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Matthew "Matt" Gordy Stuller has forged his own success in life, entering the jewelry business as a high school student in his beloved hometown of Lafayette LA. Against the advice of his parents, Dr. Gilbert and Alma Stuller, as well as industry titans he met at the age of 18 when he traveled to New York to share his innovative ideas on the more timely delivery of orders, Matt has always followed his own intuition when it comes to building his business. Over the years, his parents were able to see him achieve monumental success. As Matt shares, "There is nothing better than being able to make your parents proud." In this episode of Discover Lafayette, you will have the opportunity to hear the heart and soul-felt message delivered by the man who built Stuller and employs approximately 1250 talented professionals in Lafayette. Matt Stuller still focuses each day on delivering outstanding service to customers worldwide who order beautiful jewelry which may be handed down from generation to generation. He attributes his success to the talent of his staff. "They are truly the ones that drive the business. Our people make it happen." Matt Stuller, along with Ray Weiland, at the groundbreaking of his headquarters at 302 Rue Louis XIV, Lafayette, LA. The facility currently houses about 1250 local employees, many of whom have been with the company for decades. He made the decision to build his business in Lafayette against the sage advice of jewelry industry titans in the early 1970's and has never looked back. Stuller is now the largest jewelry manufacturing and distributing firm in the United States and will celebrate its 50th anniversary on November 12, 2020. From Matt's early days of delivering his wares to small mom and pop jewelers from the back of his Datsun 240Z and creating designs in his dad's orthodontic dental lab, to his current operation which delivers hundreds of thousands of orders worldwide each and every day, Matt delights in the fun adventure of creating "gifts of God's greatest creations of gold, platinum, and silver with the most beautiful gemstones harvested from the inner earth. We get to be the artists in building jewelry that allow people to celebrate life's most meaningful events." Always mechanically inclined, Matt fell in love with the business when he worked with a craftsman in the back of a local jeweler's store when he was still in high school. He learned sizing, stone setting, and polishing, and in the process, he fell in love with the business. As he sold jewelry and componentry to small, independent store owners throughout Louisiana in his early days in business, his passion for service was cemented and he looks back fondly on all the kind people who helped him by purchasing his wares as he was starting out. Stuller is now the largest jewelry manufacturing and distributing firm in the United States and will celebrate its 50th anniversary on November 12, 2020. Some of Matt Stuller's employees have been with him 20, 30 and 40 years. Over the years, Stuller has had to adapt to changing business conditions. "You have to change to stay up to date with the market place." Yet he's also awed by the number of employees who are daughters, sons and grandchildren of some of his original employees. Each quarter Stuller celebrates work anniversaries of employees, some of whom have been with him for 20, 30 and 40 years. "I think we're the best in the jewelry business worldwide. I certainly know we're the best in service and reputation worldwide. That's been my goal. It's not ok to just be ok. Matt Stuller also believes in giving back to others. He started The Stuller Family Foundation 26 years ago when he realized that part of the responsibility of his Christian faith is to tithe from his earnings. He has committed to giving 10% of all his earnings to be invested back into the community's 501(c)(3) organizations that deliver humanitarian, youth,