However, I made my annual spring visit to my local nursery to beautify my property and provide an expensive meal for the marauding deer that wreak havoc on anything I try to plant. Anytime I buy something at this nursery I am treated to an unrehearsed tutorial on everything I could possibly want to know about the care, feeding and nurturing of the deer food I'm about to plant. On the drive home I suddenly realized that I get more of an education from my nursery store than I ever received from my bank in the last 20 years. Something's wrong with that picture.
Considering the financial quagmire we continue to be engulfed by, where many people are afraid of any type of investment, why aren't banks falling over each other to provide free financial education to both retail and business customers and prospects on the merits of prudent financial habits? Instead of gathering dust after 3:00 pm, why aren't more bank branches teeming with people listening to bankers educating them on everything from commodity products to saving for college, retirement and everything else in between? Why aren't bank websites, which tend to look like electronic product brochures, carrying more financial education so that people feel like they have some of the necessary information to make sound decisions on where to put their hard-earned money?
It seems like we have been talking about this forever. But now is the time for more action. The customer or prospect that we work hard to educate today may just be the long-term customers that we all need to remain viable and prosperous tomorrow.
Nick Vaglio, CFMP
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