By all conventional standards, Room & Board should be bigger than it is. The Minneapolis-based furniture retailer, which runs just nine stores, has a devoted base of customers who rave about its hip design and customer service on message boards and blogs. Its sleek styles, priced between the highbrow midcentury classics at retailer Design Within Reach and the flat-pack furniture from Ikea, are often featured in magazines alongside brands several times its size. It's popular among private equity and venture capital investors, too: Founder John D. Gabbert says he receives at least one overture a month. But investors haven't been able to persuade Gabbert to take their money. "We don't want to grow faster," he says. "So the conversations are usually incredibly short."
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机译：按照所有常规标准，Room＆Board应该大于实际尺寸。这家位于明尼阿波利斯市的家具零售商仅经营9家商店，其忠实的客户群在留言板和博客上热衷于其时髦的设计和客户服务。其时尚的款式价格介于零售商Design In Reach的本世纪中叶经典之作与宜家的扁平包装家具之间，并经常在杂志上刊登，其品牌数倍于其尺寸。它在私募股权和风险资本投资者中也很受欢迎：创始人约翰·D·加伯特（John D. Gabbert）说，他每月至少收到一笔提议。但是，投资者并没有说服盖伯特（Gabbert）拿走他们的钱。他说：“我们不想增长更快。” “因此谈话通常非常短。”
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