Membership Benefits

Your APRO membership helps protect your right to do business. Since 1993, seven federal bills have been introduced that would cripple the national rent-to-own industry, overriding all state RTO laws enacted to protect the right of rental dealers to conduct business. Additionally, the creation of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) has produced many more attacks upon our industry, and will continue to do so.

Whether the rent-to-own industry is being vilified by powerful politicians or an aggressive government agency, our business will always be a potential target. Only APRO and its members’ work to educate lawmakers about how RTO benefits consumers has kept rent-to-own viable for decades.

Please join the hundreds of APRO rental dealers from across the country in Washington, D.C. for APRO’s Annual Legislative Conference, where you will meet with your U.S. Representatives and Senators to tell the rent-to-own story, and protect and promote our industry.

Your APRO membership gives you what you need to know to grow your client base. Since 1994, APRO has been continually conducting market research on how to retain current and recruit new customers – offering invaluable insights that have evolved into modern marketing plans for today’s digital shopping experience and new rental lifestyle.

APRO’s latest research focused on potential customers – especially among  the fast-growing Millennial and Hispanic populations – who fit rent-to-own demographics, but who don’t rent-to-own. The results were remarkable, the data was consistent, and the study generated four action plan documents:

• APRO Focus Group Executive Summary
• APRO Focus Group Action Plan
• APRO Online Marketing Action Plan
• Deep Dive: Targeting Hispanics and Millennials

Available exclusively to APRO members, these reports detail what rental dealers must do to thrive within an ever-changing marketplace.

Your APRO membership provides unique, leading-edge industry education designed to help you succeed. APRO’s national conference and trade show – the main annual event for the rent-to-own industry – offers participants crucial updates for your company, ample opportunity for meaningful networking, great deals for your business, awesome social events and extraordinary industry insights during APRO’s RTO Education Day. APRO members receive a deep discount to APRO events.

Additionally, APRO’s RTOHQ Live Learning Center offers members an online library of video and audio recordings from live educational sessions, accessible to you and your employees year-round.

Your APRO membership offers deep channels for collaborative peer connection and communication. Through members-only groups and other online opportunities at APRO’s Facebook Page and RTOHQ’s YouTube Channel, like-minded rent-to-own colleagues come together and share innovative ideas, discuss common problems and possible solutions, and develop new ways to improve our industry.

The networking and camaraderie that naturally occur through APRO give members a chance to connect, share information, strengthen ties, and build lucrative business relationships, partnerships, or alliances, as well as lifetime friendships.

Your APRO membership raises your digital profile. Through its research, APRO has learned how heavily potential customers depend upon the first two pages of organic [unpaid] Google search results. So Search Engine Optimization [SEO] of your company website is key. While SEO can be done mainly in-house, APRO members have the additional support of authority sites ShopRTO.com and RTOHQ.org to help fortify their SEO game.

Authority sites – which are favored by Google – are a powerful SEO tool. ShopRTO.com was created as a consumer-facing website, but was developed using a purposeful SEO strategy and framework. APRO members can submit articles to be posted on ShopRTO.com; when the posted piece links back to your company website, it gives your site greater visibility and a significant SEO boost.

Likewise with RTOHQ.org – APRO members can send company news for APRO’s digital newsletter, which then links back to the company’s website, providing a substantial SEO boost. Of course, backlinks from both of these authority sites are for APRO members only.

Your APRO membership helps you keep current on industry-impacting issues. Through its award-winning magazine, regular e-newsletters, and large social-media presence, APRO provides timely access to news or developments with the power to affect RTO businesses.

RTO Today delivers twice-weekly trending and other important news straight into your inbox.

RTOHQ: The Magazine provides in-depth articles and competitive insights quarterly for all levels of rent-to-own employees.

APRO’s website is the most comprehensive source of RTO-related industry information.

Your APRO membership helps project a positive image of your company. Your investment and involvement show your commitment to doing business legally, ethically, and following best practices.

APRO members have access to meaningful marketing studies, with results and recommendations you can use to help keep your current customers happy and to reach the 40-million potential customers who fit the rent-to-own demographic.

Through APRO’s Educational Scholarship Foundation, APRO members support dozens of annual scholarships for spectacular students who are either the children of APRO member-company employees, or employees themselves.

And should you ever face negative coverage of your business or our industry, APRO’s media relations team can help you navigate such attacks with maximum positivity and minimum profile.

Your APRO membership includes exclusive extras to benefit your business. APRO General Counsel, Ed Winn III, provides APRO members with limited free legal advice. With almost 30 years of experience, Winn is the leading legal rent-to-own expert nationwide. Your membership gives you access to our industry’s most knowledgeable legal expert to help you address legal issues affecting your company.

Cowles & Thompson, P.C. offers APRO members limited free wage-and-hour consultation, while Relation Insurance Services – the APRO-endorsed commercial insurance agency – gives APRO members access to property, liability, auto, and workers’ compensation insurance programs customized to meet the unique needs of rental dealers. APRO also has established a Disaster Relief Fund to help member-company employees recover from natural disasters.

Finally, APRO Member Business Statistical Surveys are excellent banking and investment tools available to APRO members only. These statistical surveys – which help industry outsiders understand RTO finances – are the only studies of their kind available for rental dealers to use for loans, growth, and investor relations.