Charlotte Russe Holding is sweet on women's clothing. The mall-based retailer operates about 500 Charlotte Russe clothing stores in some 45 US states and Puerto Rico. The stores (averaging 7,100 sq. ft.) offer value-priced established and trendy fashions for women in their twenties and teens. Most merchandise carries the company's proprietary labels (Charlotte Russe, Refuge, and blu Chic). Charlotte Russe Holding company shut down its struggling 64-store Rampage chain in 2006, converting several locations to Charlotte Russe stores. Charlotte Russe Holding went public in 1999. Charlotte Russe Holding was taken private in 2009, when investment firm Advent International acquired Charlotte Russe.

ecohaus wants to improve on the home improvement store. The company offers some 1,500 eco-friendly building materials and products. It operates an online store for its green building supplies, as well as a pair of showrooms in Washington and Oregon for retail customers and trade professionals. Both showrooms were remodeled in 2008. ecohaus's products include reclaimed wood flooring, low-toxic paints, low-flow toilets, formaldehyde-free cabinets, and recycled-glass tiles. Matthew Freeman-Gleason, the company's chief knowledge officer, started the firm as a small storefront in 1992 on Bainbridge Island, Washington. Freeman-Gleason and chairman Tim Taylor are major shareholders of the company.

Dollar General's at ease with living off the crumbs of Wal-Mart. The retailer commands a chain of more than 9,000 discount stores in 35 states, primarily in the southern and eastern US, the Midwest, and the Southwest. Offering basic household items, such as cleaning supplies and health and beauty aids, as well as some apparel and food, it targets low-, middle-, and fixed-income shoppers. Stores are generally located in small towns off the radar of giant discounters. Its big-city stores (about 30% of its total) are situated in lower-income neighborhoods. Some 25% of its merchandise is priced at $1 or less. Two years after being taken private by affiliates of KKR and Goldman Sachs, the chain went public in 2009.

Carls Furniture is a home furnishings retailer with about 20 stores, including more than 10 Carls Patio showrooms, in Florida. Carls offerings include indoor furniture for the living room, bedroom, and dining room (sofas, chairs, dining table sets, occasional tables, entertainment centers, curios), as well as outdoor patio furniture collections (aluminum, wicker, teak). It also sells mattresses under the Sealy and Stearns & Foster brands. Carls' owners Mike Baker, Bob Dragin, and Fred Friedman purchased Carls Furniture in 1974. The company's Carls Patio division plans to continue growing in California through its Berk's and Saddleback of San Diego furniture operations.

The Gap, Inc. operates as a specialty retailing company. The company offers clothing, accessories, and personal care products for men, women, children, and babies under the Gap, Old Navy, Banana Republic, Piperlime, and Athleta brand names. Its products include wardrobe basics, such as denim, khakis, and T-shirts; fashion apparel; casual apparel and accessories; maternity apparel; women’s underwear, sleepwear, loungewear, and sports and active apparel; and shoes and accessories. The company also franchises agreements with unaffiliated franchisees to operate Gap and Banana Republic stores worldwide. As of March 24, 2010, it operated approximately 3,100 stores in the United States, the United Kingdom, Canada, France, Japan, and Ireland. The Gap also offers its products through catalogs, as well as gap.com, bananarepublic.com, oldnavy.com, piperlime.com, and athleta.com Web sites. The Gap, Inc. was founded in 1969 and is based in San Francisco, California.

Founded in 1908 by William Aubuchon, a French-Canadian immigrant, the company is still owned by the Aubuchon family, including CEO William Aubuchon III and president M. Marcus Moran, Jr. Old houses in New England get refurbished with assistance from W.E. Aubuchon. W.E. Aubuchon operates about 130 hardware stores throughout New England and New York, as well as a Web site. More than just nuts and bolts, the store stocks about 50,000 products, including appliances, camping gear, hardware, housewares, paint, and tools. It carries such name brands as Delta Faucet, Honeywell, Stanley, and Weber. The store also offers rug cleaner rentals, propane tank filling, and key cutting, among other services.

Robinson Export and Import Corporation, which does business as Reico, specializes in bathroom and kitchen remodeling projects, offering a range of cabinets, countertops, sinks, faucets, and appliances. Brands include Merillat, Miele, Moen, Wilsonart, and Bally Block. Reico operates about 20 showrooms and a warehouse in Delaware, Maryland, Pennsylvania, and Virginia. The company was founded in 1952 as a wholesale distributor of wooden materials from Finland. CEO Richard Maresco owns the company.

Charles Hyde and David Vredenburg founded the employee-owned firm in 1930. It takes its name from a combination of its founders' names.Give Hy-Vee a high five for being one of the largest privately owned US supermarket chains, despite serving some modestly sized towns in the Midwest. The company runs more than 200 Hy-Vee supermarkets in eight Midwestern states: Illinois, Iowa, Kansas, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, South Dakota, and Wisconsin. About half of its stores are in Iowa, as are most of its two dozen Hy-Vee drugstores. It distributes products to its stores through several subsidiaries, including Lomar Distributing (specialty foods) and Perishable Distributors of Iowa (fresh foods).

Pottery Barn, Inc. sells casual home furnishings and accessories, such as sofas, tables, bedding, and tableware, at nearly 200 stores across the US and Canada. Pottery Barn also sells its wares by catalog and online. In 1999 the retailer launched Pottery Barn Kids, which operates retail stores and a separate Web site. Pottery Barn launched another specialty brand in 2003, PBTeen, which sells merchandise through catalogs, a Web site, and stores. Pottery Barn, which has roots that go back to 1949, is owned by home furniture and cookware retailer Williams-Sonoma.

Spahn & Rose Lumber Co. is a retail lumber company with about 25 locations throughout Iowa and, to a lesser extent, in Illinois and Wisconsin. The company, which was organized in 1904, produces roof and floor truss systems and sells a variety of building supply products from such suppliers as Andersen (windows), Georgia-Pacific (lumber), CertainTeed (building materials), DuPont (plastics and flooring), MidContinent Cabinetry, (cabinets), Stanley Black & Decker (hand tools) and more. Spahn & Rose is promoting a range of green products, including recycled goods, solar reflective windows, and arsenic-free lumber.

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