A Conversation With ... Michael Brady

Chartered in 1923, Systematic Savings Bank was long known as Systematic Savings & Loan. Did the charter change, or just the name – and why?
Our charter is still the same. We’re still a savings and loan, and we’re still regulated in the same way. (Under) savings and loan laws, a bank could do a charter change to a savings bank or they could change names, and we just chose to change our name. The main reason for that was not knowing where chartering laws were going to go. When this decision was made ... there was a lot of talk of different charter changes, and I didn’t want to go through the cost to have it be duplicated shortly thereafter. I think it was May of last year when the name change became effective.

Systematic Savings Bank operates a single branch at 318 South Ave. How big is the institution?
We’re currently at 11 full-time and three part-time employees and about $48 million in assets. The big difference between us and (other banks) is that we are mutually owned. ... If you have an account with us, you’re actually an owner. We don’t have an investment group that owns us or an individual who owns the bank. ... We serve roughly 1,500 households.
 
Does the institution still function the same as it did when it was Systematic Savings & Loan?
No, not really. Charterwise, yes, but the services and functionality are more bank-like. That’s the big change, offering (more) services. (Before), we had no ATM, no Web site ... and as a financial institution, we have to offer those services to be able to serve our customers. We’re pulling it all in. The Web site went live in August. ... The only thing we really had to offer was certificates of deposit, so we had a lot of CD customers, and our [real estate] lending. Now, we do any ... type of consumer lending, such as car loans, home equity lines of credit, commercial lending, commercial real estate, agricultural lending – all of that is available through us. ... We had checking accounts and an interest-bearing checking account, and a money market deposit account (with) a limited number of checks. But without having an ATM or access to ATMs, no debit cards and no online banking, it was a very limited market for people who would be interested.

Is it challenging to convey the changes to your customers?
The biggest issue is that we’ve taught our customers not to ask us (for those things). It was, “We don’t do that, so don’t worry, go to another bank.” Now, the process is to let everybody know that yes, we do offer these services. If you want your checking account, and you want to do online bill pay or you want to do your car loan through us, we can do it. It’s just a slow process, getting that out there. It’s not a simple change. ... We have to have the infrastructure behind everything perfectly in place before we start pushing these products, so that’s what we’ve been concentrating on.

On the commercial side, what’s your target demographic?
I can’t handle a great big business. I don’t have the wherewithal to do that. I can’t make huge loans. It’s called concentration of risk. ... I’m more interested in dealing with the mom-and-pop businesses, somebody that’s started up, or someone who’s been in business for a while but is tired of being a second-class customer. ... Hopefully, the downtown market is strong for us.

Systematic Savings is putting the finishing touches on a roughly $600,000 renovation of its building. Was there any board discussion about relocating instead of renovation?
Yes, there was a lot of discussion. I was rather adamant about staying downtown. I like downtown, but that’s not the main reason. The main reason is we’ve been here 40 years. This building is long paid for. (We) could remodel, spend a little money, comparatively, to what it would cost to build a new building, and I end up with a total of 5,000 to 6,000 square feet (on South Avenue). It just made more sense to stay here and develop this market.[[In-content Ad]]