Rent-to-own News - Bogeys and bass: Heartland gets off to sporting start

Gib Collins lands the biggest bass in the annual Heartland fishing tournament, a 4.3 pounder.

Rent to own pros took full advantage of the recreational opportunities available at the seventh annual Missouri Rental Dealers Association's Heartland of America Regional Trade Show at the scenic Lodge of Four Seasons Resort in Lake Ozark, Missouri.

Attendees showed up en masse today for golf and fishing tournaments and will kick off the event's annual trade show at 3 p.m.

See event photos here.

Around 20 fishermen and women sped onto the Lake of the Ozarks at dawn in search of "the big one" as part of the trade show's annual bass tournament and another 48 golfers teed off for the golf tournament at the lush "Cove" course.

In the fishing tournament, Gib Collins of Show Me Rent to Own took home top honors for the single largest catch, a 4.3 pound Big Mouth Bass. Collins and teammate Nathan Young also of Show Me, also claimed the greatest total fish weight.

The team caught 14.2 pounds of total bass.

Second place for total pounds caught went to the team of Steve Branning and Ron Mueller; third place went to Doug Neuhaus and Vic Lombardo; fourth place went to Dan Cole and Joe Fagin.

Golfers were still on the greens when this newsletter was released.

Though the overall number of companies exhibiting in the trade show portion of the Heartland of America Conference is down to 47, the show still sold out, filling all 70 booths -- the same number as last year, according to MRDA Executive Director Ken Steiner.

Similarly, though the total number of RTO companies attending is down to 20, overall attendance is comparable to last year.

"The (MRDA) board really did a great job of getting people to come out," Steiner said. "And for $25 for each additional person to attend, it's a tremendous opportunity for these store managers to get to spend time with vendors one-on-one and get some really great individualized product training they can put to use in their stores on day one. It's a winning formula."

The Missouri Rental Dealers Association is holding its seventh annual, Heartland of America Regional Trade Show and Seminar at the Lodge of Four Seasons Resort in Lake Ozark, Missouri, June 14-16.

The work/play event is a truly regional RTO opportunity attracting rental dealers, store managers and industry associates from across multiple states.

The trade show and unique training sessions are directed at the store management level and will let owners and managers alike see all of the latest products in the RTO channel.

The annual dinner and awards banquet takes place tonight from 8 p.m. to 10 p.m.

Thursday kicks off the training portion of the show which runs from 8:45 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. Participating companies and a brief description of their seminars follows:

Classic Flame: This training will focus on how to educate consumers to understand how to use infrared heaters to save them money and provide them the benefits of using these heaters. The training will focus on the operation and construction of this type of heater. The goal will be to have an educated sales staff that will provide their customers a product that they will be satisfied with.

LG Electronics: This training will focus on the features and benefits of LED, Plasma and LCD TV. The new technologies to be discussed are SMART TV and 3D TV. We will also demonstrate new Sound Bars, Home Theater Systems and Blue Ray Players with SMART TV and 3D features built in.

O’Rourke Sales: Their training will focus on new Tablets to compete with IPad as well as Dell’s newer more powerful notebooks.

Serta Mattress: With all of news coverage and legislative activity in the states, the public is being over-run with information about the condition of their mattress. Has it been sanitized and properly stored? Are they protected from bed bugs? This session will provide a procedure that will ensure your customer with a clean, safe and sanitary product. This process will protect your business from frivolous tort actions while assuring your customer the product they expect.

Whirlpool: This session will focus on how/why to step customers up the line. Training will mainly be on refrigeration and laundry, highlighting the features and benefits of the new Whirlpool top mount lineup as well as Maytag Bravos laundry. After the trainings, there will be a box lunch available and then we will have round table discussions of various RTO Industry issues before adjournment.