once called simply “Mattress Mike’s.” On California’s Central Coast, the Mattress Mike’s tag is so familiar and beloved, it almost seems something that emerged alongside the mountains and sea. In fact, the pre-Mattress Mike epoch was defined by a couple of pals just trying to turn a page. “My dad and his best friend both had the same idea,” Gustason says. “They just wanted to change what they were doing. So when I was born my dad was like, ‘Okay – it’s time to get out of Los Angeles!’”

Garret Gustason’s dad, the legendary “Mike” (yes, he is flesh and blood and still walks the showroom floor like a relaxed Obi-Wan) was seeking a new business frontier and found it. “They knew a guy that was in the mattress industry,” Garret explains. “And he said, ‘…hey, I’ll advise you guys on how to get up and running, I’ll mentor you.” In the fullness of time, the two buddies would each start their own mattress company.

Determined to quit L.A., Mike Gustason began casting about for a California town worthy of his flag-planting, a place where growth opportunity and jaw-dropping natural beauty went hand in hand. By the end of the process, Gustason’s choices had boiled down to either Santa Barbara – or a peacock-plagued peninsula called Palos Verdes. These mesmerizing birds – exotic and imperiously graceful – strut around the lush PV environs like Harrah’s Lake Tahoe dancers circa 1968, regally arrayed in a spray of gorgeous plumage. Say, have you ever heard the sound a peacock makes? 

“The business started behind Cal Taco in Goleta,” Garret says

Circling the Block

“It was a 1,200 square foot warehouse, and when I was working there during the summers, I’d watch these dear older women slowly roll up and look at our store. I could see they were thinking, ‘I don’t know if this is the place…’”

At a glance, Mike’s digs may not have looked like the town’s long-awaited new mattress palace, but in a comparative jiffy locals figured out where the place was – and found being waited on hand and foot by mattress know-it-alls a pleasant buying experience. “You’d see them drive around the block,” Garret says, “and then they’d come back around like ‘I am in the right spot….’ On the second approach they would see all the mattresses lined up, and they’d hesitantly get out of the car. And then they’d be greeted with a smile, and then the whole demeanor would change, right? They’re like, okay – we’re good!” 

Initially, Mike Gustason’s place had a different name than the one to which Central Coast locals would later become endeared. Factory Direct for You arguably makes up in clarity what it lacks in musicality, but never mind. The increasingly besotted locals would in short order adopt and swarm Gustason’s start-up – warmly devising their own alliterative shorthand for the business.

“Yes, when my dad started, it was Factory Direct for You. And as he grew the business in the first couple of years the community created the name. And so then he transitioned from Factory Direct for You to Mattress Mike. It organically got cooked up by his customers.” 

Sleep – The Final Frontier

Soon the business moved to a space nearly three times the size of their original. Yes, the expansion was still behind Cal Taco. “We were at 3,300 square feet. And that was our first real showroom,” Garret says. “When we began working with furniture, we became Mattress Mike’s Furniture Gallery. And then when we made the transition here, we had a lot more furniture. So we decided to put that name first; Furniture Gallery by Mattress Mike.” 

Here, by the way, is a sprawling (and exquisitely homey) 55,000 square foot showroom, located in the old Sears space at La Cumbre Plaza on upper State St. in Santa Barbara. Furniture Gallery by Mattress Mike is the largest furniture showroom on the Central Coast. They carry all the relevant major brands as well as more boutique offerings, with a price point continuum that runs from Ramen-eating university students to the higher-falutin. Living Room, Bedroom, Dining Room, Entertainment, Décor, Office – if it exists, this counterintuitively cozy NASA hangar has it. But the humble mattress is the fuel that launched the rocket. 

“We know our subject,” Garret says. “It’s about sleep, which truly affects one’s life. A lot of people think, you know ‘…it’s a bed. I’m only on the thing for eight hours!’ Well, that’s a third of your life. If you don’t get the right sleep, the other two thirds will not be that great.” 

He’s right, of course. Peer-reviewed papers and researchers’ Sleep Studies are all over the subject. “Look,” Garret says. “It’s really important to find what works best for someone. The most expensive option isn’t always the best option, needless to say.” At FGMM they pride themselves on leaving the customer alone to wander the furnished acreage, and stand ready to answer any question. This is not a commission-driven pressure cooker, but the sort of family business where the newly-arrived customer is an immediate member of the Furniture Gallery clan.

Today, Garret is COO and General Manager. Did the old man dragoon him into working in the family biz or what? “As soon as I could, I got a worker’s permit. I started working summers in the shop, and then I was going to CC for about two and a half years, decided that it wasn’t for me. I’d been working the whole time, and I love Mattress Mike’s! I love what I do. So I said ‘Dad, I don’t know that I want to go to school anymore.’” Mike (dad) quite sensibly laid out the cards. “He said, fine – you just need to find yourself a job.” Garret grins in the telling. “Okay,” he replied. “I have one in mind.”

I Went to a Garden Party

When you’re a town’s mattress king, things happen. “Some years ago, my dad took a phone call. ‘Hey, do you have 20 king mattresses?’ At the time,” Garret says, “we had stacks of S immons Factory Direct Seconds. So my dad’s like, ‘Yeah, I do have 20 king mattresses.’”

Reader, your hurried calculations are correct. We are talking about ~ 850 square feet of mattress. In the event, Gustason Sr. – Mattress Mike, after all – grabbed his keys and 20 king-sized mattresses and hit the road. 

“He arrives at this property out in Montecito, and it’s huge, right? The assistant shows up, takes him to this big open lawn, and she says, ‘okay, just lay ‘em out right here!’ They ended up beautifully decorating them so everybody could just lounge on these king-sized beds in this outdoor setting.” Shades of ‘67s Summer of Love! Though we must charitably assume this village bed-in featured neither rampant nudity nor wild baying at the sun. What was the occasion, and who on Earth would dream up such a thing? “It was a certain well-known figure hosting a – I don’t know what you’d call it. It was like a garden party?” (The whims of our most beloved Thought Leaders are not always decipherable…) 

The Gustasons rule, their showroom is homelike and enfolding, and this Garret guy is happy as a lark. What gives?

“My father and I love every minute we get to do this together. We’ll call each other after work. ‘Man, what a day! But wasn’t it fun?’”