In an era where the connection between financial institutions and the communities they serve can feel distant, Gesa Credit Union stands out with a deeply rooted commitment to local impact through everyday banking. At the forefront of these efforts is Brandon Allison, Assistant Vice President of Community Impact, who has dedicated 16 years to building programs that empower members to make a difference. Â
Gesa Credit Union, a community-focused institution since 1953 with 33 branches across the Northwest, operates with a simple yet powerful mission: to make a positive impact in the communities it serves. One of the primary ways this is achieved is by enabling members to contribute through their everyday banking, a concept brought to life through the innovative affinity card program.
The affinity card program allows members to choose from 65 different card options, each linked to a specific organization. A portion of the dollars spent using these debit cards goes directly back to the selected organization, effectively turning a member’s debit card into a continuous fundraiser. This model has proven highly engaging for members, who appreciate knowing their funds are supporting local causes they care about. Data shows that affinity card holders use their cards more frequently than standard cardholders, underscoring their engagement and passion for the program.
Brandon Allison highlights several impactful examples of the program’s success. The Forever Green affinity card, for instance, supports the Arbor Day Foundation’s reforestation efforts in the Northwest, helping to plant thousands of trees and restore land affected by wildfires. Another significant component is the Local Hero Card program, which supports organizations serving firefighters, law enforcement, educators, healthcare workers, and veterans. Over the past 10 years, the affinity card program has awarded over $3 million back to various organizations, including more than $1.8 million to local schools, providing crucial funds for educational experiences and professional development opportunities for students. Â
Stories like the funding of state-of-the-art simulated lung machines for respiratory therapy students or the purchase of a drone used to rescue a stranded hiker showcase the tangible impact of these programs, all made possible by Gesa members. Gesa actively shares these stories through recognition ceremonies, social media, and video testimonials to demonstrate the real-world difference members are making.
Brandon Allison expresses deep gratitude for the members who participate in the affinity card program, emphasizing that their simple act of choosing a card and using it makes a significant difference. Gesa provides the platform, but the members drive the impact.
To learn more about Brandon Allison, Gesa Credit Union’s community impact initiatives, and the inspiring stories behind their affinity card program, be sure to watch the full video interview below. You can also find more information about the program and how to get involved by visiting gesa.com.
Disclosure: Transcript below is automatically generated
Sarah Cooke 00:00
Hello and welcome to the credit union connection. I am here today with Brandon Allison, welcome,
Brandon Allison 00:07
hi. Thank you for having
Sarah Cooke 00:10
me. It’s great to have you and Brandon is and Brandon is the AVP of community impact for Gesa Credit Union in Washington State. Why don’t you go ahead do a little introduction of yourself, a little bit of your background in the crane. Sure thing, yes,
Brandon Allison 00:25
as mentioned, my name is Brandon Allison. I am Assistant Vice President of Community Impact for Gesa Credit Union. I’ve been with the organization for 16 years now, helping build the programs that we’re about to speak to. But you know, more important than geese or credit union, we’ve been a community focused credit union since 1953 we have 33 branches currently that serve the Northwest, and really, we’ll speak a little about a little bit about it today, but our mission is simple. We really want to make a positive impact in the communities that we serve, and one of the ways that we accomplish this is by empowering our members to make an impact through their everyday banking, which I’m excited to share how we do that
Sarah Cooke 01:01
today. Yeah, yeah, and that’s awesome, and it’s so in touch with what I imagine your membership is this, what I contacted you about was the Forever green affinity debit card. So tell us a little bit about that.
Brandon Allison 01:14
Sure they the Forever green affinity card is part of and one single card within our affinity card program. So I’ll start with the affinity card program and then lead down to the Forever green card. So the affinity card program really is a way to have our members join our mission of making a positive impact in the communities they serve or we serve. They can select one of 65 different card options and that the card, they select, dollars that they are. Dollars go back to the organization that’s reflective on that card. Essentially their debit card turns into a continuous fundraiser for the organization of their choice. So going back to the Forever green card, that card is is here to support the trees and reforestation within the Northwest. So we have found that our members really have a passion for making sure that that we have a healthy reforestation and replacing wildfire acres that have burned. So these this particular card goes back to support the Arbor Day Foundation. So just this year alone, our members helped us plant over 73,000 trees, and that refurbished 393 acres of land in Washington State.
Sarah Cooke 03:05
So, okay. And so you mentioned member interest. How’s that? How are they accepting the news this new card as well as the other affinity programs?
Brandon Allison 03:34
Yeah, we find that our members are very engaged in this program. There’s, you know, when credit unions at the heart of credit unions. We want to make sure that we tell our members in our communities that their dollars are staying local. And in our opinion, nothing is more local or nothing is more engaging than letting our members decide which organization they want to support. And so we do find that our members are very engaged in this program. They are excited to swipe their debit card knowing that it’s a fundraiser for a school, a local hero organization, or even the Forever green debit card, you know, and the data has shown that our affinity card holders, on average, swipe their card more than the standard image holders, and so they are certainly engaged, but more importantly, they love to hear The impact that it’s make. We that they are making. We’re out there telling the stories that their funds are supporting a local school district, their funds are supporting healthcare workers. Just yesterday, we went and told the story of how, through our Local Hero Card program, the funds are awarded through a grant process, and last year, we awarded over $480,000 in grants to local hero organizations. And yesterday, we got to see one of those in action. It helped to fund new technology for Respiratory Therapy at a local college. They were able to buy a simulate, simulated lung machine that. Can help show students that are in respiratory Respiratory Therapy what they’re anticipating when they’re out in the field post college after earning their degree. It simulates different lung diseases so they can see exactly what their patients are going to be experiencing. And that machine is state of the art, and with they would not be able to have that without the funds that our members helped earn. So that was pretty impactful to see on how, you know, the dollars that are earning are making a difference in the community.
Sarah Cooke 05:31
Yeah, I’m particularly supportive of that. My husband was in the hospital with pneumonia earlier this year, so they definitely, he definitely, I guess, benefited from something like that. So that’s great. And how about talk a little more about the return to the community? You talked about the trees and the HERO Program. Are there other things that help the community that you all can put numbers to? Yeah,
Brandon Allison 06:00
without question. So the affinity card program was established in 2015 and it really was designed to help, you know, have our members be part of our mission, and just through everyday banking tools, the concept was created within two school districts were a part of the initial launch of the program. So our members at that time had two schools to choose from, but it’s grown through the years to the point now where we have 26 different school districts on board. We have, and that’s across the Northwest. We have local hero organizations that we support through our local hero cards, because, you know, that’s one to be consistent in every community. There are local heroes in every community that we serve, so that’s the best way that we can provide consistent support to every community, but those local hero organizations include firefighters, law enforcement, educators, healthcare workers and veterans. So through the program, through 10 years of the program, now, we’ve awarded over $3 million back to all of those organizations. The great thing is, is that with local schools, you know, we now have awarded $1.8 million back to local schools. The schools get to decide how they’re going to make the impact for that particular year. We do not say it needs to go to particular programs. Our only ask is, is that it benefits the lives and educational experiences of students. So the schools get to decide where that those funds make the most impact for that particular year, one of my favorite ways is when it supports professional development. And so a lot of times, students do not have the opportunity to explore professional development opportunities outside of the classroom, because there’s out of pocket costs associated with that, and so these districts allow some of these funds to support student professional development experiences, traveling to conferences, being a part of DECA or FBLA competitions that they wouldn’t get to experience that without these funds, The Local Hero cards with through these funds, we’ve actually awarded over $400,000 annually and an average of 40 grants per year. And with that one, it’s those grants are awarded based off of a grant submission process. We do have a committee that reviews them, and they select the best grants of the year on how we can spread those funds evenly across all local hero organizations. You know, I mentioned the healthcare workers one. But you know, with the law enforcement, there’s a great story that emerged from that. So we have a local law enforcement agency in western Washington. They needed funds to purchase a new drone device. They wanted to the drone to be able to put eyes on situations prior to law enforcement officers entering that just to get a better understanding of what their officers were going to be entering to ensure the safety of those officers, and, more importantly, the safety of the community. Well, the first time that drone was used was actually to rescue a high car off of a stranded hiker in a mountain that got lost, and they used that drone to put ice on the hiker. There’s a two way communication, and they led that hiker to safety. So it was used for things that they run in didn’t originally intended for. But again, you know, our members have helped us earn, through the course of 10 years, over $3 million to just truly go back to their community, whether it be a school or a firefighter station, veteran organizations, all of that stays local, and that’s what’s most important to us. Yeah,
Sarah Cooke 09:31
and as you’re doing these things, I think it’s great that you’re telling me these stories, and it sounds like you all tell the stories in the community as well, because brand awareness is such an issue for credit unions at large. I mean, some do an excellent job of it. Sounds like you all are, how do you share that in the community? I know that’s not You’re not marketing, but how do you share that in the community?
Brandon Allison 09:51
Yeah, well, we share that through various ways. This every August we award in alignment with the school year. We award each school day. Strict the funds that our members have earned for them for that particular year, where we hold recognition ceremonies and just really thank the educators for being a part of the program, give them support as they’re entering that school year. And then we give we give them presentation checks, we give them images of their cards that they can promote to their communities. And we put that up through social media pathways. We also for the local hero organizations. Those are really deep stories, and so we really try and find the best of the best stories and go out and capture that through video. We want to show our members that it’s not just not just images that are not just showing images that are making the difference, but hearing it from the local heroes themselves, and then saying, like I mentioned the other day, that professor is saying, I would not be able to have this tool without the support of this grant program. And so it’s really capturing that through video and local hero testimonials, and broadcasting that either through local media outlets or through our social media platforms. Mm, hmm,
Sarah Cooke 11:08
yeah, that’s excellent, awesome. I love what you guys are doing there. And so, who’s your partner and debit card, debit card program. And you know, how do you, how did you work together on this? That’s a lot to manage 65 different cards.
Brandon Allison 11:26
You know, I have an affinity debit card team that really manages the partner side of things. So we have a team of people that are dedicated to supporting just the school districts. So the partners for school districts are really internal. Their mission really is to work side by side with our school districts to ensure that they maximize the relationship. We want our partners to promote that to our community, because there are no earnings cap on these cars, the more community members that are swiping for students, the more dollars that are going to support student education. So for the for the school districts department side remains internal, and it’s our team working side by side with the districts for the local hero cards that really is connected back to our the Gesa Community Foundation. The board of directors with the Gesa Community Foundation reviews all of the grants that are submitted, and they select the ones that we feel can make the best impact in these communities. So those are then awarded through our Gesa Community Foundation, the Forever green card is the one that really has the true partner in this and so with that, as we mentioned, it goes back to planting trees across the Northwest and helping reforestation efforts. The best organization that we could find was the Arbor Day Foundation. And so we work in partnership with the Arbor Day Foundation, and we were contacting communication with them throughout the cadence of the year or calendar year, saying, All right, here’s how much our members have earned so far. And we’re giving them updates on dollars that have accrued so that we can when we award that. You know, prior to Arbor Day, they have a kind of draft of how many dollars and how many trees that our members have helped earn, and then they identify projects that we can support for wildfire efforts and making sure that the dollars that go back to the Arbor Day Foundation stay within the Northwest and not nationwide. So it’s, it’s the partners that we partner for the partners that we have are really dependent upon the card. School districts are, you know, internal local heroes awarded through community foundation and Arbor Day is our partner with forever Green Party. Okay,
Sarah Cooke 13:33
awesome. Well, I appreciate everything you’ve told, especially those great stories. I love the the drone, one in particular. So at this point, I always give my guests a final thoughts. What would you like to say based on everything we’ve discussed today? Or something else? Yeah,
Brandon Allison 13:52
my final thought, really is thank you to all of our members that have an affinity card. We couldn’t do this without you. You know, we provide the platform for them to help us make a difference, but there are members of the ones that are swiping their cards, and there’s nothing more powerful, like everyone has a debit card, everyone has normal daily living expenses, but for our members to take the time to select something that they’re passionate about, to ensure that the dollars that they’re spending on their debit card go back and remain Local, make a difference in the students lives. We couldn’t do it without them, and so we appreciate all of our members that have an affinity card. If anyone is interested in learning more about this program, they can visit gesa.com and you know, they can help us make a difference as well. One last thing is that I mentioned the grant process for those that are doing this within the northwest, the grant application process is opening next month, in June, if you are a local hero organization, or know a local hero organization that includes firefighters, law enforcement, educators, healthcare workers or veterans that could use some. Your funding to support an underfunded program or provide some tools to protect these local heroes that grant application process opens next month in June. It’s very simplistic process. Just tell us what the need is, dollar amounts and provide some proof of what exactly the proof of the cost of associated with this and the grants will be reviewed by our Community Foundation, and we will award those this coming September.
Sarah Cooke 15:26
Awesome. Well, thank you so much. I appreciate it. Have a great day. Brandon,
Brandon Allison 15:30
yeah, thank you for having me. Sarah, it’s very nice to meet.