Redwood Credit Union named best in the nation

Credit unions aren’t flashy. There are no quarterly earnings reports or big baseball stadiums named after them. They typically don’t make a lot of news, even though the nonprofit industry grew by 3.6 percent in 2014, its largest gain in 20 years.

So when officials at Santa Rosa-based Redwood Credit Union were examining how to better promote services it has been providing around the North Coast for 65 years, they didn’t see the need for a massive overhaul.

Through focus groups, surveys and meetings, executives struggled. Finally, inspiration struck, and a slogan was born: “We love to help you succeed.”

Redwood’s marketing job may have gotten a little easier, as the 242,000-member cooperative recently was named the best of the nation’s approximately 6,100 credit unions in an analysis by North Carolina-based Glatt Consulting. The firm, which does not have Redwood as a client, used 11 areas to rank credit unions, including net worth, return on assets, loan charge-offs, deposit growth and ratio of loans to deposits.

“We didn’t look to rebrand … We were looking to articulate our brand,” said Brett Martinez, Redwood’s chief executive officer. “We knew we had a really strong brand with our membership growing.”

Tom Glatt Jr. said Redwood is a healthy financial institution that ranks very highly on his scorecard, while having a good management team that serves members well, but not at the risk of safety and soundness.

For example, Glatt said he recently met up with a member from Redwood’s technology team at an industry conference. He noted how few other credit unions have their own in-house technology staff, preferring to outsource everything to third parties.

“They’ve actually taken upon themselves to look at their members and respond to them and their needs,” Glatt said.

Martinez said Redwood has placed an emphasis on its technology offerings for the past six years, responding to the rapid growth of desktop and mobile banking, especially used by younger members. But what Redwood found was that while it needed techies, it also had to have customer services representatives to explain the technology to customers.

“It’s not something where if you build it, they will come,” Martinez said. “You have to build it and show them how to use it.”

Redwood still is benefiting from customer growth from those who got fed up with large banks in the aftermath of the 2008 financial crisis, spurred by Bank Transfer Day on Nov. 5, 2011, declared by organizers of the Occupy Wall Street movement.

Given their nonprofit status, credit unions typically are able to return profits back to their members through lower loan rates and higher interest on accounts, rather than back to shareholders. Like banks, they also have National Credit Union Administration insurance that covers up to $250,000 per account.

That message especially has resonated in the politically progressive North Bay. Redwood’s growth has increased by 18,000 members from 2012 to 2014, and its assets climbed from $2.1 billion to $2.5 billion during the period.

“We’re not here to make a bunch of stockholders rich,” Martinez said. “We don’t do anything unless our members ask us to do.”

But it still operates like a business. For example, last month its insurance subsidiary bought Sonoma-based SST Insurance Brokers to serve as an in-house broker for the credit union, which also offers auto, home and commercial insurance products to its members through a network of outside brokers.