Regency Inc.

a start-up inside the established local retailer and maiden family business, Summervilles,’ Inc. With zero employees, capital, or inventory, Regency supplied one black leather swivel arm chair to Summervilles and grew from there. Over the past 17 years Regency has only had three years of non-double digit growth, and one year of negative growth, which puts its average yearly growth well above the industry standard. Regency continues to expand and increase its product offering to serve additional customers’ needs. Regency came from the heritage of a family business that did not know the meaning of “that can’t be done.” The Summervilles’ business was started in 1945 by matriarch Norma Summerville during an era when women did not own businesses. In the late 1950s - early 1960s, Summervilles’ was the very first building in what was then Akron’s Opportunity Park. In 1960, the company received the industry’s most coveted prize, “The Guyers Award of the Year,” for creating a retail space where shoppers no longer had to walk up to a counter and hand the clerk a list for him or her to gather, but instead could walk up and down aisles with a cart to shop for their own supplies. This was revolutionary then. Regency carried the tradition on in 1997 when John ‘Skip’ Summerville began to sort out the specifics of what is now a worldwide supply chain without speaking a word of Chinese or knowing where any factories were located. Today Regency manufactures in China, Vietnam, Malaysia, the Czech Republic, Canada, and The United States. Regency holds several trademarks, copyrights and a patent for a truly modular conference table, allowing the table to expand or contract to any length and is manufactured from just five components.