Our Company |
All companies have stories. Ours starts with
success.
In 1955, gasoline cost about 20 cents a gallon, cars sprouted fins, Jim
Henson created the Muppets, Rosa Parks refused to move to the back of
a bus in Montgomery, Alabama, and Elvis Presley was Billboard magazine's
newcomer of the year. Other newcomers to the national scene that year
were McDonald's, Kentucky Fried Chicken, Disneyland, Legos and H&R Block
-- destined to become a leader in financial planning and mortgage lending,
and, of course, "America's largest income tax service."
Taking the advice of clients.
Still,
1955 wasn't the first year tax returns were prepared and filed
professionally. Two brothers named Henry and Richard Bloch
had been offering tax return preparation as a free, extra
service to the customers of their United Business Company,
a firm that offered bookkeeping and management services. United
Business Company had been in business since 1946. By 1954
the brothers felt they were spending too much time preparing
tax returns. But in January 1955, they followed the advice
of a client who worked for the Kansas City Star, and ran two
ads in the newspaper, offering to prepare individual tax returns
for $5 each.
Although
Henry Bloch will tell you today that he and Richard thought
there was no future in tax return preparation itself, the
urging of a client was all that was needed. The rest is history.
In that one year, H&R Block produced volume equal to one-third
of the business done in the preceding nine years by United
Business Company. Professional tax return preparation was
born with a flourish.
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