Two decades ago, when Room & Board's founder John Gabbert took on a project furnishing the new Le Méridien Chambers hotel in Minneapolis, he didn't realize it would be the beginning of the company's commercial division. In fact, there had been a commercial division all along.
“It was a big undertaking,” said Nicole Gaynor, who leads the newly launched Business Interiors Experience for home décor company Room & Board. “We had to deliver furniture in large quantities, create custom pieces to fit each room, custom mattresses … something we'd never done. We figured out all the logistics, and it was a crazy experience in general. But overall, I think it inspired us because it helped us to understand that there were probably other customers placing orders for commercial applications. There was this whole other side of the business that we didn't know existed at the time.”
To understand why this is important, a little primer from the past is necessary. In the 1970s, John Gabbert's family owned a furniture store. Gabbert started a little side project, which would later become its own entity known as Room & Board. Inspired by the model Ikea put forth — quality furniture accessible to everyone, Room & Board developed a customer base made up of people who appreciated affordable artisan-crafted furniture pieces. The company developed partnerships with craftsman to create products exclusive to Room & Board, that are bench made, live well, and can be something people can pass down.
Room & Board grew through the 1980s, and joined the e-commerce platform in the 2000s. This is also the time when office design was shifting toward a more comfortable feel — the birth of the resimercial movement.
“The commercial arm to Room & Board was developing, but very organically,” Gaynor said. “We weren't marketing to business customers, just identifying them as they come along, and start offering business services to them.”
As Room & Board continued to see more commercial sales, the company wondered how its residential line stood up to ANSI/BIFMA and ACT standards. After a lot of testing, almost every piece passed the requirements – another inadvertent development to the commercial side.
“It has really taken root and we decided we needed to devote time and attention to it that it deserved,” Gaynor said.
Room & Board Business Interiors may have officially launched this fall but Gaynor notes the addition of the commercial arm is not an amateur ambition.
“Our story is different from other residential companies trying to get into this,” she said. “Our pieces are already being used in commercial applications, so it's less about us experimenting with an opportunity in the sense of everybody's doing this. It was born from more of a need to develop the commercial arm than trying it out. We felt an obligation to pursue it. The launch is sort of putting ourselves out there instead of people finding us.”
Room & Board Business Interiors can also leverage the expertise and talent of its vending partners.
“They have been around for the past 13 years when kicking this off, so they have grown and developed as well. We know them. They are the ones we have relationships with. These were all set in place which makes the commercial segment launch fluidly,” Gaynor said. “People love our seating for ancillary spaces, like lounge and lobby areas, and that's and easy transition from what we've been doing residentially.
The company has a very broad offering and keeps a large portion of it in stock so its readily available, but, Gaynor said, “We are also open to custom pieces. That's been a strong point for us as an organization, so that's not something we'd walk away from on the commercial side. People want these artisan pieces, that are beautiful and will last. Like our Callan chair. I don't think I ever looked at that and thought Business Interiors is going to sell a lot of that. It's a beautiful piece, it has beautiful curves, it's what people appreciate and what they want to have around them. They want space that feels like their own.”