At Sunshine Furniture, we believe that nobody should be handicapped by their surroundings, and we use this as the basis for our design. Our President and Founder, Sonya Funk of Westhampton, MA, first had the idea to create the Tuff Koda easier chair when her own family was deeply affected by a random act of destruction.
Sonya’s son, Leo ‘John’ Perry, was stationed at Fort
Bragg, N.C. at the time, with dreams to become a paratrooper. He was the
victim of a hit and run accident that threw him off of his motorcycle and
left him without the use of his legs. Far from being “disabled,” Leo has continued on an exciting and fulfilling life path that does not
exclude such things as karate, car racing, and scuba diving.
However, the everyday difficulties of living with a wheelchair continued to become apparent, and when Sonya noticed her son struggling to maneuver into an easy chair within the comfort of her own home, she decided to do something about it.
Wanting to create a piece of comfortable living room furniture without the stigma that comes with many items made for use by the “handicapped,” Sonya worked for weeks on plans for a chair with an arm that would swing out of the way. An “easier chair” for those who use wheelchairs. One that looked and felt like any other normal comfy chair. She called it the Sunshine Chair, and that was the beginning of Sunshine Furniture.
Years later, with a hard-earned patent under her belt and a prototype in the works, Sonya Funk and Sunshine Furniture are ready to bring this user-friendly chair to the world. It has been re-christened the “Tuff Koda” chair. Koda is the Lakota (Native Americans originally residing in North and South Dakota) word for “friend,” and we all find ourselves sometimes in need of a tough friend.