Sep. 2—GOSHEN — Furnitureland, {span}2121 W. Wilden Ave.,{/span} is closing its doors forever on Saturday.

After almost 40 years in business, current owner Steve Immel finally decided he was ready to wash his hands of the furniture business.

"I tried to sell it as an ongoing business but nobody was interested," he explained.

Immel is the third owner of the building, with six years of tenure there.

"There's a need for a furniture store in this town," he said.

The closing is a result of Immel's intent to retire.

"I kind of wanted to a year ago," he admitted, but decided to wait in order to support his customers who had special orders that had supply chain issues resulting from the pandemic. One product still in the store awaiting pickup on Friday had been ordered over a year ago and came in last week.

"Two of them were actually previously sold and I refunded their money back a long time ago because they got tired of waiting," he said. "Plus, when they bought it the price was one price, and the price when I got it was much higher. It's a tough situation."

So, Immel waited to retire for his customer base.

"I had all these special orders and I wanted to make everyone happy," he said.

The store had a total of 10 employees, most of which have already moved on. As for the experience, Immel said it's been good. Working on the wholesale side, the experience was mostly new to Immel, who also owns a few rental properties in the area

"The majority of our customers were great," he said.

The building was constructed in 1985 by Ancon Construction, which also ended up purchasing the building from Immel during Wednesday's auction, he explained. He said Ancon Construction has the intention of moving their office headquarters to the location, since they've outgrown their current building at 2146 Elkhart Road, Goshen, on the other side of the railroad tracks.

There are just a few items left in the store. Anything not sold on Saturday will make its way to Northern Traders, 2801 N. Old U.S. 31, Rochester.

Dani Messick is the education and entertainment reporter for The Goshen News. She can be reached at dani.messick@goshennews.com or at 574-538-2065.