Pontotoc furniture company opens health clinic to provide employees and their families with affordable medical care

PONTOTOC, Miss. (WCBI) – Southern Furniture Industries has opened a new health and wellness clinic in Pontotoc to provide quality healthcare for employees and their families, without the high cost.

“I get to practice medicine the way medicine needs to be practiced,” says Jessica Maffett, the nurse practitioner at the clinic. “Without having to worry about the money, the insurance.”

The official ribbon-cutting ceremony was held during the last week of October, but CEO Mark Weber says the clinic has been in the making since 2020.

“We thought that if we could bring a clinic, that would add a whole nother level to what we were able to provide our associates,” Weber says. “Over the last two decades, along with college tuition, healthcare has been one of the highest inflationary categories (they face).”

The clinic is staffed by Maffett and three registered nurses from Everside Health.

“We pretty much treat anything, Maffett says. “Diabetes, hypertension, high cholesterol…depression and anxiety. Acute illness such as runny nose, flu, COVID-19, sore throats.”

There are no co-pays or deductibles and the clinic offers close to 40 standard prescriptions at no extra cost.

If any of Southern Furniture’s roughly 2,200 employees have to leave work to go to the clinic, they’ll still get paid during their time there.

“If we have somebody that’s sick and needs care, we want them to be able to go get that as quickly as possible and not have that impact their pay,” Weber says.

The center is just minutes away from the Southern Motion campus and does both walk-in and scheduled appointments.

“We want them to be able to come and be in and out as quick as they can,” Maffett says.

“I’ve had co-workers that have gone and it’s been all positive,” says long-time employee Becky Haley. “They’re very efficient, they’re very knowledgeable, they know what they’re doing.”

Weber says that providing this level of care also gives them a leg up in the ongoing labor battle across the country.

“You’ve got to get creative and you got to look at other ways to be the employer of choice in the area,” he says. “That’s a big reason why we did this. Obviously, there’s a benefit to our employees. We think there’s a benefit to us.”

But more importantly, he hopes it can make a lasting difference in the lives of the people who work there.

“They could save hundreds,” Weber says. “If you have a large family and you’re taking your kids somewhere on a regular basis, it could be significantly more than that.”

Southern Furniture is currently holding an incentive program for workers who schedule a visit. They are also offering the flu vaccine and plan to have COVID shots available soon.

“Come be treated with the right medicines and not have to worry about that bill in the mail,” Maffett says.