New AirBed Pros Open Store in Eureka

When wishes people good night, he really means he hopes they have a good night. As owner of AirBed Pros in , Fry is concerned about the quality of sleep people receive. He tries to ensure customers get matched with products that best suit their needs.

To that end, he just opened a retail store at 1739 West 5th St. in Eureka. It is in the as .

"We began as a local service company that operated online. Customers would call for service, and we would go to help. When we rebuilt our website in 2010, we realized our national sales went up. And as we grew, we began to drop-ship to customers nationwide more than local sales. This was our biggest gain to date. It today accounts for 90 percent of our total sales," said Fry.

With the volume they do, Fry had been working from home. "Our third bedroom was just getting smaller by the minute, and it was clear we needed an office outside of my home to work from," he said. "I also home-school my son, Justin, and it helps to be able to have a larger spot to work with him, so leasing a office began to make more sense."

Fry's background is in business, communications and sales. "I learned all of my skills in the field with top-producing sales companies in St. Louis," he said.

Fry said he always wanted to be in sales, but wasn't sure which area. "As I approached my last career change from Wonder Bread in 2000, I began to look more closely at what it was I wanted to do. I started to work for Select Comfort, creator of the Sleep Number Bed. I worked there for about four years, and was let got as they closed the store I worked at in Plaza Frontenac," he said.

"When I left there, it did not really fit together like a puzzle; it took about seven years to get this far. But now we operate airbedpros.com, an online mattress sales company nationwide, and are on our way to do about a million dollars in sales this year," Fry said.

Fry's business partner is Gary Oleksiw, chief financial officer. Fry said he considers Oleksiw a great friend with whom he loves to work. "Together, there is no problem we cannot get through. He has helped me grow this company. We started as a repair team to fix air beds. Once we realized that most people did not want to repair them and wanted to purchase new beds, we got the idea to build a full line of beds to compete in today's market," he said.

Fry said it is helpful to have room to display beds and have customers to their store. "While it is not a huge store, it is cozy and customers really love it. Being here helps me provide better service to St. Louis and surrounding areas. We have people come to us now to pick up parts, and we used to only ship or install them."

The new retail location was found due to a local business owner advertising on Craigslist that he had a spot for lease. "I had been looking and calling people on signs of lots of local spots with little, or in most cases, NO response. If they did respond, it was with some price that was not anything we could do," said Fry.

But when Fry met , owner of IPG Financial, Inc., in Eureka, he said he was a down-to-earth guy and family man, and was willing to work with them. "His spot was just the size we needed, and the price was right on! Now that we are here, I'm glad we did it."

Although Fry and Oleksiw started their business at the low of the market, during December 2007, Fry said things are going great. "We try to live within our financial means. We strive to offer high-quality products at below wholesale prices to the public. It is working great for us. We make it up in volume!"

He said their bed products have been on the market since 1974, so have more than 36 years of air technology to back them up.