The niche strategy helping small banks compete with Wall Street

FEATURED STORY: From churches to mobile home parks to clean energy, specialty lending creates better loans and loyal clients. Some banks have figured out that niche strategies are critical for the health of the local and national economies.

A couple of decades ago, when my family moved to a small town, one of the first things we did was open an account at its one-and-only bank. A small lifetime of cumulative minutes was spent waiting in the car while my mom used the ATM or chatted with the teller inside. I opened my first checking account there, around the time I got a job as a golf course beverage cart driver. When I came in to make a deposit, the teller and I would joke about where I’d gotten all that cash. When I studied abroad in college, I had to call ahead to make sure they didn’t freeze my debit card. It seemed superfluous, but it was comforting to know there was a real person on the other end of the line, asking where I was headed.

Eventually, I left that bank for a larger one with a more robust app and better credit card perks. Everything is so easy now — depositing checks virtually, opening accounts in the app and setting up autopay. We bemoan our thinning social lives, yet we do everything we can to avoid the daily interactions that once drew us out into the world. Still, when the time comes to take out a loan, it will be a face-to-face conversation.

The small banks that endure understand that relationships are the strongest currency in a community. And when it comes to life’s big business, it’s a people thing — just as it should be.

– Dakota Morlan, managing editor

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Odds and Ends

Our February issue is an ode to the night workers who keep our city running. Inside, you’ll find a photo essay chronicling their work, along with reporting on the Delta tunnel project, AI in schools and more. Read it now on your computer, phone or tablet.

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