ORLANDO, Fla. – Speaking from experience, Clearview Federal Credit Union Assistant Vice President of Marketing Christianne Gribben explained that credit union members are not only loyal to their credit union, but also to their credit unions' field of membership and name. Clearview, formerly U.S. Airways Federal Credit Union, in Pittsburgh decided that the turmoil of its main sponsor was a negative for the credit union both in membership challenges and reputation. "U.S. Airways had filed bankruptcy twice. That made them unpredictable as you might imagine," Gribben said.
Even so, the membership was loyal to the brand name and reluctant to seek a charter change, which was something the credit union had to overcome. The credit union held a press conference to inform the media and membership with the help of a consultant. Clearview also launched print and radio ads, which featured pictures and voices of actual credit union employees. "Our primary goal was retention. The secondary goal was awareness in the community," Gribben said.
The credit union, from past branch closings was expecting about 20% run-off, but has only experienced about 10% nearly two years into it.
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To help sway the membership, the credit union issued a statement of commitment to the members on its Web site. "A big piece of this is presentation," Gribben advised. Focus groups were used to come up with the new name so management could say this was chosen by the membership and "suddenly, it was OK." They also had to persuade members that growth was good for the entire credit union. Also, overnight, the large credit union's field of membership overlapped 200 other credit unions. To help smooth things over, Gribben said, Clearview initially employed 100% of its media buy to promote credit unions generally. The credit union is still committing about 25% to general credit union awareness. But even before these steps, the credit union had to choose the type of charter conversion. The credit union initially began the application process for a state charter. However, 90 days into the process, she explained, "The political climate changed so substantially they weren't going to be able to allow us to do that." Then-U.S. Airways also looked at the TIP charter, but decided against those. "We're pleased we didn't go that direction because we would have been going head-to-head with [others]," she said. [email protected]
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