Branching that Blends Design and Functionality for the Future

The role of the credit union branch has been experiencing massive changes. Big banks are mostly pulling back on branching as they continue to improve their technology. In contrast, credit unions and community banks continue to see the value of the branch - but differently. Not only is the technology rapidly evolving, but so are demographic shifts as more employees work and consumers bank remotely. Determining the right location and the appropriate size for a branch, as well as the technology to include in it, has undergone necessary adjustments for the optimal site selection, from the probability of natural disasters to environmentally friendly building options.

Host and Co-founder of The Credit Union Connection Sarah Snell Cooke sat down with Whitney Loe and Jay Speidell of Momentum to discuss the importance of the branch experience even as digital banking continues to grow in popularity. They also discuss how the design of the branch is helping to improve the branch experience, even going so far as to help prevent robberies! Be sure to watch this one: It’s a doozy! —->

Read the full transcript:

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Sarah Cooke 00:41

Hello. Welcome everybody. My name is Sarah Snell Cooke, and of course, I am your host here at The Credit Union Connection. I am here today with these lovely, lovely people from Momentum. On my right is Whitney Loe, VP of sales and partner engagement. Welcome.

Whitney Loe 00:59 Thank you.

Sarah Cooke 01:01
And on the left there is Jay Speidell, who is the marketing manager over at Momentum.

Welcome,

Jay Speidell 01:07

Thanks.

Sarah Cooke 01:09
And so I'll give you each a quick chance to introduce yourselves and Momentum. Whitney, you want to go first?

Whitney Loe 01:15

Yeah, sure. So thank you for having us today, like you said earlier. So I am the VP of sales and partner engagement at Momentum. I've been here about 14 months, but I've been working with Momentum and several different capacities, probably for the last five or six years. So I have a background. Actually. I started in banking, then worked in credit unions and moved over to the partner side, I think in 2015, I started with CU Direct, which is now Origence, and I have made my way here with Momentum. But yeah, I love, I love working with credit unions. It's been a big passion of mine for a long time. I think I really drank the Kool Aid in 2014 during my first crash experience at the GAC. So, yeah, it's been, it's been a great ride. And now I get to work with the the wonderful people at Momentum, so and Jay as our marketing manager, I'll let you tell a little bit about yourself, but he and I work together every day. We have a lot of fun.

Sarah Cooke 02:12

All right, go for it, Jay.

Jay Speidell 02:14

Yeah, I've been the marketing manager at Momentum. I've been here just about nine years, and I do a little bit of everything. So, you know, if you got a proposal, I'm the one who put that together. You know, I write all our content. I, you know, manage the websites. I do marketing strategy. I work a lot with the sales team, with Whitney and Mark and Bob and yeah, it's just been exciting to, you know, learn about the credit union industry and be able to contribute in some capacity, you know, writing content and, you know, helping people learn.

Whitney Loe 02:56
Yeah. I call him the jack of all trades. That's really what he is. He does everything.

Sarah Cooke 03:00

So it's Jack, not Jay.

Whitney Loe 03:02
Yeah, not Jack, but Jay. Yeah, we would be so lost without Jay.

Sarah Cooke 04:02

Jay, branching has changed dramatically over the last couple of decades. You know, credit unions are looking for smaller footprints and more technology. There are fewer credit unions, a lot fewer credits than when I started, but the same number of branches that are being operated for the most part. And you know, we've got the LEED certification, so the greening of the branch. What are the latest trends that you're seeing in branching?

Jay Speidell 04:38

The latest trends are sort of continuation of what a bunch of credit unions were sort of pioneering several years ago, and it's sort of maturing and spreading throughout the credit union industry. So you've got the changing purpose of the branch, which I'm sure everyone knows about, as more of the branch interactions move from transactions which are kind of expensive and don't bring a lot of value to the credit union towards relationship, relationship based interactions which bring incredible value to both the member and the credit union itself. And this is really the driving force between pretty much every change that we're seeing in the credit union industry. So as more transactions shifted digital, a lot of credit unions were looking to invest in digital technology in the branch, but a lot of it was done initially without a lot of purpose. You know, we've all seen those iPad stations that never get used. So the real innovation is just having purpose behind every decision that's made in the branch. So one of the things that's interesting is that as there's more technology in a lot of these branches, we're actually seeing less technology. So the technology is sort of falling behind the scenes and helping drive these member interactions. So, you know, we're going from the teller stations to laptops that staff can carry around and meet with members throughout the branch. The stations are being replaced with cash recyclers, which, you know, they, they allow the branch to still fulfill its function as servicing transactions, but it just sort of brings the emphasis more to conversation. So, you know, when, when a member comes in, they can have every single need serviced, but they can also, you know, come in and just have a natural greeting and interaction with the staff member and talk about any you know, the more complex issues that they come in with. And as far as the branch footprint, you know, this has dramatically reduced the amount of space that branches need, and so this is kind of what's driving the smaller branches.

Jay Speidell 07:23

So this is what's driving smaller branches. And this has had a lot of different impacts on, you know, branch operations, because while the branch footprint needs are shrinking, the ideal spaces aren't. So we're seeing a lot of credit unions looking to make use of a large footprint, even though they only need a smaller area of that for the branch front of house. And that means, for example, Blue Peak Credit Union, they've got an ITM contact center in the back of the branch. And one of the really interesting things about that is that they're actually rotating staff in between the front of house and back of house. So a lot of their sort of older membership base, they were resistant to the idea of, sort of technology replacing people's jobs, but they were able to cut through that and gain a lot of ICAM adoption just by the members seeing like, Hey, this is the same person I saw at the, in the branch, you know, last week, I'm looking at that same person on the IPM, and they're just in the back of this branch. So that's one way that you know technology and, technology integration has intersected with the smaller footprint and just more possibilities that have opened up due to this what was seen as a problem before, the mismatch between the available real estate footprints in good locations versus the space needs of the branch.

Sarah Cooke 09:01

Mm, hmm, yeah, makes sense. I would love to see where, you know, where the Taco Bell and the KFC, they're together. If they can get, like a Taco Bell in my credit union, that'd be awesome.

Jay Speidell 09:10

Yeah, and we actually have Ocean Air, which was formerly, until very recently, CBC Federal Credit Union. They've actually got a partnership with Dunkin, where, oh, really, that's perfect, yeah, so their Camarillo Road branch is co-located with the Dunkin, and it's been really cool. So they had a huge space, but they're in an ideal location. So as their branch needs diminished, or their footprint needs diminished, they actually, you know, partner with this Dunkin, and they have a shared lobby. So, you know, members and customers of Dunkin Donuts are just hanging out here. And one of the really cool, sort of unintended benefits of this was that they've actually recruited Dunkin customers as staff members. It actually, you know, managed to fill positions from the Dunkin customer base, which has been really cool, yeah, yeah. And we've also seen, you know, as it's, as credit unions merge, we're seeing fewer credit unions of the same number of branches. And one of the reasons for this, and kind of the story behind why there have been so many branch closures over the past few decades, is a lot of the bigger institutions had kind of overbuilt and overextended themselves, and then as mergers happened, these institutions were sort of cannibalizing themselves with market overlap between their branches. So we're seeing the larger institutions reducing their branches, but the credit unions are actually increasing their number of branches because they're looking to, they're in an expansion phase, and they're looking to cover new markets and compete. And you know, when it's two of your own branches in an area, that's cannibalization, but they're placing their branches to compete with the big banks and grow their membership bases. So that's why, that's why we're seeing this sort of paradox of the number or this sort of like, sort of contradicting stories of the, the total number of branches is going down, but the number of branches per credit union is going up.

Sarah Cooke 11:42
Right, yep, very, very cool, especially like Bank of America, they, shutting down all their drive throughs and things like that. Credit unions...

Jay Speidell 11:55

Yeah, they're shutting down all their drive throughs. They're, they're cutting their number of branches. But we've also seen, you know, Chase and PNC have announced plans this year and over the next few years, to actually build hundreds of branches, renovate 1000s more, and they're hiring a bunch of new staff to cover these areas. And what it stems from is demographic changes. So there's a, quite a variety of factors, but one of the biggest impacts was actually the pandemic, and once people could work from home, you know, you saw people who no longer needed to commute deciding to relocate to areas where they could have a bigger home or a more affordable home, and this has caused, like, a dramatic shift in, like, where people are living. So what these, you know, some of these bigger institutions, like Chase and PNC, are realizing, as they sort of shift from shrinking their branch network to increasing it is they're, you know, looking at their predictive analytics models and stuff like that, and they're realizing, like, oh, there's, there is new opportunity in the market that we are chasing. There are new markets emerging, and it's just a excellent growth opportunity for, you know, both these big banks, but if the credit unions can get ahead of them, it's a great opportunity for the credit unions to grow as well.

Whitney Loe 13:28

Yeah, and to Jay's point, today's point about that because, yeah, they're going to do 500 new branches. They're hiring 3500 people within the next, like, three years. I mean, this isn't just, this isn't just a little, this is a lot. And I think, I think the most telling thing, and I think, you know, to Jay's point, what credit unions probably really need to be paying attention to, is the fact that they are talking about going into underserved communities. So that's an area that Chase has not really been going after before, right? But I think they have taken up so much of the market. Obviously, they have locations in all the lower 48 states, so they they're already spread, obviously, across the country, but now they're going to be going into these communities where they're under banked and underserved. Um, and I think credit unions need to be paying attention to that, because that might be an opportunity that we need to continue to capitalize on, because of what our mission as credit unions are and what we do, but it, you know, the whole branches are going away to Jay's point, they're not they're becoming consultative. They're not transactional anymore. But we are going to have more competition in our space, especially with people like Chase saying, Hey, we're going to start going into these underserved communities. We're going to start changing the products that we're actually providing our customer base, and so we should all probably be paying attention to what's going on there. And if we're already in there, that underserved community, and we don't have the footprint like we should, I think it's something everybody should be, should be looking at, because for them to say that's what they're going to do over the next three years, that's a big change. I mean, 500 branches and 3500 people in three years. It's a lot of, yeah, footprint that they're going to be covering. So I think it's we definitely need to be paying attention to to what's going on there, and make sure that if we're not already serving those communities, what can we do to get there as well?

Sarah Cooke 15:17

Yeah, I think, you know, the, the credit unions that are in those communities have such a good connection with them, it would be a shame to lose it to freaking Bank of America or Chase. Exactly, yeah, Jay, I'm sorry you think you were starting to say something.

Jay Speidell 15:36

There's also going to talk about the, sort of the greening the branch and lead, and this is one of those really cool success stories of the credit union mission and other similar purpose driven organizations, with the commitment, the environment that sort of goes unsung. So back in the aughts and the 2010s you know, lead was sort of an expensive add on, you know, finding ways to deliver these projects sustainably, finding, sourcing sustainable materials, sourcing sustainably made furniture. It was a challenge, and it added cost to the, to the projects. But credit unions made this investment. We have so many clients who invested in lead, and it sort of had a major impact beyond those individual credit unions facilities, because what it did was it forced the supply chain to sort of rebuild itself as a more green supply chain. So all the processes and manufacturing techniques that were sort of, you know, more expensive back then, this investment in lead and green technology has caused the cost of these things to go down dramatically. So, you know, the cost of sustainable construction materials, the, the way that furniture is built, even, and casework. So what we've seen is that these credit unions who invested in lead early on, not only did they save money on their you know, you have all the other benefits of LEED is demonstrating your commitment to the environment as well as, you know, lowering your operational costs with utilities and stuff like that. But they've actually managed to transform the entire supply chain so that green building is now the default, and making that extra leap to getting LEED certification is a much lower barrier than it used to be, and it's attainable on most projects. So it's kind of like these were, these were small wins for the credit unions when they achieve LEED certification, but a big win for the environment and the construction industry as a whole, as the supply chain just totally transformed itself to become greener. And we're also seeing a lot of credit unions make this, you know, part of their brand. So one of the really interesting case studies is a NIH Federal Credit Union. So they're serving, you know, the health care workers and the health sciences industry, and they didn't want to integrate, you know, direct connections to the hospital and environments like that in the branch environment, because, you know, you get off work, you're stressed, you don't want to think about your rotations or your clinicals and stuff like that. You want to think about the impact that you've had and the reason why you go to work. So what they've done is they've made their branch, branches sort of like about health and sustainability. So you go in and there's green walls. Everything's sustainable. It has a natural, welcome, healthy feeling. There's, you know, air filtration, healthy, clean air, and it just feels healthy. So they're, what they're doing is they're using the sustainability, sort of show rather than tell what their brand is. And I think that's really cool.

Whitney Loe 19:17

It becomes part of that immersive experience that you hear a lot about today too, right? Like people talk about when you go into whether you go into Target or any other large retailer, and we talk about this now in branches, is you want them to have that experience when they go and they feel immersed in whatever your brand is. And I think NIH did a really good job with with that part, by, by what Jay's talking about by like, when you walk in there, you actually feel something when you're in that branch. And I think that's something credit unions, you know, when you're looking at your brand and going forward, especially changing and updating your branches, how can you take that brand and actually make that a feeling when you go into a location?

Sarah Cooke 19:58
Yes, even in B2B marketing, marketing like I do, I would say, find the feels.

Whitney Loe 20:06

And people do want that. They do want that type of experience. And I think there's several ways credit unions can can look at doing that when as they're updating their branch, you know, footprint and, and moving forward, but yeah, this whole immersive experience, I think, is going to become an even bigger thing as we continue to move forward with different types of branches that we're going to be seeing, I think, throughout the credit union community.

Sarah Cooke 20:29
Cool. And I want to get back to something we touched on a little bit Whitney, is that, that real estate transaction, location, location, location, right? Yes. How have the demands and identification of prime real estate changed?

Whitney Loe 20:44

Well, so obviously we've seen a lot of change through, you know, the pandemic. You're seeing a lot of change, like we talked about earlier, where both banks and credit unions are moving to different communities, smaller communities, or into different areas I never thought about because when this whole work from home after the pandemic, it definitely changed the real estate. But what we're seeing now is people are going back to work, right? Amazon's called everybody back into the office. Dell just went through this whole thing where, basically, either you come back to work or, I'm sorry, you're gonna have to go, you know, find another job. And so, as we see that, so we're going to see a little bit shift right now. Now it's not just work from home, so that's going to, once again, change the real estate footprint. Another thing that we're seeing, too, though, is, you know, with this work from home, that strategy that's been going on for a really long time is people are not moving like they used to, so they're now staying longer in certain communities, so the housing market is not turning over as fast as it was. So that means there's less opportunity to get new members right, to get to bring new members into your credit union, or through your branch bring new customers, you're kind of, you're kind of there. So that's changed the real estate footprint too. But now, really, if you want to put all of that aside, and what we're seeing now, when you talk about location, location, location is, where do you go? And used to you'd get together and you'd all say, Okay, well, you know, there's a Target going in over there. So maybe we need to put, like, you know, a branch over there. There's this, you know, all these going up. Let's go look over there. Now we have this thing called, at Momentum, we call it Momentum Location Intelligence, but we have partnered with Precisely who was a spin off of Pitney Bowes, and we have a true machine learning model that we can go in there and actually look at all of the competition around you. We can take your member data, compare it to the markets and the competition that you have, and we can tell you down to the intersection now where you should put a branch. And it's not just descriptive, it's prescriptive analytics, like we are literally forecasting for you now based on the information we're getting, gathering from you and the millions of touch points of data that we get with our partnership with Precisely, and we can tell you exactly where you need to be. We can tell you, if you shut down this branch and open a branch over here, how long is it going to take you, you know, to recapture that market? We can look at cannibalization. We can look at, do you want to go into an underserved community? What does that mean, an unbanked community? So now it's not just guessing, and so when you start looking at the real estate in the market, it's now saying, You know what, we've sat down, we've done the work, we're producing this market study, and we can tell our, you know, our executives, our board members and our members, that we're going to this next location because it fits into what we're doing as a credit union, and we can prove it with the data. So I think that's going to change our real estate market a lot going forward, because I think it's going to become table stakes, where if you're going to expand your branch footprint, if you're going to go into a new market, or look at adjusting your existing branch footprint, then we can actually tell you how to make those changes, and what that will do for your credit union before you ever purchase another piece of land or a building or start to remodel. So I think we're going to see a big, big shift, and it's actually really exciting, in my opinion, going forward to have data analytics, because it's a big deal, right? Everybody wants data and data touch points are is what's helping drive us forward as an industry. And now we cannot just say, hey, we have AI and data and fintechs, we have AI and data and machine learning in actual physical locations. So that's, that's our, that's our big push right now. And I think we're going to see a big change in our real estate markets for people that are putting in branches based on that.

Sarah Cooke 24:40
Yeah. And that kind of gets to a point, oh, I'm sorry. Go ahead, Jay.

Jay Speidell 24:43

Oh, sorry. I just wanted to add on to that, when we're launching this, like Momentum Location Intelligence product, what we're really doing is we're bringing something in house that we've actually been partnering with precisely, and their director of by, I think it's director of applied location to, location intelligence, Steve Reimers, we've actually been doing this for credit unions for about two decades, and we've got a lot of success stories going back, you know, years of credit unions forecasting where their best branches, will be, putting those branches there and seeing absolutely enormous success. And not only seeing like enormous success, but being able to help inform this, helping use the results of these forecasts to inform how they design and staff these branches. A great example would be the Verity neighborhood branching so Verity Credit Union, they worked with us to develop their next five best branch locations, and they've been rolling that out for think it's about 10 years now, and each, each branch location that they've opened has just been incredible. The performance.

Sarah Cooke 26:03
Yeah, I think that's particularly important. And Verity is a CDFI credit union. It's particularly important finding those areas to serve. Before you know, the Chases get there.

Whitney Loe 26:14

Exactly, exactly.

Sarah Cooke 26:17

And, so getting back to the high tech, high touch kind of thing. Whitney, the, we've, we've seen, you know, credit unions have to balance that, obviously, because they are known for the high touch service. How do you determine the best, How do you determine and deliver the best ROI for a credit union and their members?

Whitney Loe 26:40

Right? So when you talk about high tech and high touch, you're, you're exactly right. I think one of the best ways to deliver an ROI right now is, I think your digital presence needs to match your physical present, presence. And what I mean is there needs to be continuity, right? So if you have this great digital presence online, and, you know, an online banking app and all, and it's just, you know, high tech, high touch, it's easy to do, but you walk into a branch that's not been updated or doesn't match what you're doing in your online President, presence, I think there's a disconnect, and it's been proven that if your branches match what's going on in your digital world, your, your members are going to feel more likely like to continue to bank with you and to stay with you and to feel like their taking care of because you know, when you're only taking care of one part and you're not taking care of the other part, well, the whole point of going into the branches is usually now or what we're moving towards, you have a problem you need to solve, or a goal that you need to accomplish, and you need to have that conversation with somebody. Well, that needs to match what you're doing in your digital world. So I think that's where you're going to get your biggest ROI going in. And then also, when you talk about technology and branches, and back to what was Jay was saying, a lot of it should be seamless, but everybody needs to remember that just because one credit union does it one way doesn't mean you need to do it and you need to even get down for like, drill down even further. You might have one branch that doesn't have the technology of another branch, but there's going to be a reason why. When you're looking at a location and you're looking at a branch, you need to drill down to exactly what is going to work in this branch and in our community, and who are we trying to serve? And I think that's where you maximize your ROI, because you're not one size fits all and one branch fits all. So in my opinion, that's really what you need to be, to be looking at, and that's where, like I said, that's where you're going to draw that continuity, maximize your ROI, but really make your members that are going to come into that branch feel like you understand them and what they're doing. So yeah, that's that's how you go.

Sarah Cooke 28:50
I like the point you made too about being consistent but not identical.

Whitney Loe 28:53

Right, exactly, exactly. And technology is a big deal. But one thing I'd like you know to point out is there's so many other things besides technology that you can do with a branch and put into a branch. And one of the things that we're seeing a lot of, which I think is, I think this is cool to credit unions, you're not going to see banks do this is a lot of them are putting in these community rooms, like within their branch. So if they have a big branch, you know, footprint and space and everything. They're updating their branches, but they're putting these community rooms that anybody can use, so anybody can come in and host a function or an event there. It gives somebody out, you know, one of the members to bring in and hold, maybe they're hosting a meeting for a nonprofit, or whatever it may be. And that adds so much more value than necessarily, just throwing in some, you know, some iPads and, and, like, we'll put up all these, and IT ends are great and everything. But, like, there are other ways to bring value, and people don't, and that actually can tie into even your digital presence, right? Because you're really thinking about the member as a whole, and what do you do, and how can you serve them in even better ways branch?

Sarah Cooke 30:02

Yeah, absolutely so if you have a community partner who you know offers some kind of mortgage deal or assistance or whatever, that's the perfect way, not only to have a partner and tighten that relationship, but then you know you're reaching more of their beneficiaries, their members, if you will, to potentially become your members. So yeah, love it. Yeah.

Jay Speidell 30:25

Yeah. And there's one other thing that these community rooms are really helpful for, is a lot of credit unions are using these as a business incubators. So we're seeing the small businesses come in, and especially credit unions like Armco Credit Union out in Pennsylvania, they're, they're using this as a big part of their business lending strategy. So they're helping these smaller businesses that maybe don't have space yet, or don't have enough space. They're having them, you know, they can come in, use the space for meetings and planning and collaboration, and I think there's one business that's using our Armco's Community Room for their board meetings because they, you know, they've grown a bit, but they don't have a space for this sort of thing. And it's, you know, it's, it's something that credit unions can do to help grow their community and help these small businesses grow. And, you know, just help their communities grow.

Sarah Cooke 31:24

Yeah, absolutely, it's so difficult being being a small business. Well, I totally get that. So, you know, Jay, not to, I don't know, throw rain on this parade, but we've seen everything from terrorist attacks, increased natural disasters affecting credit union branches. You know, most recently had, three, four hurricanes hit in the southeast, down here and so and unfortunately, of course, unfortunately, there's the, I don't say usual, but robberies, they happen kind of relatively frequently across the entire industry. But excuse me, how do you account for those types of things in the building and design of an existing location or a buy, a new location, build, whatever? How do you design the security and technology around that?

Jay Speidell 32:19

Yeah, so I don't want to give the terrorists our secrets, but I can speak on the natural disasters and bank robberies. Um, so we do, actually, in both renovations and new construction, we do harden the branches against the natural disasters that are expected in the region. So for example, I'm thinking off the top of my head River Fall Credit Union down in Alabama, there, and this is a common feature for banks in their branches, in their situation is their safety deposit box, or their safety deposit box room is actually extra reinforced. Both the walls, floor and ceiling to function as a tornado shelter. So, you know, people outside or people in the branch can go there and hide and be safe during a tornado shelter. And we're seeing a lot of, you know, we're doing a lot of that's part of the, you know, basic design conversation in branches in areas that are vulnerable to natural disasters, so that things like, you know, hardening rooms against tornadoes or adding basement shelters or, you know, whatever would be relevant for that specific type of branch. Obviously, a Florida branch isn't going to have a basement.

Sarah Cooke 33:42

Yeah.

Jay Speidell 33:46

And you know, it always goes into, you know, the location selection is Candace location support. You know, we what we do is part of the branching strategy conversation is, we do build a list of requirements at the very beginning. So we do it sort of like this, like Moscow exercise, what this branch must have, should have, could have and won't have. And this translates to a list of checklist items for the real estate search, for building shortlist. So if you know a building property can't check off all these boxes, then it's not going to be considered.

Sarah Cooke 34:26
Mm, hmm, yeah. And, it's like hurricane ties, or, you know, wild, wild fires, not flowers.

Jay Speidell 34:34

Oh, wildfires, that's another, yeah. Out in the Pacific Northwest, we have a lot of wildfires, so we do have a smoke season. So Papo Community Credit Union went for a well certification on their latest, you know, big flagship branch. And basically a part of this was they have, and, you know, a really powerful natural, filtered, or outdoor filtered air circulation in the building that delivers clean air, free of pollutants or any pollen system. So they basically, you know, went, we went for the, really, you know the best options for the, you know, air filtration, water filtration and things like that. So when smoke season rolls through, the air is clear and breathable in this branch.

Sarah Cooke 35:33
...to worry about getting to it.

Whitney Loe 35:39
Gotta get to it. But if you do, the air is...

Sarah Cooke 35:42
You guys can just buy a bubble over the Northwest and have the filtration going.

Jay Speidell 35:49

Yeah? We're all used to like, you know, walking around even like, you know, I go mountain biking sometimes with an N 95 mask on, because I don't want to stay inside.

Sarah Cooke 36:00

Yeah, so with that, love it. I, as you all know, I allow my guests to have final thoughts as we're closing up this discussion today. Why don't we start with you, Jay and then Whitney actually close it up.

Jay Speidell 36:17

I just realized I only answered half of the past questions, so I can also answer. So as far as robbery prevention goes, the main goal is to make the credit union a less attractive target for bank robberies, so it's more of a psychological deterrent. That's kind of like the main deterrent. So you know, if you put yourself in the shoes of a bank robber, you know that's going to be even you know, for a hardened criminal, that's going to be a fearful and nerve wracking situation, and a lot of the designs and branching strategy goes to amplify those fears and concerns that the bank robber has. So one of the things we do is we make sure that the branches have open sight lines so any of the staff members can see the street outside and the sidewalk, any area of the branch, so there's not really anywhere in the branch that someone can sort of like sit and hide and wait or prepare for their robbery. And this even goes to, I don't want to go into too much detail, but I can give one example. You know, the check rate stands. So traditionally, you walk in and there's a check rate stand and it's facing the transaction area. Well, this is actually a really common area for bank robbers to case an institution, and that's actually where they usually write their notes. So one of the things is rotate that around so that the check people writing checks are facing the door, and you deny the bank robber, that opportunity to sort of observe the goings on in the branch without looking suspicious. So if they're standing there and watching things without doing anything, it's going to alert the, the branch staff. So what it's doing is it's, you know, removing their ability to sort of like, hype themselves up, understand what's going on in the branch, and that's just a major deterrence, as well as the universal associate model and having a greeter in the branch. So you'll notice, like a big part of robbery deterrent also overlaps with excellent customer service. So one of the big attributes of a modern branch is that when you walk in, you're greeted by someone who will, you know, ask you how you're doing, ask what you need help with, and guide you to either transaction area or a conversational area. So when the bank robber comes in, they're expecting to, you know, walk in, keep to themselves, quietly, go out to the teller and hand over their note. But when they come into a modern branch, like, you know, any of the branches we've built recently, they're going to be greeted by a greeter who's going to say, you know, Hi, welcome to X credit union. Um, how can I help you today? What are your concerns, whatever? And that's just a massive wet blanket on a bank robber. And I'm going to leave the names anonymous, because I don't want to, you know, call anybody out. But we do have one client who is in sort of a rougher neighborhood where bank robberies, and, you know, convenience store robberies, all sorts of robberies are unfortunately, uh, sort of regular occurrence. And the thing is, the banks that look most like banks are the most likely to be robbed. So, we've got our clients who is a universal associate model and has all the attributes of the branches that we've been talking about today, and they haven't been robbed once. Meanwhile, in, you know, I think the past year, there have been half a dozen robberies at their peer institutions, one of which that actually got robbed so many times that they had to shut the branch down, had inch and a half thick ballistic glass separating the tellers from the customers, and that did not deter bank robbers at all. And then there were a few other sort of traditional branch layouts that also got hit pretty hard, and it's pretty unfortunate, but by implementing these sort of psychological deterrents in the design, you know, I believe that we've managed to protect and prevent a number of bank robberies. Yeah, I think it's so interesting. It comes down to design, more so than those physical barriers, that's interesting. So, as you all know, I allow my guests to have final thoughts. Whitney, I'm gonna let you close us out. So, Jay, why don't you start? Yeah, so my final thoughts is, you know, we're sort of in a really interesting era for the credit union industry. So one of the things that's happening that's both an opportunity as a threat is the shift to digital and as you know, digital banking, it used to be a competitive feature. Now it's just table stakes and, the institutions that miss the ball on truly integrating the digital and physical member experience and providing like this, you know, comprehensive high touch service, they're at risk of becoming a commodity. So the thing is, when people are, you know, the first thing that a young person is going to do when they're looking at, you know, mortgages, they might google it and see who is, who has the cheapest rate. And a lot of times, you know, the conversation might end there. But if the credit union has managed to build a significant amount of trust, even if they don't have the lowest rate, you know, they're going to be the first person that that a member or prospective member will come when they're looking for things like a mortgage or facing other life milestones. And think the CFPB has shown that a lot of people don't research. They don't, they'll research what rates are online, but 70% of people are not looking at the process of getting a mortgage or the things that they need to be aware of, and they're actually learning this information from the branch staff. So if you manage to build these relationships, get people to open the accounts, have a presence in the neighborhood, and manage to stand out in your community, you have the ability to capture this, you know, that's a significant amount of people that are just learning about, you know, the process of getting their first home loan or many other things, they're coming into the branch, and you have the opportunity to capture that. So it's an opportunity to, you know, while a lot of institutions, especially smaller institutions, are going to fall to this threat of commodification, the ones that really find their rhythm in the branching strategy and capture these, you know, relationships, they're going to succeed, and this is going to be an opportunity for them.

Sarah Cooke 43:54
Yeah, excellent. Thank you, Jay. And Whitney?

Whitney Loe 44:01

Coming from the FinTech world and especially, and I know everybody's so tired of hearing about the pandemic, but coming from the FinTech world and during the pandemic, I would have said that branches were going to go away, and I have learned more in the last especially 14 months, in the last two or three years, which is that's not true. They're not going to go away. They're going to stick around, but they are going to change. And I think that it's imperative as an industry for us to pay attention, you know, to what's going on, but to understand that people want to talk to other people, if they have a problem, or if they have a goal and something they want to accomplish. They want that face to face interaction. And they're going to go into a location, into a branch, you know, to do that. And so what that means is we have an opportunity to capitalize on that, to build those relationships even more. And it just goes back to this whole, your strong digital presence, you still have to have a strong branch presence. And so I think one of my biggest takeaways is when you start looking at changing your branches and updating your branches or adding branches, talk to the experts, whoever they may be. Yes, we're a design build firm, but we have a lot, you know, we have a lot of other design build firms too, but, but what I would say is find the ones that, that are the experts, the ones that can take you from beginning to end that can look at the strategy that can come and say, Hey, listen, you know, if X, Y and Z is going to produce this result, we have a saying at Momentum is, you know, it's for the good of the project. So when you're looking for a partner and an expert to help you make sure that you have found somebody that really understands that strategy, and that no matter what, in the end, it's what is best for this project and for this credit union, whatever that may be. But, but going forward, yeah, I think, I think branches could be in your branch strategy could end up being what makes or breaks a credit union or even our industry. So I think it's, you know, I think we really need to be paying attention to what's going on and making sure that, you know, we're there for our communities like we should be, and that is, that is going to be having a physical presence, but we have to adapt to to what's changing, right and within our community and in our industry as well. So yeah.

Sarah Cooke 46:17

Awesome. Thank you all so much. I appreciate it. I think branching, as you guys, kind of mentioned, people thought it was my go away. It is definitely not, especially for credit unions. So thank you all for joining me today. I appreciate you.

Jay Speidell 46:31

Thank you.

Whitney Loe 46:32

Thank you.

Sarah Cooke 46:33
Have a great rest of your day.