WASHINGTON - CUNAMutual Group will contribute $1 million to fund Filene’s Centerof Excellence for Consumer Decision Making, Filene ResearchInstitute announced Monday during CUNA's Governmental AffairsConference.

The center is the first of five Centers of Excellence that willbe launched by Filene through 2017. The first center will be led by HopeSchau, associate dean of Eller MBA programs and marketing professorfor the University of Arizona.

The center’s research will focus on consumer money decisions,emerging societal trends and their relationship with financialdecisions.

The five Centers of Excellence will be designed to address thechanging needs of credit unions and their members, and issuessurrounding the future of consumer financial trends in an effort toencourage credit unions to think differently.

“The rapidly changing market means the credit union system ofthe future will not look the same,” Mark Meyer, CEO of Filene,said. “And those credit unions need the kind of research, analysisand insight that come from Filene’s Centers of Excellence.”

The Center for Consumer Decision Making will focus on threeissues. First, its research will center on money behaviors in aneffort to help credit unions appeal to potential new markets.Second, it will zero in on consumer preferences and behaviors tohelp credit unions design new products. Finally, it will look intoemerging trends and their implications for retail banking.

Other Centers of Excellence will focus on organizationalinnovation and entrepreneurship; emerging technology, performanceand operational excellence; and the war for talent.

Filene is a consumer finance research institute thatinvestigates how issues affect the future of credit unions, retailbanking and cooperative finance.