Through times of adversity & growth, the APRO Charitable Foundation helps rent-to-own support & sustain its own
Once upon a time, rent-to-own businesses had, let us say, not exactly an immaculate reputation. And honestly, despite decades of rising standards of integrity and accountability, the whole RTO industry still carries the weight of some customer and lawmaker distrust because of a handful of dubious operators from rent-to-own days gone by.
In RTO’s seemingly never-ending struggle to prove its good intentions via corresponding actions, the APRO Charitable Foundation serves as a force for good and a resource for upholding the industry’s status. Not only is the foundation a catalyst for doing good works, but it also benefits our own – helping rental dealers support their colleagues during crucial times in life.
Building a Strong Base: The APRO Charitable Foundation
The APRO Charitable Foundation consists of two different funds designed to help sustain rent-to-own folks through both adversity and growth:
RTO Employees Disaster Relief Fund: In 2005, in response to devastating duo Hurricanes Katrina and Rita, APRO members contributed more than $190,000 to help 159 rent-to-own employees get through and bounce back from these catastrophic natural disasters. Unfortunately, natural disasters have become all too common; we don’t know when or where the next hurricane, tornado, flood, or wildfire will happen, but we do know a rapid response is critical. So APRO established the RTO Employees Disaster Relief Fund, to combat natural disasters affecting our rent-to-own family.
APRO Scholarship Fund: Since 2008, the APRO Charitable Foundation has annually provided scholarships to rent-to-own professionals and their families, empowering students connected with RTO to pursue college degrees and successful futures. APRO members have contributed generously to the fund – awarding 447 scholarships totaling more than $1 million to date. Rental dealer state associations can partner with APRO to give scholarships specifically to students in their states, and the APRO Society for Tomorrow helps the program continue to thrive by allowing members to commit to an ongoing annual donation to the Scholarship Fund.
All contributions to these funds are tax-exempt and go directly to APRO members in need. Additionally, they help strengthen understanding of rent-to-own as an industry that does good work, and is there for its customers and communities.
RTO EMPLOYEES DISASTER RELIEF FUND
Blown Away by Support: Tornado Aid, One Year Later
During the late evening of December 10, 2021, an EF4 tornado moved violently and lethally through Western Kentucky, traveling over 165 miles and crossing through eleven counties, causing calamitous damage and ultimately claiming 57 lives.
Particularly hard-hit was the town of Mayfield, Kentucky. This devastating storm peeled bark off of trees, tossed semis like toys, and turned mobile homes into matchsticks. Mayfield’s historic downtown courthouse and churches instantaneously became piles of rubble and debris, while residential neighborhoods were destroyed – many homes were left as nothing but concrete slabs.
The three employees of the SKC Enterprises Inc., dba Rent One Mayfield location awoke the next morning to assess the damage done to their own lives.
• Store Manager Trisha Staples lost power at home, and struggled to restock her refrigerator with food for her daughter, stepchildren, and grandchildren. Still, she never missed a day of work.
• Jeremy Martin, Assistant Store Manager, also lost all the food in his refrigerator due to power outages, with four children, a pregnant wife, and in-laws to feed. The family went without city electricity or water for a total of two months.
• Brand-new sales associate Brandon Hamlet experienced severe damage to his family’s manufactured home, including broken windows, ruined underpinnings, and a hole through the roof from a fallen tree. Unfortunately, Brandon didn’t have insurance to help cover the costs of the damage, and he needed help fast.
Of course the destruction went way beyond this team’s personal lives; their customers’ lives had also been turned upside down. Prior to the tornado, this small and mighty team was on its way to becoming a million-dollar store, but lost 100 agreements due to the storm.
Despite their own losses and hardships, this Rent One team reached out to assist their customers. They visited customers’ homes to help document damage for insurance purposes and replace items where possible. With the help of the multi-state Rent One family, the Mayfield team also put up a tent in front of the store and provided much-needed supplies to the community, including clothes, toiletries, perishables, batteries, and other necessities.
Today, almost a year later, the Mayfield store is well on its way to a full recovery. Trisha was honored with both the Rookie of the Year and Rising Star awards at Rent One’s annual conference for her leadership. Jeremy has a beautiful baby girl, Persephone, and a new home for his growing family, and Brandon is expecting his second child soon.
APRO’s RTO Employee Disaster Relief Fund provided these three exceptional RTO employees with necessary resources for their housing and food post-disaster. They, in turn, helped their customers and their town through this difficult time, securing their spot in the business community and in Mayfield residents’ hearts.
Making It Rain Rainbows:
State Associations Reinforce Relief Fund
When eastern Kentucky got hit hard this summer by heavy rain, deadly flashfloods, and destructive river flooding, Bill Howard, President of the Kentucky Rental Dealers Association, wanted to Act quickly to help those in need.
“As someone who does business in Kentucky, I felt it was important that Kentucky rental dealers do something to step up and help their own,” said Howard. “The devastation was widespread, and it was just the right thing to do.”
Howard connected with APRO to engage assistance from the RTO Employees Disaster Relief Fund. As he was working to secure relief for Kentucky, Howard noted that natural disasters are all too common nowadays and the need is widespread, so he challenged other state rental dealer associations to match his $2,500 donation.
“APRO’s Disaster Relief Fund is for all RTO families affected by natural disasters,” Howard said. “It’s our responsibility as state leaders to lead the charge and ensure their needs are met.”
To date, Howard’s leadership has raised almost $22,000 for the RTO Employee Disaster Relief Fund from state rental dealer associations nationwide – including organizations in Arkansas, Connecticut, Florida, Georgia, Kansas, Kentucky, Massachusetts, Missouri, Ohio, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Tennessee, and Virginia. Two individual APRO members also donated to the cause, helping ensure their RTO colleagues receive aid when they need it most.
APRO SCHOLARSHIP FUND
A Titan Tiger’s Legacy:
Special Scholarship Honors RTO Legend
“Tiger” John Cleek was partner and president of Missouri-based Cleek’s Home Furnishings/Rentals & Sales, a 48-year RTO veteran, a former APRO President, a 14-year APRO Board Member, a Co-Founder of APRO’s State Association Coordination Committee, and an industry icon. Tiger lost his fight with ALS this past spring.
Tiger has been memorialized many ways, including the APRO RTO Tiger Award recognizing extraordinary work at the state level, and a celebration of life party held at his beloved Mizzou’s Faurot Field, where hundreds toasted a life well-lived as Tiger’s face lit up the sky on giant scoreboards.
This year, the Cleek family also opted to honor their deeply loved husband, father, and grandfather by establishing an APRO Charitable Foundation Scholarship in his memory; the first-ever Tiger Cleek Memorial Scholarship went to Robert Bennett of Pennsylvania.
APRO Scholarship Star:
Robert Bennett
Pennsylvanian Robert Bennett is one of this year’s 29 deserving APRO scholarship recipients, and the first-ever awardee of the Tiger Cleek Memorial Scholarship. At 32, Rob is a returning student – a potentially difficult situation, but he has managed to keep a 3.95 GPA as he pursues a career in data science. Studying at the Bloomsburg University of Pennsylvania, Rob is set to graduate with a Bachelor of Science in Mathematics, with a concentration in Statistics.
Rob grew up in the rent-to-own business, with a dad – Michael Lerch – who has worked in the industry for more than 30 years, including 14 years owning his own ten-store business, Lightning RTO.
“As kids, we’d come home from school and go directly to the store,” remembers Rob. “We’d do our homework, then hang out in the showroom, help with cleaning, get to know the customers. We learned to appreciate the interpersonal aspects of RTO, and how it brings people together.”
In 2015, Lerch and his two partners sold Lightning to Majik Enterprises International Inc., dba Majik Rent-To-Own; today, Lerch helps handle operations at the company’s Mountville, Pennsylvania, location.
Upon graduation, Rob wants to get into the data analytics arena to gain experience and strengthen skills, so that he can eventually transition to become a data scientist. And while he’s gotten a bit of a later start, he’s committed to the long game.
“My best examples of work ethic, dedication, compassion, and ensuring people know how much you care about them all came from rent-to-own,” Rob concludes. “Our family business surrounded me with people who lived these values, so RTO has played an essential role in developing me into who I am today.”
APRO Scholarship
Star: Leilani Jimenez
Leilani Jimenez, 19, is a sophomore at the University of Rhode Island, where she’s pursuing a degree in Computer Science. Ultimately, Leilani wants a career creating video games.
“I’ve known I wanted to be a game designer since I was eleven years old,” she says. “Our first gaming console came from my mom’s rent-to-own store. RTO has let my family to get many different things we normally couldn’t afford – so it has not only put food on our table, but also has made ours and many other houses feel like home.”
Leilani’s mother, Dajhira Encarnacion, is Sales Manager for Aaron’s Sales & Lease in Cranston, Rhode Island, and has worked in rent-to-own for 15 years.
“I remember the store as a place of warmth and calm,” recalls Leilani. “As a kid, I’d watch movies and play on the Tvs. Her co-workers would see me and smile, say hi, and joke around with me as they were closing up. My mom has made countless connections with all kinds of people; she runs into people from the store all the time, and they’re always happy to see her.”
Leilani’s parents are both immigrants from the Dominican Republic who came to America as kids. She says they are her greatest role models, working to take care of their family while also bettering themselves and their lives.
“My mom works late nights and weekends while learning to speak Korean,” notes Leilani. “My dad is currently working toward his college degree in accounting. I remember quizzing him for his American citizenship test, and now I watch him doing homework until late at night.”
Leilani says most of her college tuition is being covered by scholarships, and she’s grateful for her APRO scholarship because it helps her family by lightening the financial burden of her education.
“My parents inspire me, and I want to inspire others by working the way they taught me to – with a purpose and with pride in what I do,” she concludes. “I’ve been taught I can achieve whatever I want as long as I’m willing to work toward it. You’re never too old to learn, and it’s never too late.”
APRO Scholarship Star:
Benjamin Estep
As a kid, Benjamin Estep watched hospital dramas and read medical textbooks for fun. Now 22, Ben is in the middle of a one-year master’s degree program in biomedical engineering at the University of Alabama at Birmingham (UAB). Over the next five years, he wants to earn his Ph.D. and eventually become the principal investigator of a biomedical research lab – a high-level educational path that carries an accordingly high price tag.
“I’m paying my own way through school,” Ben attests. “I’ve already got significant debt from my undergrad degree, and with six more years ahead of me, more large loans and scholarships are the only way I’ll get through.”
Luckily, Ben’s academic achievements are already more than scholarship- worthy. As an undergraduate, he made the Dean’s list every semester, partnered with a UAB Hospital clinician for his senior project, graduated magna cum laude in the Honors College, and was accepted to UAB’s prestigious master’s program a year early. Currently, he is a research lab assistant in UAB’s Microbiology Department, chairs the university’s National Organization of Rare Diseases chapter, serves as Treasurer for the Volunteers in STEM, Innovation, and Outreach Network, and has had a manuscript accepted into the research journal iScience.
Ben’s dad, Roger Estep, has worked in the RTO industry for more than 35 years, in various positions at various companies. Today, he’s a Regional Vice President for Bestway Rental Inc., dba Bestway Rent-To-Own. And while Ben’s career concentration is focused singularly on medical research, he feels he has gleaned some essential work wisdom from his father’s years in rent-to-own.
“Through my dad, rent-to-own has exposed me to work cultures and environments I wouldn’t have gotten to experience otherwise,” affirms Ben. “His career has taught me a lot about hard work, business management, and interpersonal communication, which are some of the best values and qualities to have in any type of workplace.”
Kristen Card has been a contributing writer for RTOHQ: The Magazine for more than 15 years.
Giving and Receiving:
Fortifying APRO’s Charitable Foundation
APRO’s Charitable Foundation is funded exclusively through APRO member contributions. All donations are tax-exempt, and go directly to rent-to-own employees and their families.
To donate to the RTO Employees Disaster Relief Fund Please visit https://apro.growthzoneapp.com/ap/donate/bVLzvxLn.
To apply for aid from the RTO Employees Disaster Relief Fund Simply submit a brief online application, APRO staff will follow up to gather further information, and the APRO Board of Directors will review and approve funding accordingly. To apply, please visit: https://www.rtohq.org/disaster-relief-application-form/
To donate to the APRO Scholarship Fund Please visit: https://www.rtohq.org/scholarship-donation-form/
To apply for an APRO Scholarship The scholarship process includes submitting requested materials via an online application and completing an interview by phone. All applications are judged by a third-party independent panel of educators not affiliated with the Foundation’s Board of Directors, APRO staff, or scholarship applicants. The judges read, review, and score all applications. To apply, please visit: https://www.rtohq.org/ and click “Foundation.” The scholarship application process for 2023-24 begins next spring. For more information about the APRO Charitable Foundation or either fund, please email us at info@rtohq.org, or call us at (800) 204-2776.
