Photo courtesy of Oregon Pacific Bank
Sponsored by Oregon Pacific Bank
The benefits of choosing a community bank
By Kelli Warner & Paul Johnson
There are many banking options to choose from these days, but not all financial institutions are created equal. When it comes to what’s most valuable in helping local businesses and nonprofits succeed, there are big benefits in banking with a community bank.
As the owner of Right at Home Southern Oregon in Medford, Brooke Fredericks and her staff provide care-giving services to communities in Jackson and Josephine counties. In her day-to-day business operations, she quickly learned the value of banking with a community bank.
“I wanted someone that I could trust that was meticulous,” Brooke says. “I wanted to be able to walk into the bank and know that people were going to listen to me, and I wanted a person that I could contact. It was really important to me to have a person at the bank because I didn’t have that at a large bank.”
Brooke found what she was looking for with Oregon Pacific Bank. In addition to relationship-based banking, Oregon Pacific and other community banks make big decisions, such as loans, based on what will best serve their clients and the community at large. And those decisions are typically made quicker and more efficiently because their decision makers are local.
“When all of our decision makers, whether it be at the local level or administrative level, are also in the communities that we operate in, it’s easier to get things done,” says Ron Green, President and CEO of Oregon Pacific Bank. “There is a shorter pathway to that decision, and our clients and our communities benefit from that.”
When Melanie Heard founded Children’s Repertory of Oregon Workshops, or C.R.O.W., a nonprofit providing performing arts opportunities to kids in the Florence community, she says Oregon Pacific Bank understood her vision.
“OPB really sees the merit in what we do, and they help us in ways that a normal bank wouldn’t,” Melanie says. “Everything they do comes from the heart, and we are so grateful.”
While Melanie and Brooke provide very different services to their communities, they both benefit from working with a community bank that supports their goals.
“It’s a nice feeling when we work so hard all day to take good care of people to have other people who are taking care of us,” Brooke says.
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