The Evolution of Ashley Furniture in Rent-To-Own with Mike Kays

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This episode offers a fascinating exploration into the workings of the rent-to-own sector, featuring a conversation with Michael Kays, the Vice President of Rental Operations at Ashley Furniture. As a leading name in the industry for over 75 years, Ashley has enabled countless families to turn houses into homes, emphasizing not just consumer transactions but building lasting relationships. Michael discusses the importance of gratitude and giving during the holiday season, illustrating that this ethos extends beyond mere transactions and is foundational to the company's culture.

Listeners will gain valuable insights into the innovative approaches Ashley employs to ensure superior quality and efficient logistics in their operations. Michael sheds light on how Ashley has successfully navigated challenges during economic fluctuations and changing consumer behaviors, highlighting their commitment to community engagement through sustainability initiatives and scholarships aimed at promoting STEM education. These efforts demonstrate that Ashley is diligent about not just making profit, but also making a positive impact on society.

Dive deeper into this episode to uncover the strategies that drive Ashley Furniture's success in the rent-to-own sector, while discovering how they continue to adapt and thrive in a competitive market. Whether you are a seasoned dealer, a consumer interested in furniture solutions, or simply curious about the industry's evolution, this episode equips you with knowledge and inspiration. Join us in celebrating the synergy between quality service, community support, and innovative strategies that contribute to an enriching customer experience. Don’t forget to subscribe, share, and leave a review!

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:07):
Hello and welcome to the RTO Show.
I'm your host, pete Chow, andtoday we're going head-to-head
with Michael Kays.
He is the Vice President ofRental Operations for Ashley
Furniture and let me tell you,guys, I've been waiting for this
.
There is so much informationgoing on we're actually talking
before all this and I can tellyou there's a lot that you might
not know.
I'm sure there is a lot you doknow.

(00:28):
Ashley's been in the businessfor 80 years now 75 years 75
years and let me tell you, thereis nothing that they can't do.
They have 10,000 SKUs, $6.5billion in revenues and, guys,
they are only getting bigger, asyou're going to find out.
Right now, I want to introduceMike, because he has his own
story to tell, as he is beforeRent to Own, during Rent to Own

(00:51):
and where Ashley is going in now.
So, mike, how are you?

Speaker 2 (00:53):
doing, Doing great, Doing great.
It's fabulous.
Fabulous weather here inFlorida, fabulous weather in
Texas and headed up to theThanksgiving holidays, which is
one of my favorite holidaysAnytime we get a chance to show
our gratitude and be aroundfriends and family, it doesn't
get any better than that.

Speaker 1 (01:10):
for me, it's the best time of the year for furniture.
It's the best time of year forrent, to own.
Not only that, it's like thatgiving season.
It's not exactly a takingseason.
It's one of those things wherewhat can I do for somebody else?

Speaker 2 (01:28):
A lot of people are in that mode and it's just, it's
just feeling good all the wayaround, amen, and we all, we all
should give Thanksgiving alittle bit more time than we do.
Typically it's HalloweenChristmas and you have one day
for Thanksgiving and moreChristmas, but I think the
Thanksgiving holiday really is,uh, it's overlooked, and it's an
opportunity for us to to giveback and to be, um, very
grateful for all that, gratefulfor all that we've been given,
and we shouldn't just blow itover and eat turkey and watch

(01:49):
them football and fall asleep.
It should be much more aboutthat.

Speaker 1 (01:53):
Well, we want you to remember that you're probably
going to see this in season five.
Everything that you do thisholiday season, whether it's now
or whether it's next, we wishyou the best holidays we always
do but we always want you toremember that giving is always
part of the holiday season, notreceiving giving your heart,
being a part of things that youcan't really put a dollar amount

(02:15):
on, part of your family, partof the community, and doing some
of the things that Ashley isgoing to actually tell us about
right now.
So Mike's going to tell usabout what's going on and how he
even gotten to rent-owned.
How did that happen?
So you have a lot of historybefore you get here, and so you
build on that and you bring thatto Ashley.
What did you bring in as far asyour history and where have you
been?

Speaker 2 (02:35):
Gosh.
So I started out of college Iworked for a couple of
department stores in Texas, bothin the buying office and out in
the stores.
I really did two tours ofexperiences out in the stores.
I really enjoyed both tours.
One was with a mid-leveldepartment store, one was with a

(02:57):
very high end, and so I got toknow customers on both sides of
that and they are very differentcustomers.
But a customer is a customerand they all have wants and some
of them think they have needs,but primarily they're all wants.
And boy, it was justinteresting to know those people
understand who they are, dealwith the problems because
there's problems in everythingthat we have out there but

(03:19):
really getting them, you get theenergy going back and forth
with them, and so I reallyenjoyed those two tours.
From there I went and spent alittle bit of time in catalog
and that turned into e-commerce.
So I learned about photography,learned about SEO, learned
about all the ins and outs ofe-commerce before it became what

(03:39):
it is right now.
And then from there I wasworking and the company I worked
for kind of impaled on itselfand an opportunity came
available at Ashley, and Iremember the day that we were
talking about it and he goeswhat do you know about rent to
own?
And I said not really a wholelot, but I can learn anything.

(04:01):
And so he said I'll neverforget what he said.
He said you know what theproblem is is that if you get
into rent to own, you're goingto always be in rent to own, and
I thought you mean like hotelCalifornia.
He said he said, kind of likehotel California.
But the good thing is is thatit's a tight, tight knit group
of people that if you work hardand you do the right thing, so

(04:27):
always be a job for you.

Speaker 1 (04:29):
You know what year is this.
This is 2011.
So 2011 was a really good timeto be.
It was coming out of that era,the 2007, 2008 time, where we're
just kind of we took a beating.
We're finally starting to comeout of it, then, so that's a
great time.
But Rentone does have a way oflike I've done it.
Starting my first year wouldhave been 24 years, probably

(04:50):
going on 25 and 2025 now, but Itook a hiatus, right.
And where did I end up?
Right back here.
Once you're in it, you're justin it and it's part of the cycle
, it's part of life.
Rentone has just a way ofbringing you back because
there's so many relationships.
It's just a relationshipbusiness.
It's a relationship to own, asopposed to rent-to-own, but it's

(05:10):
one of those things where thepeople you know they're going
through something or they're notgoing through something, but
either way you are affectingtheir lives, and usually for the
better.
When we're in the furnitureindustry, they're getting rid of
something that they don't need,or they're getting something
that they do need, or they'remaking their home just a
different place than it wasbefore, from a house to a home.
And rent to own has always beenlike that for me, Since the day

(05:33):
I decided I was finally goingto start selling and it finally
came on to me and it was almostlike a bug.
Once I got it, it was just likeI really enjoyed that part of
it, and it's changed everything.

Speaker 2 (05:44):
Yeah, you learn to help people and you keep that
perspective that people havewants and needs, and some of
them.
Sometimes you need arefrigerator, right, sometimes
you want a new sofa, and beingable to help those people is a
little bit of a drug and Ilearned early on in my retail
career.
Me personally, I'm alwaystrying to find things.

(06:05):
What is that next big thing?
What's the next big thing thatpeople are going to want, at
least in my furniture world?

Speaker 1 (06:11):
It looks like, with 10,000 SKUs, we found something
that they want right, we foundeverything that they want, so
yes, so, being from Ashley, nowthat you're in the rent-to-own
division, what does that mean?
To be the vice president ofrent-to-own operations or rental
operations?
Does that encompass theentirety of rent-to-own?

Speaker 2 (06:30):
Yes, I've got a number of associates that work
for me and we've got a couple ofhouse accounts that we drive,
but beyond that we've got a seaof 450 sales reps.
We call them marketingspecialists within Ashley and
they have their ownrelationships with the own rent
to own dealers, and so I assistthem with what it is, because,

(06:54):
as a sales representative, goingto a retail store is different
than going rent to own.
There's some things that you'vegot to talk about, there's
things that are.
They're just different, and soI try to help them and try to
help them understand rent to ownand try to maximize those sales
that are out there.

Speaker 1 (07:09):
I can tell you right now I've known Kevin gone for
years, I think.
I've traveled and he's traveledwith me right Cause he's in the
rent to own sector, theSauerbecks.
I love to see that his son'sinvolved in it.
I love that.
I'm talking about generationalright.
Ashley's got so many years andhaving a generational Larry
Sampson, who's like, oh my God,yeah, he's the OG of everything.
I think he's followed me sinceday one.

(07:30):
You know going back and seeingthese guys time and time again,
regardless of where I've been,they've always been a part of
that, and the great thing Ithink about that is when you're
talking to the same personyou've known.
It's not somebody that's newright, it's not somebody that's
been cycled out and gone over.
They've got to be staying for areason.
I doubt that Kevin would bestaying because he didn't want

(07:51):
to, and I know Larry's beendoing this since the flood.
He has been solid on this and Ican tell you what when he walks
in, I knew not only was I goingto buy a bedroom set, but he
was going to take care of me andit was going to be a quick,
fast transaction.
He knew exactly what I neededto do.
He knew exactly what to ask me.
He walked in, he took care ofme and he left and it was like I
appreciate him coming in andtaking care of me.

(08:12):
He didn't take up a whole lotof my time.
He knew exactly what I waslooking for, what I needed to do
.
Boom, boom, boom Done.
All right, guys, I'll see younext week.
God, I loved him for that.
I mean I still do.
I don't buy from him the sameway now because of the company,
but I think that, god, it justshows a lot that Ashley has

(08:36):
those people out there thatreally do form those
relationships, pete, it's notdifficult.

Speaker 2 (08:40):
It's the same relationship that the
rent-to-own dealers have withtheir customers.
The suppliers have to have withthe dealers and it's no
different If somebody's got aneed out there.
I was dealing with somethingthis afternoon in the hotel room
that I was at this afternoonwith a customer out of Florida

(09:01):
and they needed some help and Iwas there to try to help them
with that.
And that's the same thing we dowith our rent to own customers
every single day.
They have a need, they have aproblem.
We want to solve those problemsfor them.
You know, um actually does a lotof things really, really well,
but, like any company, there'sgoing to be some shortfallings,
and so part of the things that Ido is try to help with those

(09:23):
shortfallings and then try tomake sure that they don't happen
again, right?
So one of the things that weuse it's a it's a core belief of
ours at Ashley Furniture iscontinuous improvement.
So it's OK to make a mistake,right.
Mistakes happen, they're goingto happen.
We need to realize that, butit's.
We need to learn from it and weneed to put processes in so

(09:43):
that that doesn't happen again,or at least it minimizes the
fact that it happens again.

Speaker 1 (09:46):
Well, we chase perfection, but there's no way
we're going to get there, right?
I think Vince Lombardi saidthat right.
And so you try to get there.
There's always something that'sgoing to happen.
How many different thingshappen between the inception of
a piece of furniture and itactually making it to the store,
the hands, the traveling, thelogistics of it.
It finally gets there.
There might be something wrong.
It's really not the fact thatsomething's never going to

(10:07):
happen.
It's what are we doing about itonce we find it, Solving that
problem, getting you the piece,getting it taken care of.
And, honestly, one of the realreasons that I enjoyed I mean,
there are a lot of SKUs okay, sothere's a lot of models but one
of the real reasons that Ireally enjoyed having Ashley
over the years was the parts,Because I've had vendors that
have some great looking stuffand you put it out there and it

(10:29):
comes back and I need a zipper,I need a leg.
It's just so hard to get.
It spends two months in theback because they have to figure
it out and I'm not naminganybody, I've been in this a
long time.
But to be able to go onto theAshley website and be able to
order, to be able to go on thereand say this is a warranty
piece and it gets taken care ofwithin a week, 10 days.

(10:49):
That's where the relationshipcomes from.
Number one keeping the serviceof the customer.
If they're paying on something,we have to keep that functional
, useful and looking good untilthe end of that relationship.
And we really wanted to gobeyond because we want them to
come back.
But not only that.
If it does come back and let'ssay the customer is fully done
with it, they've moved, they'vegone, they've hit the lotto and
they've decided to go somewhereelse, at least we can change the

(11:11):
life around for that piece offurniture, no matter what it is,
and make it right for somebodyelse.

Speaker 2 (11:15):
Yeah, I'm glad you said that because Ashley has you
know as fast as we have grown.
We started trading with therent-to-own industry back into
the 1980s and we've alwayspartnered up, whether it's been
Renison or it's been Aarons,it's been Countryside, whoever
it is, we've grown up togetherand we've listened to each other

(11:37):
.
Our big growth spurt in the inthe nineties it's it was because
the rent to own industry neededa somebody that could house the
furniture and can deliver smallpieces quickly, because the
back rooms are so small, andduring that we always would
listen to the the, the goodthings and the bad things.

(11:57):
And so if we found that umproblems we're having with the
sofas, you know we maybe addedstress welts or we added zippers
underneath the things.
We try to listen to the dealersand the problems that they have
and respond to that.
Talking about parts and I'm gladyou brought it up because it is
challenging for a lot of ourdealers because we're asking

(12:18):
them to give me the serialnumber when they put through a
part request or a warrantyrequest but there's a very
specific reason for that andit's because we want to
continuously improve.
With that serial number we canfind out what truck it was on
what DC it came from.
We can find out where it wasbuilt, what time it was built,
what team built it, and ifthere's continuous problems

(12:38):
there, we can go fix thoseproblems so that they don't
happen again.

Speaker 1 (12:42):
I don't think a lot of rental dealers actually think
about that, and not in a badway.
I just don't.
You know, it's just one ofthose things.
What do you need to get to thewarranty department?
What do you need to get thatpart?
I need a serial number, I needa model number.
This is what I got going onright Description.
But to say that we're tracingit back to its origins to make
sure that you know, maybe thatpallet or maybe that sector,
maybe that timeframe, maybe thatstaple gun, whatever the case

(13:05):
is, had an issue, we can goafter that, I don't think a lot
of people really think about it.
I didn't really think about ituntil you just said that.

Speaker 2 (13:12):
No, and that's why we always try to improve.
That's why we've got some ofthe highest quality In
mattresses.
Our quality is.
Our out-of-the-box quality isless than 0.3% quality problems
that we have, and it's becausewhen we do have a problem, we
react very, very quickly to it.
We do not want a problem tohappen time and time.

Speaker 1 (13:32):
It shouldn't happen time and time again, right?
Well, I tell you I'm glad yougot there, because when I first
started with Ashley, there wasno betting.
This is something that came on,and now, from what I understand
, ashley is what?

Speaker 2 (13:44):
the third or fourth largest bedding manufacturer in
the US, I believe right nowwe're fifth, fifth, okay, we've
been the fastest growing andcontinue to be the fastest
growing mattress company that'sout there.

Speaker 1 (13:53):
I can tell you right now, every time I see the
Sauerbecks, they have a biggerlist in the front Every time I
go there.
At first it was just a few andthen there was a lot.
Now there's foam and there'sintroduction, and there's
bedding, and there's coil andthere's hybrids and there's I'm
in the box.
There's so much going on.
Let's get to the start.
Where is Ashley started?
In Arcadia, wisconsin, correct?

(14:13):
Yep?
So there it goes.
They start there.
How does it transition fromthere to where you're the fifth
fastest growing beddingmanufacturer in the US?
That's not easy.
We're talking about ceiling,we're talking about Serta, we're
talking about the S brands,because everybody has an S brand

(14:33):
.
So how do you get there?
How does Ashley say we're goingto go into bedding, and not
only are we going to go intobedding, we're going to be a
player.
We're not just going to besomething for the rental
industry that you can throw outthere and this is going to be a
cost-effective, economicmattress that you can compete
with.
But you can say we've got10-inch, 12-inch, 15-inch foam,

(14:57):
we've got bedding, we've gotstuff that you can put in a box.
When it first came out, itwasn't.
Now I don't think we receiveany beds from anybody that's on
the box anymore.
It's pretty much the way itgoes.
It gives us a way to stack inthe back room.
The logistics are completelydifferent, a lot cheaper.
It changes the pricing on themat.
How do you get there?

Speaker 2 (15:15):
We've had a number of new introductions over the
years.
We started with occasionaltables, then we got into
bedrooms and the millennialpiece that became the 1980s with
the black shiny lacquer andeverything.
Then we get into stationary,then we get into motion, then
we've gone into accessories andso forth and mattresses was an

(15:36):
evolution out there.
Mattresses is a big businessout there and it's a very
profitable business.
That's why in a lot of largetowns you'll find a mattress
dealer almost on every corner.
That's out there and it was abig miss for us not having it.
It was a big opportunitybecause it just marries
naturally onto the bedroombusiness that we have, one of

(15:58):
the advantages that we have.
People joke that Ashley is alogistics company that just
happens to sell furniture.

Speaker 1 (16:06):
Yes.

Speaker 2 (16:07):
And it could be.
The epitome of that is ourlarge trucks that are painted so
beautifully in black with theAshley logo on side of it, and
any dealer can go on to AshleyDirect and they can build an
order that has two bedrooms, onesofa and three mattresses on it
and when they just don't needany mattresses they can just

(16:28):
have a sofa and a bedroom.
If all they need is mattresses,they can put three or four
mattresses on it and it becomessuper flexible for that dealer
to just order what they needwhen they're able to need it.
And you get out of.
A typical mattress company mayneed a six-piece minimum in
order to move a truck on there.
You don't with Ashley, right.

(16:49):
As long as you have the wholething, put one mattress on it
because that's all it needs,right?
In addition, a lot ofmattresses since we're talking
about it can go FedEx right.
I've got a dealer up north inthe Midwest and he tells all of
his stores if you just need onemattress, use the Asher Express
thing, order it, asher Expresswill have it to you in probably

(17:10):
72 hours and then you have itfor that customer.
You don't have to worry aboutdoing everything else.
So all of that flexibility.
So, going back to your originalquestion about mattresses, one
of the things that we do is, ifwe're going to do it, we're
going to do it right and we'regoing to do it.
We're going to do it right andwe're going to build it so that
it's got the most flexibility.
So we made a decision If we'regoing to do it, we're going to

(17:30):
spend the money on the machinesthat roll the mattresses and put
them in a box, because it savesspace in our warehouse and it
saves space in your warehouse.
Plus, it's easier for thedelivery guy to put it up on one
shoulder, walk it up threeflights of stairs and set it up
for them.
We weren't going to go intoanything that's full size.

(17:52):
In addition to that, we wantedto roll our own coils.
We wanted to be independent ofhaving to buy from anybody else.
We buy our own metal.
We roll it into our own coils.
Now we put we pour our own foam.
After the um, I call itsnowmageddon in Texas.
Uh, back in Valentine's day2021, we had the huge snowstorm

(18:14):
and everything that froze all ofthe refineries.
Everybody was at a loss of foamagain.
Continuous improvement.
We weren't going to have thathappen again, and so company
went out, put the made theinvestments to go and build our
own foam pouring plant in Verona, mississippi.
So now we pour our own foam, weroll our own coils, we um, we
still source our call thembuckets or covers from overseas.

(18:37):
Bring those in and we've got adynamite product out there.
That's the fastest growing.

Speaker 1 (18:45):
And I, you know, just just so you know this.
So the last RTO show was doneat the RTO World, right, and so
I was out there and I wastalking to the Sauerbecks and
actually it kind of goes back alittle bit to the night before.
But they're telling me thisprocess that we're getting the

(19:05):
mattresses out there, we'rebuilding it, we're making a
quality mattress here, shippinghere and one of the things that
I've got to say, because youmentioned it and I don't want to
overstep that and not say itagain there is always a shipping
minimum To be able to get thatlow, to be able to say I need

(19:26):
one or two or three things.
That is such a game changer,because sometimes you really
just don't have enough to makethat order.
And what the worst part of itis is with some of the showrooms
, because right now inrent-to-own, what do we have?
We have a decrease of the salesfloor.
It's because we're starting tofind out that the stores of the
80s, 90s and the early 2000s wedon't need 12,000 to 15,000

(19:48):
square foot showrooms.
So they're coming down right.
Then they start hitting the8,000.
Then they start hitting 6,000.
Right now I'm hearing that 3,700is probably the good point.
Right, 3,750, maybe 42 is alarger showroom, right?
Well, with the decrease of theshowroom, you have a decrease of
the backroom, and so you don'twant to call somebody and say,
hey, there's a $1,500 minimum.
Even if you say, hey, itdoesn't matter, you can order

(20:10):
whatever but there's a $1,500minimum.
And then I've got to ship itthrough a carrier.
I know I always tell my.
It's always a funny thing,because anytime I see an Ashley
truck by one of the stores, I'mlike, hey, are, are you guys
getting a delivery today?
Because they do stand out, theydo get delivered pretty quick
and one of the things that Ilove about it that you, you know

(20:31):
again, I don't want tooverstate this too much, but I
don't think it's ever enough.
If you don't need it, you don'thave to get it.
And right now, I think dollarsis where it's at.
Right now our advertisingdollars need to go further.
Right now, our show dollarsneed to go further.
Right now our showrooms need togo further and we're cutting
down space.
So how do we do that?
We don't want to over stack inthe back where I've got to order
two or three pieces of productthat I just don't need and I'm

(20:51):
hoping to sell.
Right, and I'm hoping to sellit.
Maybe it's a great seller,maybe it's not, but either way
I've best position, becausegetting it to a showroom is one
thing, getting it to a home isanother.
Keeping it as a warehouse we'renot warehouses, we're back
rooms.
Right, we need it to befunctional for things that are

(21:15):
coming back, things that need tobe serviced and go back out.
That is a huge advantage.
But I have also heard thatAshley is a logistics company.
Right, when you say that nowyou're carrying, you know, all
of these products, including nowa very successful line of
mattresses, how does Ashley doit so well?
Where does the whole logisticsthing come from?

(21:38):
Where do we say, okay, I've gotthree or four major players out
there and they're not reallypaying for the logistics like we
are.
We're not paying for the samething, right, so I can do a deal
or I might be able to squeezeout a segment, but you do have
to have a minimum because I'vegot to throw that on a carrier.
And then Ashley says you knowwhat we're going to do away with
that.
We're going to have a fleetconstantly on the road.

(22:01):
Not only that, I mean, you canhonestly see it they're black
trucks.

Speaker 2 (22:04):
You cannot miss beautiful too.

Speaker 1 (22:06):
And they do it consistently.
How does Ashley do that?

Speaker 2 (22:12):
Yeah, so it goes back to um.
It goes back to our founding Um, ron Wannick, when he built the
company.
He's got a saying you build thebarn before you build the house
, and so when Ashley was started, all the money and all the
investments went back into themanufacturing plant and went
back into logistics.
We've grown to 500 tractors andover 5,000 trailers.

(22:36):
We have a fleet of drivers wecall ambassadors.
They're the best in thebusiness.
I'm sure I'm talking to peoplehere who have had plenty of
ambassadors drop off loads andthese guys are phenomenal.

Speaker 1 (22:49):
They're like the Kevins and the Larrys.
I've seen drivers.
Of course they're not stuck toone rental company, so I've seen
them cover the Tampa Bay areaand I've seen guys kind of
follow me in the sense that hey,you're over here.
Hey, you're over here, You'rewatching this story, doing this.
Guys have been here for 10, 15years.

Speaker 2 (23:06):
They're phenomenal and we keep on investing in them
.
We keep investing in theambassadors, we keep investing
in the logistics, because thatbecomes our face to our dealers
out there, right?
So you interface with a salesguy like myself, or you
interface with Ashley Directonline and order points, but
ultimately, when that blacktruck comes up and pulls up

(23:26):
behind your store, there's anambassador that's talking to you
and knows you, and, heck, halfthe time they know who your kids
are and everything else, andthey'd be able to deliver.
And I'm not saying we don'tever use a third party.
There are some cases we have touse a third party.
We prefer not to, though,because we do such a good job on
that, and it goes back again towe're building the barn, we're

(23:47):
building the infrastructurebefore we try to go and do other
things, and logistics was a bigpart of it.
We did not want to be at themercy of having to farm out that
critical piece right tosomebody else, and so we take it
in-house, and we do that quiteoften.
We take it in-house because wefeel we can do it better than
you know paying for that servicefrom other people, and I think

(24:09):
we do.

Speaker 1 (24:09):
Is that Ashley's golden goose getting it all
in-house?

Speaker 2 (24:13):
I think so.
I think so.
We feel like we're going to putthe money into it.
We're going to invest it,depending on whether it's
manufacturing or it's robots orit's logistics or whatever it is
.
We want to sit there and do itbecause we feel like we can do
it better than if we pay for itand we can do it cheaper.
If anybody's ever been up inArcadia and toured our case

(24:35):
goods plant up there, there's agreat part of the tour where you
talk about our tool shop andyou go why am I going to go see
a tool shop?
And there's a guy in there thathas been building drill bits
for years and it goes back to weused to buy the drill bits from
a drill bit sales guy and thedrill bit sales buy would come
in here and sell us a new drill.

(24:56):
Think about all the holes wedrill and all of this stuff.
We're just plowing through drillbits.
And a guy came back and says Ibet if I had a couple of
machines I could do our owndrill bits and we don't have to
pay Mike Kays that come in hereand sell me $5 drill bits.
I can make drill bits for $0.25.
And so it's like oh all right,so we bought the machines and

(25:20):
started doing our old drill bitsand saved all that money and we
can customize the drill bits towherever we want to.

Speaker 1 (25:26):
So when you're talking about bringing it
internal right, so we'recreating new brands, we're
creating this bedding sector andwe're making sure that
everything is delivered in-house.
We're developing the foam,we're making our drill bits.
So then the question comes inand it's always a big question.

(25:47):
It's quality.
I know that if I go to, let'ssay, one of the mattress
companies on the corner, I go inthere, the guy's going to know
all about it, he's going to tellme, but he's not selling one
brand, right, he's selling methree or four different major
brands that have five differentmodels.
But I do know that over theyears they've stacked up pretty

(26:08):
well.
So Ashley's now a new contender.
They're at number five.
But how does a quality and Iknow I'm asking an Ashley
individual but how does aquality stack up?
How does the warranties andwhat Ashley is doing in, let's
say, something new like thebedding industry?
How are they doing it?
How does a warranty stack upand how is a quality versus some

(26:29):
of the other guys?

Speaker 2 (26:30):
I would stack our quality up against anybody
that's out there and you seepeople that are out there up
against anybody that's out thereand you see people that are out
there.
We're building everything in,you know pocketed coils, latex,
memory foam, whatever the pieceis.
We're building all the qualitythat anybody else is doing.
It's just we're doing it allin-house versus other people
that may be having to buy thisor buy all those types of things

(26:53):
.
We look at all the quality thatgoes out there.
We try to compare ourselveswith all those types of things
and at the warranty.
We stand behind that.
We've got a 10-year limitedwarranty, just like everybody
else does out there.
We just feel like we do itbetter.
We've got a better product.

(27:13):
Is the Sierra Sleep product gotthe same name brand that Sealy
or Serta does?
Probably not, but we feel likeit's got a lot more advantages
to the dealer and to thecustomer that they don't need to
spend extra money for.
You know all the marketing thatgoes into Sealy or all the
marketing dollars that goes intointo Serta.
You can get all of those with aSierra sleep.

Speaker 1 (27:34):
Well, I, I know that I've, that I actually own a
National Bed myself, so I'm nottrying to tout it.
Thank you very much.
It's one of those things, likeyou always say back in the day
Go cars.
For instance, when Kia firstcame out, it was new on the
market and it sold.
But people found out veryquickly that it wasn't the old

(28:01):
Chevy that it used to be.
It wasn't the old Ford, itwasn't the Nissan, it was just a
car that got them from point Ato point B.
As the years have progressed,they've gotten better.
They're actually, I think, thefourth, third or fourth largest
car dealer right now Because ofthat.
They've gotten better.
Their quality control hasgotten better, their longevity
has gotten better, and soAshley's been doing this now for
75 years.
They've got warranty undercontrol, they've got logistics
under control.

(28:22):
They're producing these newitems that are vastly growing.
How do you do your qualitycheck in-house?
Do you have people justdedicated to doing that?
Because I've seen some things,but I wanted to get it from you.
Does somebody walk?
Do you have people that arejust dedicated to hey, that's
not wound tight enough.

(28:42):
Hey, this you know you can'tnot wear gloves in this area.
Like, how does that?

Speaker 2 (28:46):
work.
So not only are we dedicated toit.
When you go into one of ourmanufacturing plants, quality
control is crawling all over theplant right, every single
manufacturing line.
There's quality people on thatline making sure at the end that
it's before it goes, you know,into the tube that's going to

(29:08):
wrap a sofa.
It's all quality checked right.
We also, as people are puttingit through, they're checking for
quality right.
So if it gets halfway down theline and somebody sees something
wrong, they can stop the line,go back and fix it before
everything else, and they'reactually incentivized to do that
right.
They're incentivized to lookfor products, problems and
everything else.
We have gosh, I lose track ofthe number I think 350 robots

(29:34):
that we have right now, and therobots are there not to take
jobs from any Americans.
Matter of fact, we hire.
We've got 13,000 Americans thatwe employ right now in the
United States.

Speaker 1 (29:46):
So with that type of investment there's got to be
quality control.

Speaker 2 (29:51):
Yep, so the robots.
The good thing about the robotsis, if they're putting staples
on the back of a sofa, they'reputting staples on, you know, on
a, let's say, a drawer.
That's going together.
Those staples are going to goat the exact same spot, at the
exact same length, at exact sametime.
Every single time they're goingto put glue at the same piece.

(30:12):
So, again, if we have a problemcomes back through a warranty
claims or a bunch of warrantyclaims, we can go back to that
robot.
We can adjust how many staples,how much glue is being put on
there, so that quality is alwaysincreased.
If you hire people to do that,which we have in the past and
still do on some lines theymight be putting some guy may be

(30:32):
putting six staples, some guymay be putting 10 staples.
Some guy may be putting sixstaples, some guy may be putting
10 staples.
Some guy may be putting theglue, uh, more heavy or less
heavy, and the the robots helpus control that right, and it
all goes back to having aquality product that that our
dealers and ultimately ourcustomers can can count on.
And so I don't know if thatanswers your question, but

(30:53):
that's I mean it's all relative,and that's kind of what I'm
understanding.

Speaker 1 (30:58):
Every time we see a problem, it sounds like Ashley
is looking to find a way tocorrect it.
So let's say that I'm a rentaldealer, I have something that
comes in and I'm a small guy.
Right, I don't mean that theindustry is small, but you know
what?

Speaker 2 (31:13):
Ashley's showrooms are large in size right To say
the least yes, I could probablyput four or five rent-owned
showrooms in there at least,right?

Speaker 1 (31:22):
So we're smaller dealers.
Something comes in and, forwhatever reason, it's not right.
Whether it was logistics,whether somebody hit it, bumped
it, whatever the case is, whatdo I do as a dealer to say, ok,
something's, something's notright.
How do I go about that?
What's the right way to say?
Let's get this fixedimmediately, right out of the

(31:42):
right out of the gate.

Speaker 2 (31:43):
So I think the answer to your question is it depends
on how astute you are withAshley Direct.
We make Ashley Direct.
We try to improve it everysingle year.
We try our best to make itintuitive so that they can sit
there and find clicks to be ableto try to do that.
Um, so if you need a part, youshould be able to go on to
Ashley direct, request a part,get the serial number you know,

(32:04):
request what you need andusually within seven days seven
to eight days you'll get a.
You'll get most parts through aFedEx.
That can solve your problem.
If you need help with a warrantyor something like that, again,
we have essentially 450marketing specialists across the
country.
You should be able to give thema call and sit there and say,

(32:26):
hey, what do I do in thissituation?
That's what they're there for.
They're not there for, and wedon't call them sales reps
because they're not there tojust solve the sale and then go
away.
They've got to be there toservice the products because
everything's going to have aproblem out there.
So if you've got a problem, youneed a part, you need a
warranty.
I would ask you first, try togo on ashleydirectcom.

(32:48):
Second, try to sit there andtalk to your marketing
specialist.
If you feel uncomfortable, theycan always reach out to me and
I'm happy to help them, guidethem through that process and
make it easy for them.

Speaker 1 (32:58):
I know a lot of people who have been in the
industry for a while, but indifferent capacities.
So sometimes you come in andyou've been doing it for a while
.
Now I want to be a part of thedeal.
I want to be a part of theindustry, not as a driver, not
as a GM, not as an RM.
I want to own my little pieceof what's going on.

(33:19):
So you get some people and I'veseen people who have been
working for the industry and Ihave seen people who own now
part of the industry.
Josh Sysek, he's one of them.
He started out in the industryworking and he said one day you
know what?
I think I can do this.
How do you, how does somebodygo to Ashley and say hey, mike,

(33:40):
you're, you know, you're thevice president of rental.
How do we start doing businesstogether?
Where would I go for that?

Speaker 2 (33:46):
Gosh it's.
It's really easy.
We and again you know we'vebuilt, we've built our company
on I call it the backs of smalldealers and especially small
rent-to-own dealers, and sowe're always looking for new
people that want to get in thebusiness.
Because there's so many peoplethat, hey, I started a business

(34:07):
20 years ago and my kid doesn'twant it and I want to retire,
and they end up selling it tosomebody bigger and so on and so
forth, and you lose that smalltown, feel that's out there.
So if there's somebody out therethat wants a piece and they
want to open up their ownbusiness and put their own
shingle out there, the easiestthing to do would be to contact
myself and I'll give you mycontact information and I can

(34:29):
get you in touch with amarketing specialist in your
area that can come by and giveyou a form to fill out.
It's very simple.
I think it's a one page formthat we just need to get your
information who you are, whereyou're going to be, so on and so
forth A little bit of financial, business or financial numbers
so that we can get you set upand we can start trading,

(34:51):
probably within 30 days.
Typically, part of it is.
We just need an opening orderto you know kind of get this
thing going.
Is there any?

Speaker 1 (34:59):
particular part of the country that's harder to get
to.
Does Ashley deliver everywhere,because I've spent all my RTO
career in Florida?
I know guys in mid States, Iknow guys in Northwest, but I
don't know Midwest.
I don't know.
The excuse me, far West Like.
Is there any place that Ashleydoesn't get to in the United?

Speaker 2 (35:14):
States.
We deliver to 95% of the UnitedStates every week.
There are some rural areas upin the Northwest that there's
just not the collection ofdealers there that we can get a
whole truck pulled together.
But yeah, the number is 95% ofthe country we can hit in seven
days, wow.

Speaker 1 (35:37):
Okay.
So how does delivery in, like,let's say, places that are not
so direct, like Puerto Rico?
I know that there are storethat rental dealers out there.
I know Rent-A-Center does verywell out there.
I know a couple other ones areactually going out there.
It's actually more of anintroduction to rental than
there's ever been, and I'm surethat they're using Ashley
Ferenger, but that's not close.

(35:57):
So how does that work?

Speaker 2 (35:59):
Yeah, so Puerto Rico is actually an export for us.
While they are a United Statesterritory, it's still considered
an export.
So a lot of times what we'll dois we'll build containers and
we'll ship those containers downto Puerto Rico.
We have other retailers inPuerto Rico that will get much
more consistent containers outof Vietnam and we can do that as

(36:22):
well, and that brings us to thewhole container business.
So far our conversation has beendealing around our seven
domestic DCs, but we also havestrong warehouses overseas and
we service a lot of ourinternational partners out of
Vietnam directly through thecontainer business.
So that's a new part of thebusiness that we have not

(36:46):
explored a lot with rent-to-ownin the United States, but it's
certainly a movement right nowthat there's a lot more
rent-to-own dealers that havefound containers and have found
the savings associated withthose.
And just to let you know thatAshley does have a very vibrant

(37:06):
container business.
We feel we've got someadvantages over our competition
and we're happy to visit withany dealer on those and we're
happy to visit with any dealeron those.

Speaker 1 (37:17):
So Ashley's probably been one of the biggest
contributors to Rent-to-Own thatI can think of.
I mean there's others, but Imean Ashley's been around since
day one for me and coming intothe year 2000,.
It was like there was Ashleyand there were others, and I'm
not saying that one has stayedand one hasn't.
I've seen some brands come andgo, not for any one particular
reason.
Jvc was one.

(37:39):
They were a brand that wasthere all the time.
Philips was another one.
Philips Magnavox, that wasanother one.
They're not there.
Ashley's been here throughout,right.
So you've seen the ups anddowns.
You've seen what's going on.
Very recently we've seen somefurniture companies actually go
under that were pretty decentsize, and when I say that I'm
not saying the people who makeit, I'm not talking about the

(38:00):
Ashleys and stuff, but I amtalking about Bad.
Cox was here Years I mean over100 years a solid company.
Now they're not.
Cons are really really big andfruitful thing for years and
years and then now they'recutting back to almost nothing.
Right now there's othercompanies that are kind of
taking it on the chin.
What does that say right nowabout the furniture industry?

(38:23):
What does that say about whatwe're going through right now
and in these times.
And and how does Ashleymaneuver that?

Speaker 2 (38:30):
Yeah, it's.
It's very sad and you know Ihate it when anybody struggles
and has to go under.
The pandemic was horrific in alot of different ways.
It was very good to our rentalcustomers because it put a lot
of money and put a lot ofpressure on the suppliers who

(38:51):
were struggling to find workersat the time because, you know,
just like people couldn't go towork, you know, in Tampa Florida
, they couldn't go to work inEckerd, mississippi, and so it
was hard for us to keep up withthe demand that was going on
with the pandemic.

(39:12):
But that pulled forward thepandemic, pulled so much
business forward from 22 and 23that it's putting the big strain
and that's what happened isthey pulled all this furniture
business forward into thepandemic and then put us in a
trough where people didn't need.
I mean, how often do you need anew bedroom set?
Right, and so we're seeing thatOn top of it, right, and so

(39:33):
we're.
We're seeing that on top of it.
In this year, particularly, theinflation has just, has just
killed it.
You know, ubs put out a report,I guess last month, and it
talked about the bottom 20percent of income earners in the
United States.
Their dollars were 18 percentless than it was before, and
it's because their dollars beeneaten up with.

(39:54):
Rent is eaten up with food,gasoline, other types of things,
and so, whether that customeris a rent to own customer or not
, I don't have any money tospend in the money they did.
They did have.
They already bought furnitureand so that strain, that cons,
bad cock, american freight theyall lived off this lower end

(40:14):
customer, right, they didn'thave any money to spend and so
their business dried up and theyended up driving up.
I haven't seen it hurt rent toown that much because we have a
different financing opportunityfor these customers, but that
low end customer has really beenhit.
Now that's the downside reallybeen hit.

(40:38):
Now, that's the downside.
The good side is, since we gotthrough the month of October and
we got through the election,things really have looked up.
For fourth quarter.
The consumer confidence at aUniversity of Michigan hasn't
been this high in a very, verylong time.
Ubs is projecting some verynice high single digit increases
for 2025.
I think most people are havinga good fourth quarter right now

(41:02):
and so there's starting to be alot of enthusiasm for how 2025
is shaping up and I think thathopefully that's good for the
dealers out there.
It's certainly good for Ashleyand hopefully our customers feel
better.

Speaker 1 (41:14):
Well, I can tell you right now, as I was having these
conversations at the RTO World.
One of the bigger questionsthat I did have was how do you
feel about an election year?
We got some mixed results, butI think a lot of them were
saying the same thing.
It's usually a little bit moredifficult in an election year
where you don't know where it'sgoing.
So not necessarily every fouryears, but if you have a solid

(41:34):
contender coming in off thepresidency in their four years
and they're going to, you knowmore than likely they'll win a
second term.
Sometimes you just don't.
Sometimes there's a lot ofturmoil for whatever reason,
whether it be health or nothealth, whatever the case is and
so now you have a differentcontendership where you're like
it's going to change.
We just don't know whichdirection it's going to change.
So whether it's the eight-yearroll where you have somebody has
two terms and they're soliduntil the end, or you have a

(41:57):
single four-year term wherethings just have to change, that
election year becomes verydifficult.
Nobody knows how they're goingto do the finances for that year
.
They don't know what's going togo up, what's going to go down,
what the new laws are comingwith, and then you have to wait.
Election is in November, so whatdo you do?
You have to spend the entireyear hoping that you're going to

(42:18):
make the right decisions forthe right type of laws and
legalities, and everything thatcomes along with it.
If somebody wants to change it,and things are difficult to
ship, ship in, ship out.
Whether it's a possible or animpossible, or it's just a
harder to do, you don't knowuntil at least something happens
right.
And then you pray that yourcandidate is going to stick to
whatever they decided to say.

(42:39):
And so you know it's been acrazy year, but I have seen
since the early part of Novemberit does seem like it's getting
a little bit.
I think everybody's like okay,let's let our hair down, it's
behind us, let's move forward.
For whatever reason that mightbe, let's just move forward, get
to the next year and figure outhow we're going to do that.
And it's made for a moreblossoming November, hopefully

(43:00):
an absolute great December, andbe able to kick that off the way
that we want to, in the sensethat we want everybody out there
to be happy, to be secure and,of course, their dollars to go
further.

Speaker 2 (43:12):
Yeah, looking back on it, it makes perfect sense.
Summer is always rough and rentto own, especially with a
neglection year where you had noidea which way it was going to
go.
And then all of a sudden, youget into's up there and you know
, and then boom, you got theelection.
You had the result.
Everybody sits there and go.

(43:43):
You know whether your side wonor your side lost.
At least you figured it outRight.
And now you're excited aboutokay, now I can go forward.
And so now people, there issome excitement, there is some
going in, and I love what yousaid.
Let's hope we have a dynamiteDecember and then you go into a
presence day and hopefullypeople feel good about that.

Speaker 1 (43:58):
Yes, yeah, well, you know.
Talking about advertisingdollars, I'm glad you said that
you know over a billion dollarswas spent this election system,
right?
I mean, there was a lot ofpeople that they were trying to
reach out to and it kind ofsucks the air out of the
advertising, right, I mean, it'shard to compete with a billion
dollars, especially when it'sone person.

Speaker 2 (44:17):
That's just on one side, that's just one side too.

Speaker 1 (44:20):
So now that that's all gone.
Talking about advertising, Isee Ashley on all of our things,
right.
I see Ashley at everything thatRent to Own does.
I see Ashley when it comes tolike RTO World and the Trib and
I see all that.
But what type of advertisingdoes Ashley do outside of that?
Is there any advertising thatthe rent-to-own sector part of
Ashley does to get itsadvertising out, or is it just

(44:45):
all internal?

Speaker 2 (44:45):
It's mostly internal.
But advertising marketing, yougot to have that now.
I mean the days of again.
I've been with rent-to-own 13years.
I joke around you, you, justyou.
The days of I, you know, againI, I've been with rent to own 13
years.
I joke around with all myfriends Like I'm still the baby
of the group and, uh, cause,every time I ran my rent to own
guys I've been here 25 years, 30, you know, Kent Clark will say

(45:08):
he's 40 years.
Okay, Great, Um, but you gottahave advertising dollars out
there.
Um, people aren't walking intothe stores anymore, right?
The pandemic has changed that.
And so, as far as marketing,just like all of our dealer
partners, they have to have astrong marketing thing.
We, as Ashley, do as well,which is what most people see

(45:33):
almost 1,100 Ashley Home Storesacross the globe or internally,
where we're trying to market tothe rent-to-own dealers and
supporting them and so on and soforth.
Yeah, marketing is a big deal.
Making sure that your namestands out, One of the things
that we're very, very proud ofand it doesn't come easy, it
takes a lot of time, a lot ofeffort, a lot of dedication to

(45:57):
the right product and the rightquality and so forth is we're
the number one recognizedfurniture brand in the world
right now.
That's something that doesn'tcome easy and something that we
work very hard to protect,because we don't want to.

(46:18):
We want to make sure that westay number one.
We want to make sure that inpeople's eyes, when people talk
about furniture, Ashley comes upfirst.

Speaker 1 (46:26):
Well, I see that Ashley's been is always forward
thinking.
Right, we've got to rent ourown sector.
We start building new brands orbuild new items.
We're coming into the furniture.
So then now the question's gotto be what's coming up?
You knocked it out of the parkwith the bedding.

(46:47):
We've got that locked down.
It is getting better and betterand better, and the guys were
telling me how we've got thisfoam thing and it's getting
great.
It's happening.
I mean, we can make themattresses quicker, better and
ship faster, and so they'reexcited about that.
They're all behind it.
So what's next?
How do you top that when you'reat right now, ashley is sitting

(47:08):
in a position where, as far asrent-to-own is concerned, you're
almost everything we can go toas far as furniture.
You've got the bedding, you'vegot the case goods, you've got
living room sets.

Speaker 2 (47:18):
In March of this year , we um, we purchased a company
resident home, and resident homeis is most, uh, most people
will know resident home from thebrand Nectar and uh, nectar

(47:40):
DreamCloud, and they have acouple of other, um, higher end
brands and that's that is crazyexciting, because this is, this
is someplace that we've neverbeen before and you go.
Well, mike, what do you mean?
You've never been?
We just talked about 30 minutesabout mattresses.
Well, the thing is that ourbrand is we build a great

(48:01):
product and we sell to a lot ofdifferent people Typically, it's
a little bit older person,right?
Especially in our home storesand one of the things that we
looked at is how do we get andhow do we add freshness, how do
we add newness, how do we addwhat's the next thing that we do
?
And um, our company spent, Imean, years researching resident

(48:27):
home and who these people wereand what their, what their
secret sauce was to to making itwork.
And it's, it's an incredibleproduct.
It's an incredible um business,um, different way to do
business, right?
So instead of just throwing amattress on the floor and
putting a bolster and a head, afoot protector on it, they have
an entire social media strategybuilt around social media

(48:50):
Facebook, instagram, tiktok, allthose different things and the
algorithms that these peoplehave created to understand that
younger customer right.

Speaker 1 (49:03):
Mike, are you going to be doing TikToks?

Speaker 2 (49:05):
No, I am not going to be doing TikToks.
I did go through a little bitof time where I was doing TikTok
shots on the weekends, whichwas kind of fun.
But that's behind me as well.
But there is.
It's incredible.
I mean, we're talking about ourkids.
So I've got a 23 and a26-year-old that are on Snapchat
and Instagram and so forth.
Nectar is built for them becausethey'll you know, nectar will

(49:29):
pick up on their use ofInstagram and where they're
going on TikTok and all thesedifferent places and then find
the right people that are goingto be in the market for a
mattress and they have these,almost these custom videos that
they're putting in front of themand all of a sudden, they're
going to want to spend money ona Nectar brand versus a Sierra
Sleep or a Sealy or a SIRT orsomething else, because we've

(49:51):
built that brand up in there andit is extraordinarily exciting
for a company like us to grab onto another company like that.
And it's a big company.
I mean it's a large company.
We had to double the size ofour mattress facilities in
Saltillo just to be able to takeon the production facilities.

Speaker 1 (50:10):
Help me out.
When you say double, what'sdouble the size?
I mean I could say double thesize of this room and be okay.

Speaker 2 (50:17):
I'm going to get the square footages wrong on this
but literally our facilities inSaltillo.
We had to cross the railroadtracks and buy the empty
furniture factory behind us anduse that facility to start
building Nectar.
We had to double our size justto be able to try to do this and

(50:38):
it's a very, very exciting timefor us.
So if there's any partners outthere that haven't heard of
Nectar, haven't heard ofResident Home, I'd encourage
anybody to call your marketingspecialist or call me and we'll
walk you through thoseopportunities, because it's a
different way to get a newcustomer into your stores.
You may be in a situation whereyou're looking for that new

(51:00):
customer and, rather than paying, trying to get new customer
acquisitions is so expensive.
This is a way that you putthree mattresses on your floor,
you can get on the dealerlocator and the system, the
algorithm will work and it'lldrive new customers to your
store New, younger customers,right?
So you drive one of my kids at23 or 26.

(51:23):
Think about the lifetime valueof that customer if they come in
and they rent a Nectar mattressfrom you and then they get to
the payment at the end and youhit them up and they want to do
it again because it was such agreat experience.
And rent to own is a fabulousexperience because you've got
all the flexibility without anyof the commitment out there.

Speaker 1 (51:40):
You know, when we did our first RTO show live and I
had Charles Smitherman, the CEOof April, there we were talking.
One of our guests was JoeLuxick from Magic Rentals and he
was describing the differences.
And I specifically want to dohim because I mean, he's a
director of sales, he knows whathe's doing, I mean, he knows
his business and one of thethings that he was talking about

(52:01):
.
The thing he was talking aboutwas the difference between the
buying habits of what we havenow compared to people of maybe
our generation and older are sodifferent and so, when he was
talking about it, there's a lotof things that go into it and
being available to where theyare, which is social media,
which is podcasts, which isconnected to their hip, versus

(52:24):
the legacy media that wemight've been grown up used to,
where it's on the screen and wewatch it for a couple hours
right there.
Well, they're watching it onthe go, they're watching it in
snippets, they're watching it insmall bites, what they like,
who they like, and they're goingto stick with those people.
And if you don't resonate, itis just as easy.
You can't change a cablecompany, but I can certainly
swipe left or right or go to thenext video, and you know what?

(52:44):
I'm okay with that person now.
So I'm going to stick there andgetting to those, those brand
new customers, getting to thepeople who need it in the way
that they consume.
That is absolutely important.
I mean, it's so important.
Now, talking about that, I meantalking about the little guy,
talking about, you know, thehometown person that's going to

(53:05):
buy from Ashley.
Every time that I turn around,I see Ashley on a board for
something that goes on a rental.
There's something you guys havedone an amazing job of being
part of the rental industry.
One of the things I wanted toask, though, was being such a
big part of the rental ownedindustry and being part of of
what we do in thoserelationships like we've talked
about, how does Ashley gothrough, and is there a

(53:29):
community type of involvementthat Ashley has when we're
talking about how involved inthe relationships that you have
with the Rantone community?
We are community driven.
We love to be a part of thecommunity.
Is that something that Ashleydoes.

Speaker 2 (53:42):
Absolutely, and I think it doesn't get enough.
We don't spend enough timetalking about it.
So I really do appreciate yourquestion.
The amount of effort that weput into our local communities
is, I think is, tremendous, andwe give back to the rent-to-own
industry because they'vesupported us for all those years

(54:03):
.
And again, we consider ourdealer partners family almost is
because you want to be able tohelp them with their charities
and so forth.
So, yeah, we have, we it's.
It's incredible.
I'm going to get these numberswrong, but you know, we, we
plant trees for Arbor Day.
We and forgive me, I may bereading some of the stuff here,

(54:26):
but we recycle over 78,000 tonsof wood.
We recycle 12,000 tons ofcardboard, 792 tons of plastic.
We plant 6,000 trees throughour employees every Arbor Day.
Looking back to sustainability,we've got a very, very
aggressive solar panel projectsacross our manufacturing that

(54:48):
generate over 25 millionkilowatt hours of electricity
Wow.
So we're very sensitive to that.
We support localapprenticeships and internships.
We've provided $3.5 million inscholarships to high school
seniors.
Wait, wait, wait.

Speaker 1 (55:07):
I didn't know that.
I had no idea that Ashleyactually gave scholarships.

Speaker 2 (55:12):
Absolutely no kidding .
Yeah, a lot of times there's abig miss in the United States
for high school seniors gettinginto STEM sciences, and so we
encourage that because, again,if you think about the
manufacturing capacity of us,we're the largest manufacturer
in the United States offurniture, whether that's
upholstery in Ecru case, goodsup in Arcadia.

(55:36):
And we need engineers tocontinually design and engineer
stuff and re-engineer it,because once you're done, it's
not until you're done.
You've got to always improveupon it.
We had the situation last yearwith the tip over.
We had to get our engineers andsay, okay, how are we going to
engineer this stuff?
So it passes tip over with youknow, and more than passes tip

(55:57):
over pieces.
So, yeah, so $3.5 million inscholarships to STEM high school
seniors, we spent $3 million ona mobile skills lab that goes
from school to school, uh,getting people excited about
this.
You know we um, we sponsorlocal robotic um classes
throughout the united states aswell.

(56:19):
Um, one of our yearly um thingsthat we do every august is we
sponsor sponsor Ashley for thearts.
Last year we gave over $750,000to over 70 nonprofit
organizations Wow, and ifanybody ever has a chance to be
in in Arcadia, wisconsin, inAugust this coming year, please

(56:41):
come by.
It's absolutely fabulous,coming from Texas in August when
it's 105 degrees, to be able togo up to Wisconsin and have
72-degree days and 60-degreenights and listen to a bunch of
great bands and we sell a lot ofbeer for people to raise money
for all this stuff and it's agreat time.

Speaker 1 (57:01):
Well, you're going to need to let me know about that,
because I think the show mightactually show up in August next
year.

Speaker 2 (57:06):
Well, we'd love to have you up there.
That would be great.
That, because I think the showmight actually show up in August
next year.
Well, we'd love to have you upthere, that would be great.
The last thing I do want tomention is we've talked a lot in
the show about mattresses.
We've given over 170,000mattresses through our Hope to
Dream to children that neededsince 2010.
170,000 mattresses to kids thatare in need, and we regularly

(57:35):
give like I think we gave 1,000mattresses to people in North
Carolina after Helene rippedthrough them and so it's a big
part of our company.
It's a big part that doesn'tget the notoriety that it should
get Because, again, you've gotto be able to give back.

Speaker 1 (57:47):
You know, 170,000 is an awesome number and it's a
disheartening number.
It's awesome that AshleyFurniture can say we have done
this, we've been a part of it,and this is how many people, how
many homes and sometimes evenmore than that, because you have
a husband or a wife or otherpeople that share you know
partners that share a mattressbut then to say there's 170,000

(58:08):
needs out, there is.
You know, it's just difficultto say, wow, we have, we even
scratched the surface.
We haven't even scratched thesurface.

Speaker 2 (58:15):
There's so many in, in our, our dealer partners.
They see it every single day.
They see it every single dayand that's, and that's why, you
know, rent to own has gotten soclose to my heart is because,
you know, gosh, when I joined 13years ago it was, you know, it
was a dirty window business.
Well, it's anything but a dirtywindow business.
Right, it may not be in thenicest part of town, but it's

(58:36):
helping the people that need tobe helped most.

Speaker 1 (58:39):
It's closest to where they live, right.
We don't need them to go to thenext mall where everything's
nice and shiny and you're notwhere you really belong right.
Everybody needs to shop there.
That you know the people whohave needs, who can't go out
there and spend $1,000, $2,000right off the bat, who can get
what they need immediately andnot shipped from two states away
.
I can get it from 22nd Streetright down the way.

(59:01):
That's really what matters.
And then, talking about that,because I love the idea of being
as green as possible, when youcan say that you're the largest
manufacturer, there's also a lotof room to say other things.
Right, we also have a lot ofwaste.
We also have a lot of trucks onthe road.
We also have a lot of thingsthat are on the other side of
that, and to be conscious oftrying to take care of that is
huge.

(59:22):
Beginning, as this all happensand you're getting these, you're
implementing new ideas, we'restarting off new products.
We're making sure they'remaking it there, they're getting
to the stores, we're workingwith rent to own, on the
shipping and making sure thatyou don't carry what you don't
need.
Did that all come from ToddWinnick?
Did that come from Ron how didthat does that come into?

(59:45):
Where they go into and they say, hey, I need to get a guy like
Michael Case to come in here andtalk to me.
How do we get this done?
Because it's generational right.
I mean they're a family-ownedbusiness and I don't know if a
lot of people know that.
I mean it started with Ron,right, and then now Todd kind of
runs the company.
Is that right?
Is it his son or his brotherthat also works?

Speaker 2 (01:00:09):
So Ron started the company 75 years ago.
Todd took over the presidentand CEO.
I think it was in 2002 and it'sjust, it's rifled, it's just
gone.
It's grown exponentially.
It's still a private company.
It's a very, very large privatecompany and I think it'll
always stay a private company,because being private gives us

(01:00:31):
the ability to do things thatpublic companies can't.
We're not at the mercy everyquarter to come up with a
certain amount of sales or acertain amount of gross margin.
We can put money where it needsto be.
And you're right, he's got hisson, his nephew, his niece.
All have strong, strongpositions.
And plus he's got otherrelatives that work for the

(01:00:52):
company and they all are.
They still all have the samepassion for the business and
doing what's right for thecustomer.
And the customer has alwaysrewarded us, and so we're always
going to give back to thatcustomer and that's whether it's
a dealer or whether it's thatend customer, we always and
we're dedicated to it and Idon't think it.

(01:01:13):
You know, did Ron start thespark and Todd started the spark
for all this type of stuff?
Yeah, but he's also hired somany people around him that have
that same.
Again, I'm from out of thecompany, but I'm, I'm, I'm an
Ashley loyalist.
I totally have have.
I appreciate being part of thecompany and part of the movement

(01:01:34):
that he's got, because he'salways doing the right thing,
whether it's for the environment, for this, for the customer,
whether it's for his employees.
You know, I mean it'sincredible.
Many of our dealer partnerswatching I'm sure have taken
some tours in Arcadia orwhatever it is and it never.
I have so much pride whenpeople walk through it because

(01:01:55):
they'll they'll meet a lot ofour workers in these factories
and these workers will say, hi,I'm, you know, barb, and I've
been on this line for 30 yearsand I've got 25 years and I've
got 13 years, right, and thesepeople have they, they, they,
it's you know they built aliving around it and they throw

(01:02:17):
their love into all this stuffand you know it never ceases.
I mean people will sit there andsay, man, the one thing that
blew me away was just the prideof ownership of these factory
workers and and hopefully I Ishow the pride of of ownership
of Ashley too, because it's it'sbeen great for me for 13 years
and I hope I have another 13years ahead of me.

Speaker 1 (01:02:38):
Well, I think Ashley's doing a great job.
That's one of the reasons why Iwanted to have you here,
because I wanted to pull backthe veil.
I think a lot of people knowofher, but they don't really
know what's in it.
I agree, they don't understandhow much goes into being the
number one industry for theirRTO dealers.
What it takes to come up withthe idea is to get it to your
door without having theseshipping minimums, making sure

(01:02:58):
that the warranties work, makingsure that it's innovative from
the beginning to the end.
And the question is how do weget better?
Well, you've said it, Do theservices through the warranties,
through the calls, through theserial numbers, making sure that
it's in town, making sure thatwe have something going on in
the US and something outside ofthe US, having shipping being a
part of a family business thatonly isn't part of the family 75

(01:03:20):
years, but giving back to thecommunities that you're in.

Speaker 2 (01:03:22):
I think it's great, yeah, and don't forget about the
product too.
I mean, the product is whatdrives everything, and we've got
to stay in front of where thecustomer well, the Wayne Gretzky
quote, you know, right, we'reskating to where the puck is
going and product is always.
You know, we call product theoxygen of our company.
Right, great product will giveyou more oxygen, bad product

(01:03:45):
will give you bad oxygen, youknow.
And so you know, we're veryexcited that we've got some
exciting things in our lineupright now.
We've got some super excitingthings coming for 2025 that
we're excited to show people, um, either in Las Vegas or in
Atlanta, the trip show and um,you know it's, it's one of the
things that that we love, andhopefully, when we get a chance

(01:04:05):
to show you guys, we show youwith the amount of love that we
really have for the product.
And it's a very exciting timeright now.

Speaker 1 (01:04:13):
You know something you said I wanted to mention
before we close it up.
You had mentioned somethingbecause I don't think we talk
about the laws enough.
You had mentioned the tip over.
Can you elaborate a little bitmore on that Because I remember
it and I remember going.
You know, I remember seeing it,I remember a lot of
conversation was about it, butthe tip over was for furniture
to not be a tip over hazard.

Speaker 2 (01:04:40):
And how did?
How did Ashley tackle that?
So we tackled it head on right.
So we worked closely with thegovernment, we worked with the
agency that was enacting that,and we made sure that not only,
you know, we had our say in whatthe tip over law turned out to
be, but we also reacted to it,and it was not easy, right it it
?
We had to change a lot of ourmanufacturing, both in States

(01:05:01):
and overseas, in order to reactto that.
But, like like most people, youhad to add weight to a chest or
to a dresser that was over.
I think it was 29 inches tall.
Anything over has specificpieces, and so you had to go
back and re-engineer.
You had to re-engineer thedrawers, you had to re-engineer
the back, you had to re-engineerthe whole thing while keeping
it, keeping the quality, and wethink that we not only did we

(01:05:26):
exceed the expectations of thelaw out there, but we also made
each case much more sturdy,right.
So you know, racking issomething that a inexpensive
chest used to have.
There's no racking anymorebecause you've got a much more
stable back that you have onthere.

Speaker 1 (01:05:39):
Was APRO part of that when you were going to do the
legislation?
Did APRO play a part in thatwith you?

Speaker 2 (01:05:45):
Absolutely they did, absolutely did, and they've
always been terrific partnersfor us and um, which is why we
like, you know, we like having aclose relationship with a pro
and close relationships withtrip, because, um, they support
our rent to own dealers and, youknow, without the rent to own
dealers, you know we would bewithout a a big chunk of our
business and we're veryappreciative of it.

Speaker 1 (01:06:06):
Well, we're appreciative of Ashley.
Ashley has done amazing thingswith the rental industry, as
they always have for years andyears.
Now, 75 years going on andabove, michael Kay's here as the
vice president of rentaloperations, right, and so, as
he's part of the rentaloperations, he seems to know
exactly what he's talking about,right?
And if anybody starts out, likewe discussed before, how would

(01:06:27):
they reach out to you and getstarted?

Speaker 2 (01:06:28):
They can always reach out to me.
My email address is very easy.
It's mkays atashleyfurniturecom.
Anybody's welcome to call me onmy cell phone, which is
972-489-4345.
I don't have anything to hide.
All I want to do is have peoplehave great experiences with
Ashley and with their customers.

Speaker 1 (01:06:48):
Well, I think that that's what they're up for.
I love it.
Guys, I want to tell you, asalways, you know we always talk
about rent to own and everythingthat we do is how to further
that business.
It's always something good tosee when you're able to cut back
and turn back the veil ofwhat's going on in Ashley
Industries and find out they'regreen, they're lean and they're
mean.
To get it to you guys, we doappreciate it.
Listen.
You can find us, as always, onfacebook, instagram, linkedin.

(01:07:12):
You can always find us onyoutube, where you can clip and
subscribe.
Mike k is our guest.
We do appreciate it.
And I want to tell you guys, asalways get your collections low
to keep your sales high.
Have a great one.