Ross Rental Station, a one stop rental store in Lockport

Helping to make any type of party complete is Ross Rental Station in Lockport.

For the past 20 years, John and Natalie Ross has been helping the Lockport community rent various party supplies, along with providing a wide variety of tools and equipment needed for home and construction projects.

John is the second generation to own a rental store. In 1976, John’s father Charles Ross opened a rental store in Clarence, now known as Grand Rental Station.

Both Charles and his wife Judy knew they wanted to open a business, so they decided on a rental store.

John grew up at the store and after attending Ohio University for engineering he began working, selling computer systems. Natalie said he did that for two years, but was always on the road.

That was when his father suggested they open up a second store, and knowing the owner of a building located on Lincoln Avenue, where Rite Aid currently sits, he wanted to do it in Lockport.

“He knew there would be a demand for a rental store,” said Natalie. “So he took a chance and wanted to see if it would work.”

John asked Natalie if she would leave her finance job and run the rental store with him, and they have been doing it ever since.

“I never thought I’d be doing this,” said Natalie. “But it just made sense.”

She said with her financial background and John’s engineering background and knowing how to repair and fix things, it was a great partnership for a rental store.

The couple now resides in Lockport with their children Calli, 12, and Dylan, 8.

“We are really apart of the community,” said Natalie. “We’ve grown to know a lot of people. We’ve also tried to do a lot for the community.”

Ross Rental Station is now located at 6722 Lincoln Ave. It is a general rental store focusing in two areas — tools and party supplies. Natalie said at the store you can rent anything from a 42-foot man lift to a fork.

In tools they carry Bobcats, mini backhoes, scaffolding, ladders, hand tools, carpet cleaners, insulation blowers, a Rototiller for the garden and much more.

For party rentals, their selection includes bounce houses, dunk tanks, a football toss and a wide variety of carnival type games. They have cotton candy makers, popcorn makers, slushy machines, snow cone machines, a chocolate fountain and their newest item, a custard machine, which was the first machine of its kind in the Western New York area.

The store also carries the supplies needed to run the machines, such as snow cone syrup and cones and pink and blue cotton candy sugar.

Ross Rental Station also has tents, chafing dishes, utensils, speakers and several types of tables. They have more than 1,200 chairs to rent.

Most of the pricing of items is per day. Tools can be rented for as low as a four-hour period.

Natalie said on party supplies they are lenient and allow people to pick up items the night before so they can set them up.

The store does offer the option to set up a tent or other large item for the customer.

Currently, Ross Rental Station is open from 7:30 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. Monday through Friday and 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. Saturday.

For more information about Ross Rental Station visit www.rossrental.com or call 439-1161.

For more local news and sports, go to www.metrowny.com.

Contact Rikki Cason at rcason@metrowny.com.