In 2011, Brad Kniep started Morton Rentals in Morton, Ill. In 2015, his business expanded with the help of partners to take over American Rental Centers in neighboring Peoria Heights, which they renamed Peoria Rentals. This year, in celebration of the company’s 10th anniversary, the team rebranded the operation with a new name — American Rental for the tool side and Create A Scene Events for the event side — a brand-new location in Morton and a whole new way of doing business.
This transformation, which has been years in the making, will help eliminate logistical and branding issues while offering state-of-the-art aspects that were all inspired by fellow American Rental Association (ARA) member operators, Kniep says.
“When we started as Morton Rentals, we offered tool as well as event rental. Then we had the opportunity to purchase American Rental Centers out of Peoria, which had been in business for 50 years. We thought at that time it would make the most sense for us to go ahead because American Rentals, which offered both tool and event rental, had the dishes and linens that we were planning to jump into. Our Morton store had all the tents, tables, chairs, etc. We changed the name of our newly acquired location to Peoria Rentals because that was in Peoria Heights and we already had the name Morton Rentals established. We moved our event sales center to the Peoria Heights location. That worked really well, but it came with its own struggles,” Kniep admits.
The stores were only 20 to 30 miles apart, but customers, seeing that the stores had different names, began calling both locations for quotes for events. “That resulted in the locations bidding against each other,” Kniep says.
Then there was the logistics issue. “We found out that about 73 percent of all our orders had inventory that was from both locations. We were doing daily store transfers, sometimes two or three times a day, just to get all the inventory. We did that for about three years and realized that we had a problem that wasn’t going to be solved unless we had all event departments in one facility. We had our eyes out trying to find a piece of property that would allow us to have one location for party and event. We finally decided to build a new facility in Morton,” he says.
However, they realized that just having plans to put up a new building might not solve the branding confusion. “Both Morton and Peoria would house tools. Only Morton would have event. But Peoria Rentals — our sales center — was the flagship for our event rentals. We felt like we had to put the sign on the building in Morton as Peoria Rentals. We already had tried to create a little bit of separation from the event side to the tool side, but we decided that our next step was to rebrand our entire company. We adopted American Rental as the tool center. As of Jan. 1, the event center became Create A Scene Events. Create A Scene Events is an existing business we have partnered with closely over the entire 10 years we have been in business. Since they had the same passion for team culture and serving our communities, we decided to make that a formalized partnership. They are physically in Morton at our new facility,” Kniep says.
So, with the new names in the works, plans for the new facility got underway in 2019.
“We originally planned a 40,000-sq.-ft. building,” Kniep says. Then the coronavirus (COVID-19) hit, altering those plans.
“We committed to the land, which is right along the interstate with the highest traffic count south of Chicago, to build our new facility as our existing property in Morton was sold. We had a little more than a year to vacate from there. When COVID hit, early on nobody knew what to expect. At that point we would have been rental homeless in a year if we did not build or find another location. Since we already had the land, we decided to change our 40,000-sq.-ft.-single-phase plan to a 50,000-sq.-ft.-two-phase plan. The first phase of 25,000 sq. ft. covers what we absolutely need. We drew the plans up for the expansion in the original drawing and got approval from the city. So whenever we decide to start the addition, we will just get the building permit. This will allow us to be ready for future growth,” he says.
Construction on the 25,000-sq.-ft. building started Sept. 
15. “We built most of the building ourselves,” Kniep says. “We paid a company to erect the steel structure, but we pretty much did the rest of it ourselves. This would not have been possible at all without our incredibly amazing team. We spent a lot of our time working on this while getting through COVID. This building is shared by American Rental and Create A Scene Events.”
The new location, which was completed in early November, boasts some very unique features — all inspired by fellow ARA members.
One of the most unique aspects Kniep added to the new facility was a three-lane drive-thru for equipment rental.
“I had read a story in Rental Management a while back about an ARA member who had a drive-thru warehouse. That always intrigued me. That was the first time that idea was born in my head,” Kniep says.
That idea gained traction after the company implemented curbside service during the height of the pandemic for its tool side.
“We did curbside pickup. It was a disaster. We would have 10 cars out front. They all had signs to call. We were short-staffed, trying to run paperwork out for them to sign and trying to answer the phone. But we learned that when a customer calls and no one picks up the phone immediately, that customer becomes ticked and thinks he is being ignored. I thought about the value a window could provide. That thought was backed up by looking at those who go through the drive-thru lanes at McDonald’s. There might be 15 cars in front of you, but you don’t get mad. You figure they are busy and when you are next in line you are taken care of. We realized that if we had a drive-thru, it would be a lot easier,” Kniep says.
It turned out to be workable because the company had started doing e-signatures and Web pay. “Our intent is that for every reservation we will send out an e-sign and a Web pay link and tell the customers that as long as they do both of those things, they can use the drive-thru upon pickup. Now, every customer will be able to use it for returns, which will save them time from waiting in line in the store and then go around back. It will help with the whole customer experience. We can still serve people at the counter, but this is a lot easier for people who don’t want to get out of their vehicle. When contactless is important to a customer, we now have the ability to serve them at their comfort level,” he says.
So, in the building plans, Kniep and his team added three drive-thru lanes. “The first lane has a window. Lane two has a speaker. Lane three has a speaker and is designed specifically for trucks and trailers. It is bigger and allows more space for turning around,” he says.
The building also has 25-ft. ceilings, a large showroom, a linen conveyer that hangs from the ceiling, and there is a large pond on the property, which probably will house a fountain in the future.
Kniep's penchant for touring other rental operations proved to be a great source of inspiration for his new building.
“We as a rental company have had a very unique rental experience. We were new and we joined ARA. That was one of the best decisions we ever made because we were able to network with other rental stores. Every time we have traveled, we have toured hundreds of rental stores around the country. I can walk around our warehouse and point to where most of these ideas came from. We borrowed ideas from a little bit of everyone. Even the development of the drive thru has come from relationships forged by ARA,” he says.
Kniep says he owes a lot of the company’s success to all the rental stores he and his team have toured. “We feel like we are on the cutting edge because we have gotten great advice over the years from mistakes that other people have made. When we stack all those mistakes that we heard and all the good things people have told us, that defines who we are. That is how we designed our building — around all those ideas. Those rental operators we met have hel
ped us build this state-of-the-art facility, which we hope is the first of many of its kind that offers a contactless experience and has self-serve attributes to it,” he says.
Kniep also hopes to pay back all the advice he and his team gained from other rental operators by offering their new facility as a location to be toured by others.
“I think we just want to share. We would love to say thanks to all those rental operators who have allowed us to tour their stores and to build our business and the facility we have today. We welcome any new store owners to share our ideas like the veterans did for us. We thank ARA for helping provide the ship to cruise us to where we are at,” Kniep says.