Strengthening Our Mission
From this position three years ago, it would have been difficult to forecast the pace of economic recovery following the pandemic. The size of the US economy exceeds pre-pandemic levels, the labor market recovery has been strong, and core inflation has largely subsided.
But like most 30,000-foot views, this one doesn’t tell the whole story. Facing higher inflation and increased borrowing costs in 2023, many Americans turned to their savings and retirement plans to keep up with everyday expenses. Additionally, the high cost of food, shelter, and energy played a large role in undermining consumer confidence.
In the face of these obstacles, SELCO doubled down on its commitment to being a safe, secure, and trusted financial partner for our members and communities—a commitment that has allowed us to serve our members without interruption and keep their money safe for nearly 90 years.
Here are several examples of how we strengthened our member-focused mission in 2023 by sustaining, advancing, and iterating on the products, services, and resources that allow us to help our members wherever they are on their financial journey.
Whatever our members’ needs or stage of life, we’ve got them covered—and have the tools and resources to help them set and achieve their financial goals. Below are a few ways we enhanced the member experience:
Helping your money grow faster. Interest rates were conducive to saving throughout 2023. SELCO responded by rolling out new and enhanced savings and checking products that made it easy to give our members’ hard-earned money a boost and ensured they were earning the highest available dividends from the first dollar saved. These products rounded out our offerings, providing solutions for a range of financial goals.
- Cultivate Savings Account. A new high-yield savings account perfect for creating a nest egg quickly.
- Link Digital Checking. A new checking account that offers rewards for banking digitally, like free financial consultations, no ATM fees, round-up savings matches, and more.
- Vault Youth Savings. We’ve revamped our youth program to focus on financial education, ensuring young savers start out on the strongest financial foundation possible.
- Accelerator Certificate. From January through March, SELCO was excited to offer industry-leading annual percentage yields on certificates with large balances, earning our members more than $13.7 million in dividends.
Welcoming our virtual assistant, Liv. Last year, SELCO introduced Liv, a voice/chat virtual assistant designed to complement all the ways we already meet you wherever you are. Always evolving and learning, Liv can answer many of your banking questions, even after hours. Just look for the Liv icon at selco.org during non-business hours or call our 800 number to access Liv any time of day to get your questions answered.
Leveling up digital banking. During the first full year of the digital banking platform, we took member feedback to heart by making several upgrades. Here are a few highlights:
- Self-service loan payment and management options. Members now have even more convenient ways to manage their SELCO loans—with options to make payments with a non-SELCO card, as well as catch up on payments or make payment arrangements, all accessed from a single location in digital banking.
- Instant digital cards / card provisioning into Apple Wallet and Android Wallet. We introduced a convenient way to have a SELCO debit or credit card digitally issued and ready to add to a digital wallet (such as Apple Pay® or Google Pay®). No more waiting for a physical card to arrive to start using it.
- View deposited images. Members can now view images of checks deposited at a SELCO ATM or through our mobile app for up to two years.
- Self-serve insurance quotes. Looking for a real-time insurance premium quote for home, auto, or a combination of the two? By selecting the “Request an Insurance Quote” button in digital banking, members can quickly get a free estimate from one or more insurance carriers.
Visit our How-Tos and FAQs hub on selco.org to learn all the ways to navigate digital banking.
SELCO continued to find innovative ways of supporting community partners and providing financial education to members and nonmembers alike. In 2023, through annual grants, scholarships, and sponsorships, we donated more than $250,000 to educational and community partners. We also donated our time—to the tune of more than 1,000 volunteer hours from nearly 150 team members—through our Employee Volunteer Program (which celebrated its fifth year). All told, our volunteer activities supported 64 organizations across the communities we serve.
Want to stay up to speed on the latest community efforts? With our storytelling, financial education, and other timely posts on Facebook, Instagram, and TikTok, we truly put the “Community” in SELCO Community Credit Union. Here are a few examples of our work in, and for, our communities:
SPARK! Creative Learning Grants. In 2023, SELCO provided over $53,000 in supplemental funding as part of our SPARK! Creative Learning Grants program. These funds allowed 61 educators from 56 schools across Oregon to engage their students with creative classroom projects. Here’s a sampling:
- “Enabling Success: Tools for Autism and Behavioral Life Skills”—Melinda McGladrey at Applegate Elementary School in Crow created the Autism and Behavioral Life Skills Classroom to provide a supportive, inclusive, and stimulating environment where every student can thrive academically and socially.
- “Introduction to Medical Careers: The Apprentice Doctor”—Becky Horst at Caldera High School in Bend used the grant money to provide students with the materials necessary to learn and practice real-life, hands-on skills which will generate new interest in healthcare careers and retain students in CTE classes.
- “Amplifying Student Learning & Creativity With Podcasts”—Duane Bean at Siuslaw High School in Florence devised a program that would provide students with a unique, alternative form of creative expression using their own voices, experiences, and perspective through podcasts.
In 2024, we’re raising the award cap from $1,000 to $2,500 per grant, so for all you educators out there: Get ready to share your innovative classroom project ideas when SPARK! applications reopen in August!
Community sponsorships. In 2023, SELCO supported more than 50 community partners and initiatives across the state with financial support and, many times, volunteer hours. While they are too numerous to list, here's a small selection of those sponsorships:
- Comunidad y Herencia Cultural. Throughout the course of the year, we celebrated our Latinx community with our community partner, Comunidad y Herencia Cultural, through a series of cultural events, including Noche Cultural and Herencia Hispana.
- SMART Reading. Not only did we supply new books to kids in pre-K through 3rd grade across Lane County, we expanded our efforts to fill a “free little library” in collaboration with the Burrito Brigade in Eugene. In an effort to build home libraries for children and their families, we held a successful book drive in our branches throughout March. Following the drive, our team members came together to sort, clean and bring new life to over 200 previously loved kids' books. We plan to expand this book drive and cleaning efforts to Burns and the Bend area in 2024.
- Statewide backpack drives. In preparation for the 2023-24 school year, our team prepped and stuffed over 3,000 backpacks with supplies, books, and snacks that were distributed to Bags of Love Eugene; the Boys & Girls Club of Salem, Marion, and Polk Counties; and the Relief Nursery, in partnership with the Eugene Active 20-30 Club #920.
“Some of the backpacks were just as big as some of the smaller kiddos. They’d grin from ear to ear and say, ‘Wow, it’s heavy!’ Their smiles only got bigger when we told them their next stop was to pick out a book and toy of their choice. Their excitement was contagious!”
- Mara, Assistant Branch Manager, Downtown Eugene Branch
- Friendly House ‘Jam’: In July, SELCO volunteers helped representatives of Friendly House, a nonprofit community center and social service agency in Portland, make blackberry and raspberry jam for their annual jam fundraiser. Proceeds from the jam sales went toward supporting Friendly House's community programs and classes, ranging from after-school care to free Friday family nights.
SELCO Scholarships. SELCO continued its tradition of supporting students seeking higher education by awarding scholarships to 20 high school seniors in 2023. Nineteen applicants received a $2,500 scholarship while an additional applicant was chosen for the $5,000 Richard Metzler Opportunity Scholarship. This honorary scholarship is awarded to a graduating senior who, despite adversity or lack of opportunity, has demonstrated excellence in education, leadership, or civic responsibility.
For the first time since 2019, we celebrated the scholarship recipients with an in-person ceremony in May. Highlights of all the recipients can be found on SELCO’s Instagram Story Highlights; some of our recipients also shared in the video below what they would include in a time capsule to be opened in 100 years.
We recognize that educational needs and goals are changing as well, which is why we’re excited to expand on this legacy initiative in 2024 by opening applications to continuing, nontraditional, and vocational students (let’s hear it for the trades!), as well as increase the total amount awarded by nearly 50% to $77,500.
Broad support for our communities. Through corporate sponsorships and independent team member initiatives alike, here are a few ways we extended our community support inside and outside our doors:
- Pole Pedal Paddle. SELCO was again the title sponsor for Pole Pedal Paddle, the largest fundraiser of the year for the Mt. Bachelor Sports Education Foundation and one of the more prominent multi-sport events in the Northwest. SELCO hosted a tent at the finish line and even assembled a team of five that completed the race.
- Dog Day at the Ems Game. In May, SELCO volunteers handed out tie-dye bandannas for pups to proudly wear as their humans cheered on the Eugene Emeralds at PK Park in Eugene. SELCO was well represented in the stands as well, with over 100 team members, as well as a dozen or so furry sidekicks—taking in the game.
- Virtual food drive. In October, we held an internal food drive in which team members donated food items and SELCO matched those donations to the tune of 22,000 meals for the Oregon Food Bank. Every dollar donated to the food bank generated three meals made available to those facing hunger throughout Oregon.
- Wellness Fair. After a three-year hiatus, SELCO brought back our employee Wellness Fair at the Corporate Headquarters. Featuring the expertise and generosity of nearly 30 businesses from Eugene and Springfield, the fair covered the spectrum of physical and mental health resources and services that are available.
Financial education. Helping our members reach their financial goals goes well beyond providing a place to store their money. We also pride ourselves on providing a variety of financial education opportunities, and here are a few ways we ramped up those efforts in 2023:
- Vault Education Hub. We launched the all-new Vault Education Hub, a dedicated space on selco.org for our younger members and their families. The hub offers a wealth of resources to develop and hone healthy financial skills from an early age. Check it out if you haven’t already!
- Webinars/seminars. Experts from our Mortgage, SELCO Insurance Services, and SELCO Investment & Retirement Services teams taught members about buying a home, Medicare, and various investing topics. Visit selco.org/events as we continue to add webinars to the 2024 schedule.
- Reaching members where they are (on social media). SELCO offered a wider array of financial education content on our social media channels—and showcased more team members offering their expertise—than ever before. Visitors to our Facebook, Instagram, or TikTok pages were greeted by a wealth of bite-sized videos, financial education articles, and links to guest opinion articles and podcast appearances demonstrating SELCO’s position as a safe, trusted, one-stop financial partner.
An unpredictable economic climate continued to swirl around us in 2023. However, by managing to these dynamic forces with intention, we were able to prepare and plan with confidence, leading to another successful year financially and operationally. SELCO ended the year with $2.7 billion in assets and $2.4 billion in deposits, while holding steady with $1.9 billion in loan volume.
In addition to all the successes above, here are two additional accomplishments in 2023 aimed at improving the member experience:
- Makeovers galore. Spanning the latter half of 2022 and the first half of 2023, two SELCO branches (Gateway & West Bend) received major construction improvements while another (Forest Park) underwent a safety upgrade. At the Gateway Branch, 3,000 square feet of office space were remodeled to help better serve members in SELCO Insurance Services, Commercial & Business Banking, Mortgage, and SELCO Investment & Retirement Services. And at our West Bend Branch, Central Oregon’s Commercial & Business Banking division got a brand-new home when unoccupied annex space was converted to a 1,500-square-foot workspace with a dedicated entrance.
- Revamped Contact Center. SELCO realigned the framework of its Contact Centers to serve our members faster and more efficiently. With a refined phone menu structure, expanded chat and text hours, and the aforementioned voice and chat assistant Liv, members can get the information they need and continue with their day faster than ever—no matter how they prefer to get in touch.
To achieve our mission to improve our members’ social and economic position, we use four guiding principles to help shape our strategic and operational decisions: Safety and Soundness, Strategic Positioning, Quality Personal Service, and High Return to Members. Below are just a few of our noteworthy accomplishments for 2023 in each of these areas:
Safety and Soundness: SELCO generated solid earnings and produced an ROA (return on assets) that exceeded projections and peer comparisons, driving the capital ratio to 10.92%. This ratio is considered well capitalized per the industry’s standards for a safe and sound credit union as determined by the NCUA, the credit union industry’s federal regulatory body. In 2023, state and federal examiners provided SELCO with a fully favorable examination report.
Strategic Positioning: SELCO continued its push throughout 2023 to better position the organization, as well as our members, for the future. Member feedback drove the thought process behind several enhancements to our ever-evolving digital banking platform. And in the high interest-rate environment that dominated 2023, SELCO developed and revamped a few deposit products like Link Digital Checking, Cultivate Savings, and Vault Savings to help members get even more out of their money.
Quality Personal Service: SELCO branches processed 1 million transactions for our growing membership, which ended the year with 151,505 members. We funded 15,920 loans totaling $420 million. SELCO Mortgage funded 428 mortgages totaling $156 million, SELCO Insurance Services wrote 3,032 policies, and SELCO Investment & Retirement Services managed $374 million in member investments.
High Return to Members: SELCO provided direct benefits to members through lower account fees and industry-leading interest rates on savings and checking accounts. We continued to help SELCO members borrow sensibly, save smarter, and invest wisely with our comprehensive product and service offerings coupled with industry-leading rates.
Thank you for choosing SELCO as your financial partner. We couldn’t have accomplished any of this without you.