John Yoder ’02

Major: Business Information Systems and Business

Business name:

Furniture Outfitters of Indianapolis, founded in 2002.

Business description:

From two retail locations, Furniture Outfitters sells a full line of Sauder ready-to-assemble furniture, as well as provides assembly and delivery services. Yoder employs several GC graduates.

On the spirit of entrepreneurship:

“You have to be persevering. It’s easy to get discouraged from time to time; things won’t always go your way. But to go in everyday, and give it your best effort – that’s what being an entrepreneur is all about. In the beginning, being an entrepreneur means working very long days; the rewards for an entrepreneur arrive later, when success has started to come.

“A challenge of entrepreneurship is that nothing can truly prepare someone for the experience, short of just doing it. You can plan as much as you want, but there will always be unforeseen factors that will affect the organization. It is how an entrepreneur deals with these daily ‘surprises’ that can mean the difference between success and failure.

“Often times an entrepreneur has to improvise and make quick decisions daily – ‘go with your gut’ – without the luxury of looking at quantitative data. The education I received from Goshen College has helped that ‘gut feeling’ be more accurate.”