This longtime St. Ann Center supporter is invested in community’s comfort.
They say there’s no place like home. One local company is making sure clients at St. Ann Center for Intergenerational Care feel as at home as possible.
“In 1983, when we opened St. Ann Adult Day Care, all we had was overstuffed, second-hand furniture that wasn’t practical for older people to use,” said Sr. Edna Lonergan, St. Ann Center founder and president. “Steinhafels donated our first piece of new furniture—a comfortable and sturdy recliner. Everyone wanted to sit in it!”
Over the years, as St. Ann Center built two new all-ages day cares, the connection to Steinhafels grew. The fourth-generation Midwestern furniture company provided deeply discounted sofas, chairs and tables for the living room in the Bucyrus Campus overnight respite. Most recently, they delivered nine at-cost mattresses to the Stein Campus respite unit. They’ve also regularly donated mattresses to the St. Ann Center Gala’s silent auction.
“I am blown away by the scope of everything St. Ann Center does—from bathing services for the adults to swimming lessons for the kids to therapies for clients with special needs,” said Dave Lappe, general manager of MidAmerica Bedding, which manufactures Steinhafels’ own factory-direct “Dreams” mattress line. “It makes us feel good knowing our mattresses are going to places that need them so much.”
The Dreams mattress factory, located in New Berlin, is filled wall-to-wall with wood for mattress foundations, layers of cushiony foam, springs of all sizes and giant quilting machines to sew everything together. A close-knit team of 25 employees can turn out up to 400 mattresses and foundations in a single day.
Steinhafels bedding can be found in homes, hotels, dorm rooms and more across Wisconsin and into Michigan, Minnesota, Iowa and Illinois. The factory also strives to find regionally sourced materials to produce its mattresses that come in a wide range of styles and price options.
In April of this year, the Steinhafels family announced the transition of their 87-year-old business to a 100% employee-owned company. “It’s a very exciting time for us,” Lappe said. With just under 600 employees, “it’s nice to know the people who worked so hard to make this company a success will directly benefit from it into the future,” he added.
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