Nationwide RentDirect’s Member Meeting was held this week in the Lone Star State in conjunction with Nationwide Marketing Group’s PrimeTime. “This PrimeTime was amazing because of increased rental dealer engagement,” says Director of Nationwide RentDirect Keven Dalke, “I am more familiar with them and they with me. I see us growing even more so in the future”.
Day one began with PrimeTime’s signature Learning Academy sessions focusing on a range of topics from business optimization practices to an introduction to the services provided by Nationwide Marketing Group. Following the sessions, attendees ended the day with a welcome reception.
This year’s reception highlighted the No Child Hungry feeding program, a part of My Neighbor’s Children. This is Nationwide’s community outreach program, which has packed more than 200,000 meals for children all across the world just last year.
The following day’s general assembly began with a keynote speaker, former NASA astronaut, Mike Massimino. Massimino spoke on his experiences as an astronaut, such as being the first person to tweet from space and being part of the team that holds the world record for most hours spacewalking in a single shuttle mission. He spoke of the adversity he had to overcome, like a medical disqualification and being rejected three times before getting into NASA.
The convention continued with several regional member meetings along with RentDirect’s annual meeting, kicked-off by Dalke. Dalke introduced APRO Executive Director Jill McClure. McClure emphasized the importance of the industry’s annual trek to Washington D.C. to educate lawmakers and protect the rent-to-own industry. Additionally, McClure outlined APRO member benefits and how both the industry and members are facing many obstacles aside from just those that are legislative, such as wage and hour changes and cybersecurity. APRO is offering call-in educational seminars to help dealers with these issues.
Dalke then introduced Bo Bradford from Retailer Web Services, who showcased his company’s digital services offered to RentDirect members. The annual meeting concluded with RentDirect’s Hot Show, which showed an increase in vendor participation from previous years. “The selection was much better,” says Dalke, “It was a full room with strong attendance and participation from dealers.”
Throughout the day, PrimeTime held intense functions like Mattress University to discuss trends in the industry and ideas to transform marketing. PrimeTime Palooza Reception offered attendees quick deals from vendors for only 90 minutes.
The convention concluded with the PrimeTime Expo where APRO staff joined in the RentDirect booth, registering members for the APRO Legislative Conference and answering dealers’ industry questions. When asked what makes this PrimeTime unique, Dalke shared, “We highlighted several new marketing assets that were created for dealers to take advantage of.”
