In his Nike sneakers, jeans, dark T-shirt and zip-up sweater with company logo emblazoned on the back, Jan Ryde doesn’t look like the chief executive of a multimillion-dollar outfit that makes some of the world’s most expensive beds.

Tall, rangy and sporting long grey hair held at bay in a ponytail secured with a simple elastic band, he looks more like a rock’n’roll roadie than the man who turned a once-flailing family business into a global phenomenon and created a bed that sells for just short of $1 million.