ABOUT THIS EPISODE
Fishers-based Round Room LCC is the sixth-largest private company in Indiana. You’re forgiven for not knowing the name, although the brand it represents is one of the most recognizable in the United States and provides goods and services to more than 100 million people. And Round Room is in the midst of a major growth spurt that could put it higher on the list of Indiana private companies, although it’s unlikely to change from what owner and CEO Scott Moorehead calls “the best company that nobody knows about in the state.”
The easiest way to explain Round Room is to say that it is one of the nation’s largest independent wireless retailers with exclusive agreements with Verizon. It currently owns or has franchised about 1,550 stores in about 45 states. The sign on the outside will say Verizon, and the interior will look like any other Verizon store, but there’s decent chance just about anywhere in the country that you’re walking in a Round Room store. And the numbers are growing fast: Round Room counted about 1,300 stores at the beginning of this year, and Moorehead projects the number will be somewhere in the 1,600 to 1,650 range by the end of the year with annual revenue close to $3 billion. Round Room’s employee count is just under 3,000 people, including about 500 added just this year.
Moorehead returns to the IBJ Podcast this week to discuss what’s driving the growth spurt. He also explains why selling phones and wireless service is a recession-resistant business. As Moorehead explains, artificial intelligence is now an important part of the business. And he goes into some detail describing Round Room’s evolving relationship with Verizon, currently the 28th largest member of the Fortune 500.
