SPOKANE, Wash. – At height of his addiction, Jason McSteen walked into the Union Gospel Mission with less than a dollar to his name.
“16 cents, 3 shoes, and 5 socks,” he said.
Today, his former net worth is plastered on signs across the greater Spokane area for a much different reason; McSteen sells furniture.
“The Union Gospel Mission absolutely saved my life,” McSteen said. “There is no doubt about it.”
Colloquially called ’16 Cents,’ McSteen’s furniture store is made possible by good people giving second chances.
At the UGM, guests must attend church service. There, McSteen met Pastor Danny Green at Family of Faith. Green works specifically with those who battling addiction.
For Green, the work is personal.
“Alcohol really took a hold of me,” Green said. “It’s powerful what God can do. And he’s done it. I never looked back.”
McSteen credits Green with giving him faith and hope – it’s how he got clean too. This was the first time McSteen had attended church since he was a child growing up in westside of Washington. It got him thinking about his dad’s furniture store where he used to work.
Green and others at the church donated used mattresses and anything else to help him build an inventory.
McSteen had some success flipping furniture but came to a pause when he needed to provide the state with a name. He called Green for advice.
“You’re gonna name it 16 cents, 3 shoes, and 5 socks,” Green said. “He goes, ‘I can’t name it that.’ I said, ‘Yes you can, it’s who you are.’ And there is message every time someone walks in there.”
To make the full transition to a legitimate business in a competitive market, McSteen unexpectedly got even more help from a man named Don Crego – he was a sales rep and extended lines of credit to McSteen he arguably wasn’t qualified to receive.
McSteen wiped tears from his eyes recalling his old friend.
“Don died a few years ago unexpectedly from Brain Cancer, out of nowhere,” McSteen said. “They were taking a big risk in the early days.”
Today, McSteen pays that forward by hiring people who are battling struggles and addictions the of their own. Some leave when they relapse, but McSteen is always willing to bring an employee back who is serious about a turnaround.
“I believe in fourth and fifth chances,” McSteen said.
