RTO Legend: Gary Ferriman of Showplace Rent to Own

What if a $10-a-week TV could spark a company built on trust? We sit down with industry legend Gary to unpack how Showplace grew from a two-paragraph agreement on a legal pad to a respected rent-to-own brand known for clear buyouts, smart growth, and customer-first service. From early days of index cards and recipe boxes to Ideal, HiTouch, and VersaRent, Gary explains the systems and mindsets that kept operations nimble and transparent.

We explore the turning points that defined the path: adding appliances and furniture without overextending, learning from mentors who pushed better ideas, and doing the slow work of advocacy that helped lock fair practices into state law. When lenders blacklisted rent-to-own in the ’90s, Gary didn’t fold. He rallied the team, educated a local banker, and rebuilt a flexible credit line—proof that relationships can save a business when markets panic. Along the way, Showplace doubled down on what set it apart: every receipt lists the early purchase option, making ownership a feature, not a footnote. That simple promise became a magnet for loyal customers.

You’ll also hear the product stories few saw coming, like riding mowers and zero-turns thriving in rural markets, plus seasonal hold programs that convert churn into steady buyouts. The throughline is clear: lead with transparency, manage debt with humility, and build culture around long-term wins. Whether you’re new to RTO or scaling a regional brand, these lessons on cash discipline, software evolution, customer care, and advocacy will sharpen your playbook. If this conversation resonates, follow the show, share it with a colleague who needs a refresh, and leave a quick review so more people can find stories that move the industry forward.

Transcript

Project Intro & Book Announcement

SPEAKER_01 0:00

Hi, I'm Peach Cow. You may know me from the RTO Show podcast, but today I'm doing something a little bit different. Apro and Wild Brands have launched a special project to bring the story of our industry to life like never before. They've asked me to sit down with some of the true legends of Rent to Own, capturing their stories, their impact, and their vision for the future. And now I get to share those conversations with you straight from the legends themselves. All of this leads to something groundbreaking though. A new book. The Rent to Own Revolution, a definitive history of advocacy and consumer access, written by April's CEO Charles Schlitterman and WoW Brand CEO Brian Kraft. The book explores the grassroots of RTO, the advocacy that has defined it, and the future that we're building together. Here's where you come in. We're giving away free copies once the book is released. Just head over to RTORevolution.com and sign up for a chance to receive a copy in early 2026. Don't miss the chance to be among the first to hold this piece of RTO history. That's rtorevolution.com. Check it out and become a part of RTO History. Hello, everybody. My name is Pete Chow. Welcome to the RTO Show podcast. Today we're doing another legends, and you've seen this legend before, but this one's in a different capacity. Right now, we're kind of peeling back some onions of the history of what Show Place has been, where Gary Fairman is going, but more importantly, how we got here. The the times that led us to the greatest part of Into Own era right now is where we're sitting at. And I love the fact that I can sit across from him now because uh, you know, there are so many people that didn't make it. You know, some some businesses that came through and they stopped and didn't find a way, or it was just their time to call it a day. Um, and we lost a few people this year. We're sorry to say that, but we they are remembered. And I will always say, I've said this to Gary many times, and I will say it again. Everybody mentions Gary Herriman's name because he does such a good job. He's been a president of April. You know, you and your wife uh have done a lot for this industry. And you told me that it wasn't for her, you wouldn't have been able to make it this far. Keith's kind of holding the torch, your son now going through it, and you um kind of letting him take on the the the rein, so to speak, in show place, which I love to see that because this just this is something we need those generations to come through. So you uh Marianne's allowed you to be on the on the trip board. You know, you guys go to to LegCon every year.

SPEAKER_00 2:38

It's been a couple years since I've been now, but for for most of the time I I went most year most every year.

SPEAKER_01 2:44

Well, the years that count.

SPEAKER_00 2:46

Yeah, I've probably been there 20 times, so that's what we're talking about.

SPEAKER_01 2:50

And so we wanted to we wanted to peel it back a little bit. And we wanted to start at the beginning when Showplace kind of first started. I know that you had mentioned that even in the beginning, you were using a family vehicle to sometimes deliver some of the product. How hard was it? Well, what first off, what was the decision going into let me start a rent-to-owned company that said rent-to-own is where I want to go versus any other company?

Origins: From Repairs To $10 A Week

SPEAKER_00 3:16

Well, again, our our initial business was just selling TVs. So it was it was uh used TVs for, you know, for a lot the same demographic that we're handling with our our rent to home, but but we were just selling used TVs for$150 and you know, making Frankenstein's out of trade-ins. And and it was just one of those guys that I was buying large sums of TV trade-ins off of a retailer, uh, the multiple locations that let us buy his trade-ins that said, Did you ever think about putting them out for$10 a week? And that's when that's when we kind of got excited about it. We had never heard of rent to own then. And uh and this guy really didn't mention the rent-to-own transaction. He just said he used to take his trade-ins and put them out for$10 a week himself. So we we kind of really kind of cooked on that idea as we drove back with a box truck of trade-ins. And I talked to my partner at that time about that and said, What do you think about advertising$10 a week? And he said, I'm good. Well, let's let's try it. So that's what we did. That's how we started being in the rental business. We didn't know it was a rental business. We didn't think, I don't think we even used the word rent at that point. But we uh I I just dictated on a legal pad to my wife on the truck truck trip back, um, kind of a two-paragraph agreement of how we would let people have TVs for$10 a week. And if they paid for 52 weeks, they were theirs. So that's kind of our entry. Along the way, within the first few months of doing that and advertising that and getting some used TVs we would have typically sold out without getting much cash, um, but waiting on the cash, um, we started realizing there was such a thing. There was a store in town that was renting things, and it was kind of similar. So then we kind of absconded one of their agreements so we could kind of brush up my legalese on our agreement. And uh, and that company was wasn't in business very long in our town and left, and we remained, and then we started renting new TVs and VCRs and you know, so it it uh it evolved from a used TV business.

SPEAKER_01 5:32

About about when did you start renting the TVs versus when you had your own repair shop?

SPEAKER_00 5:37

We we started the repair shop in the spring of eighty-two, and we started renting the TVs in the spring of eighty-three.

SPEAKER_01 5:44

So about a year later, you decided, you know what, I'm gonna try this guy's idea. Do you remember his name?

SPEAKER_00 5:48

Was he was he like anywhere to do with rental own, or he was like he was not rent, he was uh Bill Schooneman TV and appliance out of Cleveland, had multiple locations, I think five or six at one point. But when I was working with him, I think he still had he was probably 75 years old and he still had three stores left, and we were just buying his trade-ins, and this was probably in '83 when we started doing that.

SPEAKER_01 6:10

So, Gary, as you grow in, as you're going along, you have a TV repair business, and you start, you obviously took a good idea and and really ran with it, but now you're in the rental business of TVs. When did everything else start showing up? Because you said, you know, VCRs and stuff, and and was there anybody who looked at you and said, wait a minute, you're not selling this, you're renting it? And they didn't go, Yeah, I don't know about you know opening up a line of credit for that. Or did you not have that issue, but you were still able to bring in product?

Cash Discipline And Early Growth

SPEAKER_00 6:41

We started on a shoestring that we didn't borrow any money. Um, we built this, remodeled this building myself uh out of pocket out of her and I's full-time job wages, and uh and got it open. Uh, I think my partner and I put$15 each in a petty cash drawer to make change with, and that was our investment. You know, we opened a bank account, and maybe maybe we put the first couple of days receipts in there was, you know, put a dollar in to open a checking account and then start putting receipts in it. And we decided not to take any wages for quite a while. We didn't take, I mean, we both had we all had jobs. My my partner and his wife and me and my wife all had full-time jobs, so we just didn't need the money that came from that business at all. And we didn't take it for a long time, you know. And we let it build up until there was cash and and then uh and then, you know, we would we we got an opportunity to be a zenith and a Sylvania uh dealer. Um Quasar. Quasar dealer. Quasar, yeah. Remember Quasar? But uh and so they had floor plans for those, you know, where they would you'd buy them, they'd deliver them, and then you owed the floor plan company for the TV, and they come around and did a monthly audit, and it and if you'd sold it, you owed it for it, owed them for it. And it wasn't spread out, you just had to pay the whole wholesale price.

SPEAKER_01 8:13

Okay. So it was like it you sold as you bought as you went. If you sold it, you had to pay for it.

SPEAKER_00 8:17

Yeah, but but you know, we'd had build up enough cash to afford if somebody gave me 17 bucks for the first week's payment and it was$430 cost TV, we had to pay$430 at the end of the month for that. Oh wow. And and we just did it weekly. Every every week, what we sold, so when they come and did the audit, there wasn't much to pay for, which most of their dealers waited till the auditor came. We always just paid as we went. But we had the we had built some cash in there because we weren't taking anything. We just would pay for them. And we we never got upside down. We just, you know, because we didn't take cash. And uh, and then I think about a year in we started taking 75 bucks a week each. My factory job at that time, I was clearing about 300 a week. But so 75 a week wasn't wasn't like a full-time, you couldn't live on 75 bucks a week. But uh that's my partner and I each took 75 bucks a week for maybe the next year or two. And by then cash was pretty good, and we'd remodeled and eventually we moved into a different location, and that took money, but um, you know, it was just just operating inexpensively on a shoestring, uh, and not not we never got debt. We just didn't amass debt.

SPEAKER_01 9:32

So were they the ones that brought in the VCRs and the other items or or like like they they give you the TVs at first? Did they also do that with other things too?

SPEAKER_00 9:39

Stereos and VCRs. There's you know, electronic distributors back in those days mostly. You weren't buying directly from Zenith, you were buying from it was the Tracy Wells Corporation in Columbus, Ohio, or or MAS Distributing in Northeast Ohio. You know, they'd bring you Sharp stereos or or Gibson appliances or whatever. We were just TV and electronics for uh probably till about for about three or four years, and then we added appliances in about the fourth year, maybe, and probably furniture maybe in about the fifth or sixth year. So I mean it was just a step at a time back then, one location for the first seven years.

SPEAKER_01 10:17

So when you went into these other, you know, like let's say appliances, right? When you go into appliances, was that also an easy transition, or was there any friction there because you were a different type of retailer?

Adding Appliances, Then Furniture

SPEAKER_00 10:29

No, there was back in those days, uh other than Kmart, because really Walmart wasn't around then. Right. Um, but there, you know, most of the TVs and appliance being sold in in mid mid-sized town America were mom and pop TV and appliance stores. So it was very common to have both. Okay. Furniture was a little bit unique to add in there, but there was furniture stores that sold TVs too. I mean, you could go to Elder Beerman's the department store and buy furniture or TVs or appliances back in those days. But uh, Sears, you know.

SPEAKER_01 11:04

So then the big transition wasn't really the appliances or you know, the electronics to smaller electronics to appliances. It was getting furniture.

SPEAKER_00 11:11

That was that was a pretty big transition. You need a lot more footprint, a lot more square footage to show furniture for sure.

SPEAKER_01 11:17

Well what was a hurdle that you can say we made it, but there would there was a little bit of attraction. I mean, you're saying the square footage, is that why you ended up getting a bigger location?

SPEAKER_00 11:27

Yeah, in four in four years we moved intended to take appliances and look at furniture, and so we bought a bigger building and and uh and had the space. We we also were renting movie tapes then. We we were a little mini blockbuster in our area, you know, but you know, eventually we quit doing that. And along the way, we bought a carpet store and tried to keep the carpet department alive and sell people wall-to-wall carpet and have installers that we put in their house. We tried a lot of different stuff.

SPEAKER_01 11:56

Like going back then, not really knowing some of the things that you know now. What were some of the first vendor experiences like?

Vendors, Mentors, And State Advocacy

SPEAKER_00 12:09

Uh a really unique one was very early on when we were a used TV shop, having a TV distributor salesperson come up and say, Have you thought about having new TVs? We have Zen, you know, this guy from Tracy Wells, Bob Broderick, said, Can can I bring you a dealership for Zenith Televisions? And we said, Yeah, I think that that's interesting. And he said, Oh, by the way, I have a partner and we run a rent-to-owned store in Columbus. His name was Pete Bush, and he was the first president of Ohio Rental Dealers Association. He formed it. Um, and Bob was his partner, and Bob was a salesman, uh, an electronic salesman and an appliance. So he set us up, and we, you know, we said, well, we can only rent so many new items because we can only afford to pay all at once for so many things to grow so fast, or we'll run out of cash. So we we kind of tethered, you know, we we mostly wanted to rent used because we owned that stuff, and the margin was better. And when you had to buy new, you know, your margin was less. So and the cash flow out was quick. So we were careful with that as we went. But uh that that vendor experience was really positive for us because he was teaching us, teaching us how to be a new new TV dealer, teaching teaching us a little bit about appliances if we wanted to have them. We didn't for a while, but uh and then teaching us about there being this state association and this regulatory effort to try to get a law passed in Ohio that would that would codify the agreement that we were doing. And uh and so we got involved in that and we joined the Ohio Rental Dealers Association and and as the as the uh AG's office worked with a group of rental dealers and some national lobbyists that companies like Rena Center, the bigger companies, were helping fund and fuel this guy coming around and helping us educate our AGs and giving us sample language to build, you know, to build state laws. And we got involved with that. That's where I met Daryl Tissett, that's where I met Ernie Llewellyn, uh John Butts of Sunrise, a bunch of Ohio area dealers.

SPEAKER_01 14:34

So when you're as you're as you're going into this legal part, right, the RDAs, what was what's what was some of the biggest hurdles? Or let's just say even say one, what would you say has probably been your league your your biggest hurdle in that era where you're starting, you know, in the early 80s or let's say even late 80s. What was the biggest hurdle, legal hurdle in that time frame?

SPEAKER_00 14:55

Well, um I think you know, until we got into the 90s where we had Henry B. Gonzalez trying to outlaw our business, but back earlier, I would just say it it just took time and effort to to educate the AG's office about what we were trying to do and get them to see the value we provided for folks that needed it. Um I I would say as far as a legal hurdle, it's the patience, the effort, you know, the time away from business to talk to state senators and state reps, not so much U.S., because this was state law, you know. But but but learning who those people were, because at 20-something, I didn't know who they were. You know, when you voted, you might have had seen who you were voting for for president on TV, but I don't know much about any of those state legislators.

Legal Hurdles And Educating Lawmakers

SPEAKER_01 15:48

I I will say I don't think much has changed nowadays. I think depending on what side of the aisle you lean on, half of the people you don't know, and you go, well, I hope that they align with my, you know, with what I say, and they're going down to take it because I've seen a lot of young people do that, but we won't get we won't get into that. But so I know talking to the strunks and talking to some other people, there was a time frame when you started rent to own where there wasn't the technology to run the rent to own as we know it today, right? There was no computer systems that ran uh what we did. And then eventually something came along. Um two questions. So it's really the same thing two two ways, but number one, how great was it? Did it did it affect you to get onto one of these systems? Did it make a huge difference in your in your business? And the other one is what was the name of the software that you got into with?

SPEAKER_00 16:42

Yeah. Well, when we first began, um, without any question, I I mean, I was flying without any knowledge, I had never been in a rent owned store. So I knew no way anybody else did this. So I I bought my my mom had gotten laid off as a bookkeeper from someplace, and uh my partner said, Yeah, we'll we can hire your mom. We can't pay her much more than minimum wage, but but if she needs a job, we'll hire her. So my mom went to work, and mom and I decided we would go out and buy a recipe box and index cards. And when we rented the TV, mom would write the TV model number, brand, serial number, and then start writing Friday dates, you know, like like May 7th would be 5 slash 7. And when somebody'd make May 7th's payment, she'd draw incline through it. And she would just keep them ahead on dates, and the the top of the card would say the beginning date and the ending date and the cash price. And we just had concocted on that truck trip back from that guy's place that I was gonna let we were gonna take 52 weekly payments, and we were gonna make the cash price, 26 of them, and we were gonna let 50 percent of what they paid us apply to the cash price, and they could buy out any time they wanted early. So that was a personal concoction that uh ended up being the way we decided to build Ohio State law. Trevor Burrus, Jr. I was just about to say uh you know that a lot of people have built it off that that model. Trevor Burrus, Jr. Well, in the early days, the big guys only wanted to apply 35 or 40 percent. And a lot of AG's offices didn't like that. And and my 50 percent, I think, was winced at by a lot of my peers when we were real young in the business and first seeing people, but it ended up being adopted as a pretty common practice, I think. I'm not saying that I'm the only one that came up with that idea, but I thought I was at the time. I'm sure somebody else probably came up with the same idea.

SPEAKER_01 18:48

And what was the name of that system that you guys went to finally?

From Index Cards To Rental Software

SPEAKER_00 18:51

Well, I mean, so so that was all manual. And then we found out there were such things for small loan companies that where they had those green cards. And so a lot of us before we had computers ended up getting away from the index cards, and there's a real nice ledger green card that was a part of the small loan company business, and we bought those. You could buy them at an office supply. Um and then uh the very first thing that happened electronically is a guy my mom had previously worked with at the telephone company was a programmer, computer programmer back in the very early days when you rip pretty much could only buy an IBM or a clone to an IBM computer. And he helped us buy a clone and wrote a program that was just an accounts receivable program for our payments. There was no reports, no ability to pull a report or do tallies for you. It just helped track the accounts receivable for each account for that customer. And we run that for a couple years, and then we were at a probably one of the early conventions and probably run into David Goldman, and the first real rental software we ever had was ideal. And I think we probably did that in about 80. I'm gonna say we probably ran manual for till 84, and then we probably ran that that homemade program from the guy at General Telephone till maybe about 86 or 7, and then we signed up with David probably in 87 and uh 86 or 7, something like that, and had ideal software before VersaRent. I was just about to say how it's called ideal software then.

SPEAKER_01 20:31

How was it how how big of a difference is it from that system to the system they have now?

SPEAKER_00 20:36

Oh, night and day night and day. I mean, uh, you know, there was some reports, but not nearly like there is now. And there were, you know, we didn't understand access to SQL and any of that kind of stuff back then, you know. Report writers were something that took real smart people to do deal with back in those days. And and we and we were with David for a number of years, and then and then we decided we wanted to try high touch, and we were with high touch for 20 years, and then in 13 we moved back to Bursa Rent.

SPEAKER_01 21:09

You know, it's it's it's crazy because in the early 90s and early 2000s, I think high touch was the you know, was the brand to go to.

SPEAKER_00 21:15

60 or 70 percent market share, I think, at one point.

SPEAKER_01 21:18

Yeah, I mean they were they were just everywhere. And pretty much, if you know how to run high touch, you pretty much knew you could walk into any store if you had the clearance and kind of just go through.

SPEAKER_00 21:26

I mean, because even Rack had it. I mean, I think they might have bought source code and had had kind of their own version of it, but yeah. Yeah, well it was everywhere.

SPEAKER_01 21:33

Yeah, when I started at Rack back then, that's exactly what we had. Uh, you know, take this out. But as you're doing as you're as you're going along, you start this legal journey. You're in the RDAs. When did you first join April?

Joining APRO And National Community

SPEAKER_00 21:51

Um I think my first time to come to convention, and I probably joined just ahead of that, was nineteen. In Washington, D.C. It was Bill Kees' initial hiring into April as the executive director. It was his first convention. I remember meeting him on an escalator at the hotel there in Washington that we stayed at. And uh that would that would have been, I don't remember what month, but I mean it was somewhere in that range of the summertime of '89 when we joined April. What made you join?

SPEAKER_01 22:25

And I know and I know that you were active in the RDA, so I know that kind of played a small foot. But what made Gary and Showplace go, This is this is all over. This is a lot of people, and this is the right way to go. Or at least what you thought at the time would it might have been the right way to go.

SPEAKER_00 22:40

Well, by then I'd been sharing ideas with friends in the business at at ORDA, um like Daryl and and Ernie, and they were joining these things, and and they said, you know, it's unlimited. There's so many people to learn from. And there's seminars, and there's Edwin, and you know, I mean, we had uh resources there, and and it was expensive as a young, you know, fledgling of course by by 89, I guess we'd been in business formally for seven years and totally for eight, including my front porch. So we we weren't new to the business. It was just time for us to to get legit and be a part of the industry. And um and I think I was already a retail buying group member, but I hadn't joined TRIB, I think, until about ninety-two, ninety-one or two. I think it was ninety-two. Um so but yeah, all those things were network opportunities. I just love to learn, you know. Right.

SPEAKER_01 23:47

So you mentioned a couple of names twice. Daryl Tissett and Ernie.

SPEAKER_00 23:53

Yeah.

Debates, Mentors, And Best Ideas

SPEAKER_01 23:55

What I'm so interested in is everybody says when they have an issue, they have a question, they go to Gary. Okay. I'm just letting you know that. They love you out here. But Gary had to go to somebody first. It sounds like I'm gonna say it's them, but I just in case, who were are are those the other things.

Differentiator: Radical EPO Transparency

SPEAKER_00 24:16

It was a combination. I mean, uh, you know, I would say Daryl and I and Ernie and I had a lot of um vigorous debates. They were they were not disrespectful, they weren't arguments, they were debates about I do it this way and you do it that way, and which is best, and you know, we're trying to make our point of how why how and why we do it. So there was a lot of that at at state association meetings. But probably And so I I definitely learned that that stretched each of us. You know, we were just stretching each other. And I think our experience levels were were pretty similar. Ernie had been in the business a little bit before us working for another company and then started his own. Uh Daryl started a couple, three, four years after I started, but uh but was older and had other business experience. So I mean, my business experience was pretty much just this. Um and but but truly the biggest mentors I think in those early days was in the early 90s was probably Norm Slatten. Really? Um very creative, very uh dynamic. Um and his his nephew Larry Sutton and uh and and Cynthia Baber Strunk, which you know is still active in our industry in Shannon. Um this was pre-Shannon, but it was you know, she was involved in Tribb in the early 90s uh as a board member and and and and and ran that group, you know, was president of that group at one point. Um learned a lot from them. Um I would say uh Lowry Schrader, um King Frog Reynolds out of Nashville, Tennessee, was on that board. King Frog Reynolds. Yeah, he was uh he had 15 stores and uh um was very creative and he was a lay preacher, so he he he he preached Sundays. Um he was a musician, really good musician. Um and uh so he'd play at all the furniture markets, they'd set up a place and him and a bunch of guys would pick up instruments and just just jam together or whatever, and then he had these these stores, but uh time spent with those guys in those trib board meetings in the early 90s was super, super educational for me. So uh I did learn a lot from from Daryl Ernie and others earlier like that, but but I I would just say I got it to a different level with Slats and Lowry and Larry Sutton and and probably even you know back in the day, uh uh Carico and you know um some of the guys were younger than me. You still learn from them. I've I've learned so much from Mike Tissett, and he's way younger than me. But uh, you know, uh you hear him say something about me, but I think the learning has gone more the other direction. I've learned more from him than he ever learned from me, I think.

SPEAKER_01 27:13

But but I think that's I think that's a good thing to not only be able to pass on some knowledge and experience, but be able to take from all the people that are around you and say, man, you do this very well as in in a in a different light. You're you're doing this very well. I need to take this or I need to take that and compound it into a better way of doing rent-to-own.

SPEAKER_00 27:32

Most of my favorite people in this industry have always been the believer that the rising tide rises all ships and you know, all those people I mentioned, I feel were very abundant-minded and and just wanted to help everybody, you know.

SPEAKER_01 27:47

Well, you know, you said something earlier about you're having conversations with David and Ernie, or Daryl, excuse me, David, Daryl and Ernie, and and you're talking I do it this way and you do it that way. What was it that Showplace did that you would say, this is our mark? This is something we did a little bit different than our neighbors, and this was how we made success.

SPEAKER_00 28:10

I got one, I got a good answer for that. What we felt was differentiated us from the competitors that grew up in my first five to ten years, which was Ronald King, a store that built dozens of stores out of, you know, out of Ohio. Um the the competitors that I found in my towns typically had a bit of a reputation for hiding the buyout price, the discounted early purchase option price. They didn't like the the store managers, didn't like losing BOR to somebody paying off.

SPEAKER_01 28:47

I wish that was a problem. That's probably a great problem to have if you have somebody owning.

Reputation, Service, And Customer Loyalty

SPEAKER_00 28:51

That's the way we looked at it. I got cash. Yeah. I mean, that was a great thing for us. So what we did was harness that every price tag and every receipt that a customer got showed them their exact discounted payout price. And and we we used it as a differentiator. We care about you getting a chance to pay off your home mortgage faster and not pay all that interest. Right. It's not the home mortgage, it's the refrigerator, it's the TV, it's whatever it was. But our big thing was they don't want you to know when the payout is. We're happy to tell you every week. But we do.

SPEAKER_01 29:28

We do because we want you to own it.

SPEAKER_00 29:30

Because we got a good character and we got a good heart, and if we can help you save money and buy it for the lowest possible, one of my one of my employees, one of my store managers, coined the phrase, they had it in their back room, and I loved it so much we put it all over our stores at one point. Is our our goal, our mission is to help you acquire ownership if you want to at the lowest possible price.

SPEAKER_01 29:53

Hey everyone, it's Pete Chao here from the RTO Show Podcast, and I want to tell you about a company that's making a real difference in the rent-to-owned space. WoW brands. I've seen firsthand how they approach marketing. Let me tell you, it's not just about ads. WoW brands build complete digital ecosystems designed specifically for the rent-to-owned industry. Their e-commerce and lead generation strategies are built to bring qualified leaders. And did I mention that they are actively working with the rent-town industry while also being members of April and Trip? Listen, these folks are passionate problem solvers. They don't just slap something together, they design, build, and scale the kind of digital retail tools your business needs and your customers actually want. So if you're serious about growing, reach out to WoWBrands at WoWBrands.com. I trust them, and I think you will too.

Debt, Bank Backlash, And Survival

SPEAKER_00 30:43

God, I think I remember that. It was character for us. It was just show them. We are your advocate. We're not here to hammer you. We are here to help you. We're here to take care of you. Yes. Yeah, no, I love that. It helped build the culture. And I've it was it was our uniqueness at that time, you know. And I I don't think we ever left that. You know, we still show on the receipt what your EPO is. Um, it's it's and and and I still say there's a lot of people that didn't want to show that. They want they didn't want somebody to know they're about to pay off.

SPEAKER_01 31:16

Yeah, yeah. Well, I mean, talking about those moments, because there was a lot of things that had to be pioneered in order to get to where we were, whether it be something that happened in the way of a same as cash or how that was calculated and thought of, or you know, reminding everybody an early purchase option is not a bad thing. A paid in full is not a bad thing. It's success all the way. Well, well, it and not only that, it also leads to recurring revenues in the sense that somebody feels like you had gotten them to ownership. They didn't pay you for no reason. Super happy with you. And and now they want to come back for more. So was there ever a time that you looked at Brentone as an industry and thought, I don't know where this is going. We might be in a little bit of trouble. There might be a future that's a little bit, a little bit grim right now or a little bit difficult. Or did you always have the idea like we are on an upward trajectory, whether it's this way or whether it's you know, smooth, that it's going to be here no matter what?

SPEAKER_00 32:17

I I don't think I ever really doubted that we could keep it alive. I always had built in the back of my mind if we ever got outlawed the the alternative, the way I would keep taking care of these customers. You know, and there's a couple different ways. But I mean, rent to rent's one. And with a a building rewards points thing, and you can buy something at the end with your rewards. I mean, I I was concocting ways if something bad happened. I never really felt like we wouldn't continue, like there wasn't a heavy percentage of demographics that needed us. Uh not not which very much of, even used us. So I always thought the opportunity for growth was unlimited. And I I was just always very optimistic about the future of the business. And I also watched in the early days the guys that I felt maybe didn't have the greatest character and was in it for quick money, they come and went. They they either they either failed or they got it to a point where they could sell and walk with some cash, and they did. And what remained was managers, operators, people that keep people that did have good character, that took care of customers long term, built good big companies.

SPEAKER_01 33:32

You know, the the Larry Sutton's, you know, of the world, you know, buddies and you know, when you champions you say Larry Sutton, who built, you know, what was it, a hundred stores at some point or something?

SPEAKER_00 33:43

Well, I think Champion had a hundred and some stores. I think Larry owned a quarter of them, maybe twenty, twenty or five or thirty of them. Maybe I'm saying that right. He had some partners in that group.

Banking Relationships And Smart Leverage

SPEAKER_01 33:51

And then he decides to make a complete different turn and go to you know the tower business. Wheels and tires explode that because I mean he he's just killing it, right? So people sometimes don't know about that. They don't know about the successes. We do, right? Because we're in the industry and we know these people, and we can walk through the halls of April, we can walk through the halls of the RTO worlds and and the conventions and the meeting of the minds, and we can see those people and say, man, that guy is success because he cares about his customer, he cares about his business, he cares about his employees. That guy over there does. And we can mention the Ernie's and the Darrell's and and how they've been able to transition down the line, you know, you with Keith. But those are inside stories. You ever what was one of the some of the hardest things that you had to overcome as far as what people thought of rent to own during your time? Because there's been a lot of comp monikers that have come with rent to own, and you're like, you guys are taking advantage, you guys are selling it at an astronomical price, and you know, without knowing the business model or everything that's included in the rental agreement, included by you know, doing a service, no credit, making sure that we take it out to you and from you for free, or picking it up if you ever decide that you don't want it at that point, and then come back a week later and you still don't get charged for it. You don't know about the cost of the truck, the cost of the insurance, the truck, you know, they have no idea of that. But they get this idea in their head that, you know, it's a disadvantage.

SPEAKER_00 35:12

Because your gross margin. They don't understand your net margin, but they can see your gross margin. Correct.

SPEAKER_01 35:20

What were some of the biggest trials and tribulations of getting that overturned in your area and saying, you know what, it's not that bad. Let me get you to a same as cash, let me get you to a paid info so that you can own this. And people going, nah, Gary, I know you're gonna charge me a whole lot and I don't want to do this.

SPEAKER_00 35:35

I never felt the resistance from the customer base. No. I always felt gratitude from the customers that they they hadn't had a new refrigerator ever before. They'd bought used or somebody gave them one or whatever. I always felt gratitude from the customer base. We tried to explain the agreement really well. Um, they knew what they were doing. Yeah. And I never really felt that kind of uh mistrust from the customer base. It was more the uh uneducated um do-gooders that didn't understand what you just said, all the backside and you know, costs um that might ask a family member of mine, even might say, How do you sleep at night? You charge too much. Why would anybody do that? You know, because they've never been in that situation, or they don't understand that lack of obligation and the freedom that some people desire if they want to buy something and they're not sure they're gonna like it. You can't do that at the mom and pop TV and appliance store. You can't do that at Kmart, you know.

SPEAKER_02 36:42

Right.

Product Surprises: Mowers And Seasonality

SPEAKER_00 36:42

You but you could do it with us, and after a couple weeks, if you really didn't like it, you just return it. You know, we couldn't do anything about it. We were gonna try to see if we could solve the problem for you, but at the end of the day, if you wanted to return it, you got to return it. Right. And uh so those those benefits and extra services, you know, if something went wrong, giving them a loan or do all the little extra things that we all know we do with this business, um all the way up to something that paid out last month. There's not many owners I know that wouldn't replace something, you know. Yeah, we replace it if if it's still on rent, we replace it. But if it paid out just last month, there's not many I know that wouldn't go ahead and fix it for them or replace it. You know, I mean do their best by the customer. Yeah, you just you know, it's a little bit over the line of what was agreed on, but you're thinking long-term here. You just want them to love you.

SPEAKER_01 37:42

You know, sometimes it's hard to be loved by somebody who doesn't know what's going on. You know, sometimes you have that child and it's like, I love you, but you know, I have to discipline you. Um If you had something to say, we're gonna we're gonna we're gonna start from the beginning all the way through. You started in repairing TVs, you come a little bit further, you start selling TVs, you start getting lines, you start putting more in there, you come across some trials and tribulations of, you know, I've got to make sure that I have it paid. I'm not gonna take on as big credit amount. So therefore my growth might have been stunted a little bit because we didn't take on a you know$500,000 worth of debt in the front end because we wanted to make sure that we did it right. But you have other people that might go down that road. They might take that that way and go, hey, listen, I'm okay with taking on that debt because I know that I can build it quick or whatever the case is. Coming into these generations now, 2025, and we're talking about moving ahead. What's something that you would tell somebody with all the knowledge and with all the experience that you've built out throughout the years? What's something you would say, I think this would benefit you the most?

SPEAKER_00 38:48

Well, I will have to say, and so so that I uh I make sure this is clear, we didn't start out with debt, but we grew so fast at one stretch that I did have a credit finance group, the you know, a commercial finance group that we we built a line of credit with, and we did owe, you know, I think uh gosh, what we owe. I think we had a six hundred thousand dollar line of credit at one point, but we were, you know, we were growing so fast, but it was all working out, you know. I mean, we we always had the money to pay the payment that was required until that big thing happened in the 90s where the commercial credit companies blacklisted all the rent-owned companies, and they called my loan. And I I had to get out of I had to reduce, I think we were in the seven or eight hundred thousand dollar area at the time, and I had to reduce that to two seventy-five, and they gave me ninety days to do it, or I had or they were calling the whole loan. What year, what around what year was that? I'm thinking that was ninety-one, ninety-two.

SPEAKER_01 39:54

It's funny. I was talking to uh Whalen earlier and he mentioned the same thing that at some point even.

Long-Term Thinking And Culture

SPEAKER_00 39:59

Borg Warner acceptance BWAC was the the big one, and and we we used Chrysler First at the time. Um there was there was a number of those commercial credit organizations that floor planned furniture and appliance retailers typically, but they'd they developed a rent-to-own arm to help us grow, and and they let some of the fast money early entrepreneurs of the industry get real deep and abscond, you know, spend the money and then couldn't manage the volume and go bankrupt. And so they blacklisted us, you know. And we'd never made a late payment. You know, I got real mad. My guy called me up and he said, Well, I gotta I can keep you at the branch level, which is 275 or under, and Chicago won't know about it. I can keep you in Cincinnati, Chicago won't know about it. But Chicago said, you got to get rid of this guy. But he said, I'll keep you at the branch level. And I had a$600,000 line, and he'd let me go over line as we were growing. I owed him$700,000,$8,000,000,$900,000 at times, never made a late payment. Um, and it agitated me so much as a young, immature businessman that I told him, you know what you can do with that$275? I don't need it. And I went looking around at local banks and uncles and everybody else to figure out that about two weeks later I called him back up and said, I'm such an asshole. I'm sorry. I need that 275. And uh, you know, and I and I had I found another way to get some to help, you know, a guy that had some some dough that he was will I was willing to pay him more interest than he was getting at the bank. And uh combined and we and we shrunk and we shared, you know, I went to all my employees and said, This is a this is just the worst thing that's ever happened. The big guys are after us, you know, the banks are after us, and uh we just got to pull together and share product and and it was some of the best teaming momentum we ever had. And man, we got cash-friendly quick and you know, got out of debt. And uh, but yeah, that would that was a really big challenge.

SPEAKER_01 42:05

So would the message going forward be be very careful with your money?

Closing Reflections & Listener CTA

SPEAKER_00 42:08

Yeah, just you know, um I don't know that we'll ever see I think our industry is more understood now, so I don't ever see a complete exit. You know, we've taught banks what to do. You s you sometimes have to teach your own banker if you're if you're using a bank. And we did we use Chase Bank One before they got bought out by Chase. Bank One helped me immensely after that. I taught a commercial lender what our business was and spent a lot of time with him in his hobby, you know, fly fishing and and messing around, ducks unlimited with him, and you know, just building a great relationship. So he'd give me the time to explain the business, and then they they gave us a line of credit that was all I ever needed after that. But uh, and I think, and that was something that Tribb brought in a uh seminar one year at a TRIP convention, a meeting of the mines out in I think Phoenix. They brought in a guy, Summers White, that taught us all how to build a bank relationship. This was right after that debacle with the commercial lenders. But uh yeah, I knew a new person getting in, I'd just say, don't go hog wild on the debt. Um, don't borrow more than you know you can pay back, you know.

SPEAKER_01 43:22

Um That's that's a tough, that's a that's a tough one.

SPEAKER_00 43:25

And and and that may mean for us in those days, it was we knew what we made at her bookkeeping job and me at the factory. And I wouldn't I wouldn't borrow more than I knew and knew safely what the business would provide, and and I could add to it out of and still buy groceries, you know. And um but yeah, I mean it's it gets down to it's fairly simple math. Um and you know what you're gonna rent this for and what what and how much you can keep it on rent. Um you know, back in those days. Whatever you put in the in the display room, you could rent. And I and I'd say today we all probably are at that place where there's enough competition, enough other ways to get things that you can't rent everything you put in the store today. Back then it was not that way. If you had something nice and new that went on that floor, it was on rent in a week or two, you know. And you knew what rent you were getting. And and and the ability to collect it at a higher percent I think was better then than it is now. Of course, we have a lot of con you know, uh arrived at ethics that in all honesty, we probably my partner would tell me some stories about how he did a pickup and we wouldn't dare do that today. It was after hours and you know, sneaking around and you know, it was we had to learn our lessons about that. And and and we, you know, I can't deny we probably did a few things that we would never do today. I wouldn't let anybody do do today, but but but we we didn't we probably had some years where we didn't charge anything off the whole year. Wow, nothing. That's that's great. I I think we had a stretch when my partner was in charge of all of our collections, and we were probably up to three or four stores at this time. We had a couple years stretch, we didn't charge anything off.

SPEAKER_01 45:22

Wow. But so kind of getting to the end of this, I'm curious. In all your years and everything that you've rented, everything that you've had, tell me an item that you weren't sure about that just literally took off.

SPEAKER_00 45:39

Yeah, well, probably a couple things come to mind. One is that it took us three times to get into the computer business before it was ever profitable. Two times I lost my shirt and we said, we're never in computers again. But, you know, obviously time went on, they got more user-friendly, and I figured out how to turn one on. But uh I I would think probably one of the biggest uh surprise items that went crazy was probably riding lawnmowers. No kidding. And I and I think I think Daryl was he or I won, but I think it was him was the first one that did it, and the other one, we were talking with each other a lot, so it wasn't long. Whoever did it first, the other one did it next pretty quick. Uh, I think he rented them first. And uh and that got to be kind of opened your eyes to something. Well, I mean, we were in rural areas, you know. I not many of my customers lived in an apartment in a city. All my customers rented some 1920 built home in a working-class neighborhood where all the people that used to live in that had moved to the suburbs of that little town, and it was where you could rent cheapest. And they built some of those houses into duplexes. Yep. And that, you know, those were the neighborhoods we were in. Um, and there was a lot of people at the edges of town on a trailer on an acre, you know, and and they were rental clients. Um, you know, maybe maybe the trailer parks, they just needed a push mower. But but anybody that had much of a lawn You want to get a rider. They wanted a rider. Yeah, they wanted a rider. And that that that surprised me how well that went. And um along the way, when zero turns came, and most of my compatriots here, peers at the rental business, said they're just too much money. Well, I've you know, we always tried a lot of stuff and kept what worked. Zero turn riding mowers is a great rent-owned item.

SPEAKER_01 47:39

Uh, they they have been. I actually have seen that. When when did you start renting your first mowers?

SPEAKER_00 47:46

Let's see. I would say mid-90s, 95. Yeah, 96. Yeah. That's about when they started coming out. We did it before I ever saw one in an Aaron's, but once we started doing it, Aaron saw it right away. And uh, I don't know if they saw it at Daryl's area or my area, but but uh it wasn't long after that that Aaron's was renting them. Rack took longer before they rented them, but uh um but yeah, it's uh it that was a big surprise. It's a it's a pretty stable income. And uh and we we'd offer a put-up program, you know, kind of like a motorcycle insurance gives you offers you a put-up program. So you don't have to pay insurance all year long if you're not gonna write if you're gonna put it in a garage. Well, that's kind of what we do. We'd say, look, you know, at the end of October, you can you're not gonna use it. You can pay us one payment a month, one week a month, and we'll apply that towards their your purchase price, but that's all you owe us during the off season is just one week a month, and you get a hold and keep your mower, and we didn't have to bring it back and store it.

SPEAKER_01 48:57

Which could be a nightmare if you have too many on rent. Yeah. That's a great idea. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 49:01

So we we did that with window air conditioners too. We'd we'd get people onto a window air conditioner, and they didn't didn't want to keep it and spend the money in the winter, but we could get a decent percentage of them to keep it by paying one week a month. And and it and it eventually just paid out, you know, but at least they got to keep it and they, you know, the it was efficient for them not to have to start over again next year. And uh and it kept us from having to bring them back and jack them in and out of people's windows, which was damaging things. And you know, somebody might say, well, I'd rather re-rent it in a new term next year, make more money on that one unit. That's not the way we looked at it. We looked at it long-term, like that customer got to own it. They're happy with us, it was more efficient for them. If somebody else was trying to rent it each season to them, they'd figure out the character there. They want to come here, you know. So it was all always about the long-term, you know, long-term relationship. And that's what makes showplace showplace. Yeah, I think that's that's a unique part. I mean, and I think a lot of the good dealers in this industry do exactly the same thing. I don't I think it's just unique showplace, but it was our difference against the big guys when we were really getting going.

SPEAKER_01 50:20

Well, as usual, it's always a great conversation. I love talking to Gary all the time because the truth is I learned something every single time we have a conversation. But, you know, coming to an end, I gotta say, I've loved doing the Legend series. I love being able to speak to some of the people that have been not only in the beginnings of this industry, but have seen all the way to where it's come and their contributions that they've had along the way, whether it's going against, you know, the B Gonzalez's in in Texas, or whether it be, you know, just figuring out this is our RDA, we have to make this work in our state. This is what you do differently, this is what I do differently, and how we make that work for ourselves, what products we bring in at whatever time. And you know, maybe some things work and some things don't. You know, I've never had an issue with computers, but then I hear that there has been. So you always, you know, those differences. Um, and it's really, it's really just great to hear, you know, how we've made it so far and through the through the trials and tribulations to be able to hear in a thriving industry, regardless of what's going on around us in 2025, to say, I think there's a pretty good look for next year.

SPEAKER_00 51:26

Yeah, you know, and keep on going. I'm very optimistic about the industry, uh, the young leaders that are coming up coming up through it. Um proud of my son doing a great job. Um, and there's there's a lot of good young operators at this point. And uh we just got to teach them to think long term, do the right thing. Yeah, we gotta teach them that stuff because it always works out.

SPEAKER_01 51:51

Keep the main thing the main thing. Yeah, I always say that. But we appreciate you guys sitting here with us. This is our legend series, and we're kind of going back and dialing in from where we were to where we are now. We are so appreciative that you guys stayed with us. If you have any questions, please hit me up at the show. It's Pete at the RTO Show Podcast.com, or you can see me on Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, and now where you're gonna see this on YouTube and kind of just give us a shout. If you have any questions for Gary or any of our legends, please let me know because I'd love to find out what it is that you were thinking about and what I may need to ask the next one. But we do appreciate your time. We appreciate everything. If you have any questions that you don't know about, make sure that you hit up April. Apro is a very big resource, you know, at rto-hq.org and uh keep them and everybody else in your prayers with the disaster relief that they're doing nowadays. And I will tell you guys as always, regardless of where you see us, Gary, I'm so glad that you're with us. I'm glad that you're here, and I will I'm gonna share a drink with you a little bit later. All right.

SPEAKER_02 52:44

All right, sounds good.

SPEAKER_01 52:45

Get your collections low to get your sales high. Have a great one.