Personal bankers build businesses

Northwestern Financial Review, Jun 1-Jun 14, 2005 by Telschow, Tony

After 25 years in an accounting office, Jim Hilgert got out from behind the desk and into the Minnesota sun. His journey from book balancer to business owner began across the desk from a personal banker in a Bloomington, Minn.-based branch of U.S. Bank, where Hilgert has kept his personal accounts for years.

Hilgert had contemplated a major move for some time. He had worked as a building and grounds manager while in college, and liked being out and about. He also hoped to do something with his two high-school-age sons and thus conceived Handy and Sons, LLC, his family-owned lawn-care and home maintenance business. He saw securing a home equity line of credit as a necessary first step away from the security of his longtime career, and the first place he went was to the bank that had served his personal banking needs so well.

As the director of finance for a transportation company, Hilgert had worked with several large regional and national banks. He said that, although they all were good, he knew that his bank had a record for accuracy. Accounting error was "one area that would just drive me nuts," Hilgert said. "You'd be off, and you'd be trying to find somebody else's mistake. With [my] bank I never had that problem. I could do my bank reconciliation in five minutes because I was always tying to the right numbers."

Speaking of the other banks he had worked with, Hilgert said, "I know that they are supposed to be focused on smaller businesses, which is great, but...the fit at U.S. Bank for me, for my experience with my personal [banker], was much better, and I had the track record to prove it."

Customer service is the key

Soon after approving the home equity line, Hilgert's bank helped him transfer his savings into a business checking account. The bank also helped him tie all of his accounts together on the Internet, so he could transfer funds among them and manage his startup efficiently. Spring cleanup season was approaching, and Hilgert was eager to buy equipment and start building his business. He didn't relish having to wait for his first batch of business checks, so his banker helped him get a debit card, which Hilgert used to buy a trailer, mowers, power washers, drills and saws.

Throughout the startup period the bank's service was "impeccable." When Hilgert asked for something, "it was always done. You wouldn't have to go back and say where is this, where is that," he said.

And so, as the snow and Hilgert's accounting career subsided, Handy and Sons was in business.

Today, the company does handyman work on Mondays, Tuesdays, Fridays and Saturdays and lawn care on Wednesdays and Thursdays.

The bank is doing business, too, with a committed customer who uses a home equity line of credit, business checking and joint personal checking one who has moved his mortgage into the bank, purchased CDs and encouraged the sons to open savings accounts. System-wide satisfaction Customers often emphasize the influence of individual relationship managers, and some tell stories about following their favorite bankers from bank to bank. Hilgert said that his personal banker has certainly done a great job, but he is equally impressed by the bank's system-wide service from the drive-up, where the extended hours suit his schedule, to web-based banking, which was set up quickly and to his tastes.

There is also no shortage of stories about small businesses feeling shortchanged by their banks, but Hilgert said that if more banks were like his, there would be little to worry about. "My experience is that, with the personal banker that's been assigned to my account...if I have any problems or questions or need anything, I just give him a call and he's on it right away. Maybe some of the bigger banks, if they would assign a specific banker to each small business, maybe that would help."

Meanwhile, the bank continues to deliver its customary accuracy in accounting, which Hilgert appreciates more than ever in his new role as chief executive. "When you're with a bigger organization you've got... four to six people in the accounting department, where now I'm doing all of the accounting and everything myself. The last thing I want to do is [go] out there trying to find mistakes that the bank has made."

Hilgert suggests that it all adds up to a commendable customer experience and strengthens a customer's commitment to his bank. "There are so many banks out there, it's hard to decide," Hilgert said. But when customers find ones they're happy with, they're reluctant to leave.

"I have relationships with other bankers...but there's really not a reason that I have to change," he said. "There's really nothing that the others can do at this time that would make me change." (Jim Hilgert is the husband of North * Western Financial Review managing editor, Jackie Hilgert.)