Ben Calder, Managing Director of Calder Wealth Management, unpacks the recent merger with Coastal Advice Group. Together with Dan Brown, Ben has built one of the fastest-growing financial advice businesses in Australia.
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In this episode of The Trusted Adviser, host Rob Pyne sits down with Ben Calder, Managing Director of Calder Wealth Management, to unpack the recent merger with Coastal Advice Group. Together with Dan Brown, Ben has built one of the fastest-growing financial advice businesses in Australia.
Ben shares the inside story of how this merger came to life — from early conversations and cultural alignment, to the role Merchant Investment Management played, to the practical challenges of integrating two large advice firms. He also reflects on leadership, growth, and why bringing the next generation of advisers and owners into the fold is central to their vision.
Whether you’re an adviser considering growth through M&A, a business owner preparing for succession, or simply curious about how two like-minded firms can combine to build something bigger, this episode offers valuable insights from one of the industry’s leaders.
LISTEN
SHOW NOTES
Topics discussed
- How long-term professional relationships can evolve into business partnerships
- Why cultural alignment is critical in mergers and acquisitions
- The role of Merchant Investment Management in enabling growth and governance
- The practical realities of post-merger integration (systems, communication, teams)
- Insights into succession planning and creating equity opportunities for advisers
- The future growth ambitions for the Calder–Coastal group
Episode Highlights
(Timestamps are approximate)
- [02:30] – How Ben first connected with Dan Brown and the foundation of their relationship
- [07:15] – The trust and cultural alignment that paved the way for merger talks
- [12:40] – Why the merger was about growth, not cost-cutting
- [17:25] – The involvement of Merchant Investment Management and its impact on governance
- [22:10] – The challenges of integrating back-office systems and client data
- [27:00] – Client communications and ensuring continuity of service through change
- [30:15] – New opportunities that scale unlocks: pricing, aged care advice, mortgage broking
- [33:45] – Ben’s vision for growing future leaders and broadening the shareholder base
- [36:00] – Advice for other principals considering succession or merger opportunities
Resources & Links
- Connect with Rob Pyne on LinkedIn
- Follow The Trusted Adviser Podcast for more conversations with leaders in financial planning
- Learn more about Calder Wealth Management and Coastal Advice Group
TRANSCRIPT
Rob Pyne
Announcer, welcome to the trusted advisor ben calderpodcast, where you get a deep dive into the world of financial planning with industry leaders who share their stories of winning and learning as they chart their path to success. This podcast is for the curious. Those of you who like to dig into the detail and that that sounds like you get ready to listen and learn, and if you’ve been here a while and you’re getting value from these conversations, I’d really appreciate you subscribing or leaving a review. It helps others discover the podcast and join the conversation. Welcome back to the trusted advisor podcast. If you’ve been following along, you might remember back in episode seven, I spoke with Dan Brown, principal of coastal advice group, about the remarkable growth journey of his firm and their future ambitions in the advice profession. Well, just a few weeks ago, coastal advice Group announced some massive news, merging with Calder Wealth Management led by Ben Calder to form one of the country’s fastest growing financial advice businesses. I’m delighted to have Ben with me today to share the inside story of that merger. We’ll unpack what led to the decision, how the process unfolded, the role merchant Investment Management played in bringing the merger to life, and what it means day to day for Calder wells clients and the team supporting them. Ben, welcome to the show. Thank you very much. Thanks for having me. Good to chat again. Ben, we’ve known each other a fair while now and always enjoyed our conversations. You’re a man with growth ambitions, and you’ve just announced some massive news. The merger that you announced with coastal advice group was just a few weeks ago. Can you take us back to the beginning of that conversation you started having with Dan, your good friend now and business partner, and what started the conversations that you and Dan had about what ultimately led you here to merging the businesses together?
Ben Calder
Sure, I think probably a bit of history. Dan, you and I met each other at a conference in Adelaide, roughly about three or so years ago, and just got to talking about our businesses and issue, you know, problems we had and things that were going well. And I think I realized pretty quickly meeting Dan, that we were very much on the same page. In many ways, we’re both idiots as clowns as well, but so culturally aligned, is what you’re saying. Very much. So, yeah, very much. So, so call to wealth had been growing at a really strong rate, and I was really happy with that. Daniel’s business had been doing the same. I guess as far as businesses go, we just bounced ideas off of each other. I’m the sort of was the only shareholder and Managing Director of call to wealth. So for people listening, I guess if you’re out in business by yourself, I’ve done it by myself for a long time. Have an amazing team that, you know, deliver the services and do amazing job, but you know, sort of running the business, and everyone looks for direction and where are we going, and setting the vision for the business and keeping everyone accountable can be a pretty lonely place to be doing that stuff on your own. So initially, just, you know, Daniel and I met, and we pretty much kept talking literally the day after that conference, probably every day for the last three years. And I’d sort of bounce ideas off of him around things that I was doing, and he’d say, That’s a great idea. Definitely do that, or don’t do that. We tried this, or and vice versa. He’d call and say, we’re having HR issue with this. Have you run into this before? Etc, so really, just the bouncing ideas off of each other, and then that happened a lot, and that gave me a really good degree of comfort. You don’t realize the support that can be there when you haven’t had it. We’re also both sit within the rhombus licensee network. We met at a investment management conference. So dimensional conference, Caldwell has been working with dimensional for over 15 years now, and I think coastal was probably about three or four years or something like that at the time. So it was around that evidence based investment piece. So we sort of had alignment there. We sort of sit in the same licensee group. We use the same systems. We believe in lifetime cash flow modeling and goals based advice. We both were doing a lot of m and a lot of organic growth. So really, there’s a lot of alignment there. Yeah, a huge amount of alignment. Like you just don’t find it to be honest. So even within sort of, you know that licensee network, there’s a lot of businesses doing everything differently. And so really, we just kept, you know, doing and then we were doing more deals, and cold wealth is buying more practices and helping people with their succession. And that was been going really great. Daniel was doing the same. And we’re at a conference in New Zealand, probably about a year ago, and we spent a couple of days before the conference trying some of the good Pinot in Central Otago, and just sort of floated the idea around. You know, we’re doing the same thing. We’re working with each other every day. Maybe there’s more power in doing this together, supporting each other. So bringing the teams together and creating lots more opportunity for our teams, and probably changing the vision of our businesses a little bit from we really just wanted to excel in South Australia and Victoria, really, and coastal was really focused on New South Wales, but sort of together, we bring a lot of infrastructure together. It made sense for us to say, Let’s reset the vision on this thing, and let’s really grow it and become a national financial advice business.
Rob Pyne
So it sounds like you’d spent a couple of years really building such a strong relationship. So a lot of trust building was going on there. You’re talking to each other almost every day, as you say, talking about things, whether it be HR issues or you’re looking at acquisitions, really, or or tuck ins that you guys were both heavily involved in, and you’d done each and each business. So it was probably really that was the genesis of it. Was that Adelaide CEO form that dimensional, hosted by the sound of it, where you got to know each other really well, and then spent two years or more before the New Zealand one, which was last year, we’d sort of gone through those early stages of getting to know one another, and then thought, how could we do things together? Because there was that common approach to Evidence Based Investing you with consultant and Dan as Ri advice. Is that, right? They’re both under the rhombus network, yep. So consistency there so a lot of opportunity to get to know one another. Was it in New Zealand, you thought like we could really do something here together. Was that the kind of the starting point where you thought there was commonality, the trust had been built. Let’s talk more seriously now about what we could do if we came together. Was it? Was it that?
Ben Calder
Yeah, I think we both thought about it. And even when we did say we should look at this, it still wasn’t a, okay, let’s do it. It’s like, okay, let’s really work out what it means, what works involved, cost and benefit, really, around all of that sort of stuff. And we both had a vision for growth, and sort of, you know, the mantra inside the business is that growth gives opportunity, where we’ve got advice staff now moving across into operations roles in the business, and we can really career path a lot of great people through to help them get to where they want to go within the business. So we think that’s a real point of difference.
Rob Pyne
So did you start talking about it in earnest in New Zealand last year? So about a year ago, you started to dig in and start to talk about, how would it work? Yeah, tell us a bit about that last 12 months, because this announcement came out only about three or four weeks ago now, where you guys have officially announced your merger. So tell us about that last 12 months.
Ben Calder
So it was sort of still business as usual, and we sort of worked through ideas, and then we got a group together some of the key people in our operations team. They came down to Adelaide. We spent a couple of days in the dining room in my house with white boards and mapping out how this might look. You know what we would need? Because we’re both very growth orientated. So merging the businesses, it has not been about saving costs. If anything, we’ve added more cost, but we’re stronger together. To go from here to here,
Rob Pyne
you’re optimizing for growth, you’re not optimizing for cost savings and sort of synergies, per se, because synergies are there, you’re optimizing for growth. Primarily, it’s about, how do we grow this thing to being something bigger than we are together, even absolutely
Ben Calder
and really, to bring the team and and a lot of the you know, shareholders in the business along, which is a lot of team members along for the ride, and then to participate, and everyone have a great experience and build something bigger than all of us, really. So probably February, it really started to take form this year where we sort of having more regular and then sort of obviously all the legal stuff happening in the background, and tax advice and all the stuff around merging, because we’ve both got various entities. You know, obviously we’ve got mortgage broking businesses, accounting interests, interest, minority interests in other businesses and sort of, how do we bring all of that together and do it well? So it really got to a point I think, you know, we started probably back in March. I think we called it the daily hustle, where the key management people would meet every morning for half an hour. So we started doing that well before we’d executed sale agreements, or every day, every day, yep, to line it up. And I feel like we probably should have started that even two years before that, because it’s such a big job to do. So we officially married, if you like, on the third of July this year.
Rob Pyne
Yeah, right. So as a lot of work that preceded that clearly, as you say, there was a lot of alignment to begin with, and that made it easier to sort of think we could be something together here without two minutes disruption. But there’s always those logistical issues to work through, aren’t there? And say, a lot of work you guys have put in,
Ben Calder
and probably the biggest thing, and I would put even more attention into this, was really thinking around how we communicate it with the staff, because the teams, when you first say, Oh, this is a big change, and we had a lot of change in our business compared to the average advice business and coastal probably had even more. So it was probably more of another announcement for them. It was a bigger change for the Calder team, which can create uncertainty. So we’ve done our best to communicate as best as we can. Most people with change, we sort of say we’d love it if everyone came from a place of love, but most come from a place of fear. And what does it mean for me and all that sort of stuff. So we’ve really had to spend a lot of time on that. Do I think we’ve got it completely right? Probably not, but we’ve done the best that we could, given what big job it is. And sort of back to your point, that alignment piece, I know there’s, you know, lots of talk around mergers out there and businesses merging and stuff like that. There’s no way that you could do this if you didn’t have that alignment bit, because you soon, when you’re working seven days a week for months on end, to get it to a point, and we’re still going even past that, profit isn’t that much of an incentive. I don’t think to stick at it. It’s certainly not me or Dan,
Rob Pyne
yeah, and I understand was a full equity merge for the two of you. No one took cash out. It was all just bolt this thing together and play on together with full growth being the focus. The announcement also highlighted that merchant investment management, who had already backed coastal they were heavily involved. How significant was their involvement in giving you the confidence the merger would be able to deliver on the growth ambitions that you and Dan have for the merged entity? What was their role? What was merchants role in that?
Ben Calder
Well, they’re sort of, you know, Dave Haynes, who represents merchant in Australia, sits on the coastal board. They’re a minority shareholder in the business. I’ve known David for many years, almost 30 years, I’d say, and so Calder, well, separately prior, because we’ve got quite a big, I guess, succession or acquisition pipeline for a lot of businesses. We were probably because I was sort of balance sheet funding it. And, you know, the only shareholder, I thought at some stage, you know, I’m probably going to need to fix the balance sheet here. So I’d had discussions with several Capital Partners in the years prior. I know Daniel had as well, and I found that they’re a fit for call to wealth. But then obviously merging with coastal and merchant already in there, that was a path I was very likely already going to take anyway. So it sort of just made complete sense in that regard. And they helped, you know, merging the business, and how we got to valuations on the two businesses and what that would look like. And they had to be a party to that. And effectively, because, like you said, we didn’t take any cash. They were going to dilute, so that required approvals and all that sort of stuff. So early on, pre again, you know, we were having meetings with senior leadership team us coastal merchant. So there was, you know, lots of little meetings happening all over Australia where we can get us all together to work through that. And I guess having them now as a capital partner, and given the amount of growth that we’re seeing as a business and what’s coming it’s great to have them there to assist us as and when we need it, not just from a capital point of view, but from an advice point of view. With David is highly valuable.
Rob Pyne
Yeah, no. Shout out to David. He was episode number 10, I guess, called Partnering for success. So you guys are a living example of that. So sounds as though merch should obviously way more than just providing capital. They’re providing strategic thinking, bringing sort of their understanding of how to value businesses and and structure mergers to the table. So can you tell me a bit about what they bring now post merger? Because obviously I’ve got capital behind you guys is David and the team, are they bringing new opportunities to you? Is there a sort of an ongoing, sort of collaboration there about, how do we continue to grow this thing, supporting your ambitions, yours and Dan’s ambitions, to grow coastal and call the wealth the combined into something much larger. And what are those larger ambitions?
Ben Calder
Yeah, so they were very comfortable with both businesses, the teams in the business, I guess a track record. They’re probably backing Daniel and I, to some extent, in that regard, we set the vision for the business. And you know, so they have a board position, and we absolutely want them there.
Rob Pyne
Are they sourcing opportunities for you, or you’ve pretty much self sourcing new opportunities to grow the business through acquisition?
Ben Calder
The majority are coming to us directly because of probably all the deals that we’ve done in the past and a lot of those principles that have sold of we’re getting a lot of referrals for their colleagues who are now sort of, don’t have internal succession in the business, and are like, you know, what was your experience like? And we’re definitely seeing a lot more of that, but all sorts of different deals, I would say the majority come through to Daniel or myself, or even Mitch, who sort of looks after a lot of the M and a part of the business. And then there’s definitely will be businesses that aren’t really a fit for a vertical inter with merchant et cetera, that David will talk to us about. But the majority, I would say, are coming
Rob Pyne
directly, yeah, but David and the team are helping you to assess each opportunity, helping do the valuation process. There’s a process there where you’ve got them on the board helping to sort of provide counsel and guidance there, but you guys had both done a fair bit of that. How do you think your thinking has changed or matured? Possible with merchant being there in the picture, supporting the way you guys are going about this growth.
Ben Calder
I think having merchant in the business has put a whole nother layer of governance into the business for us. Okay, as I said, Daniel and I are clowns at times, so having that accountability has been really good. It’s sort of made us grow up a lot in regards to running the business. We’ve got internal processes, metrics, templates, just for everything, everything in the business. And really, we agree what we can pay and what a deal has to look like, and that then has to get signed off by all parties, including merchant. So, yeah, we know the rules that we want to play. I think, you know, there’s plenty of deals that can be done where the financials make sense, but that alignment piece is probably to your question how we’re changing as we’re evolving. Because, you know, there’s definitely businesses that have come in where they can be reasonably difficult to transition for various reasons. But getting that values piece is number one. I know everyone says it, but it’s like number one by like 80% that’s how important it is.
Rob Pyne
Yeah, I can believe it. So unless you’ve got that cultural alignment and values piece aligned, then it’s not worth pursuing the last 20% Well,
Ben Calder
you’ve done a few acquisitions, and, yeah, you learn as you go. And there’s those ones that have been perfect because of the values bit and others that have been more challenging.
Rob Pyne
Yeah, it’s the old rule is, if you enjoy the company of the people you’re talking to and could spend a bit of social time with them and actually enjoy the experience, then you think it’s a pretty good place to begin, isn’t it? Yep, if you feel like I want the business but I don’t want to spend time with the people, you probably need to keep looking. And that’s the reality. And that’s not because they’re not good people. They’re just not aligned with the way you think and the ambitions that I have, and not that I have are not aligned with
Ben Calder
what yours are. It’s like any relationship. It’s got to be alignment. There has to be mutual respect for each other. I think people with a lot of deals in business, because there’s money, all of a sudden, those things don’t matter anymore. Hasn’t changed. It’s just another relationship just happened.
Rob Pyne
Did you I know Dan as well? Did you always like rum and coke and salt, vinegar chips.
Ben Calder
Daniel got me drinking rum. I was never much of a rum fan before, but yeah, it helps Rob. It helps grease the wall.
Rob Pyne
It does. But once the decision was made for the two of you, what were the first practical steps? Probably post merger. Because, you know, you’ve brought the businesses together. You’ve done a lot of work leading up to that. And as they say, once the merger has happened, now that now the real work starts. So what were the first practical steps that you’ve taken? Now, the businesses are together. I think we spoke the other day, and you talked about building out a whole new executive team. So give me some of the first steps, those first 100 Days type steps that you’re taking now.
Ben Calder
Yeah, so I think when mentioned before, this was about growth, and there’s no cost savings. So we’ve gone and built four executives. So I would say we’re sort of not more profitable than we were standalone, one plus one, but we’ve had to scale the business to get ready for what’s coming. So, you know, we now have a CEO. CFO Dan is the CEO. I’m the chief advice officer, so we’ve got that, and then we’ve got support that runs down. We’re bringing more management in regional directors to manage all of the advice teams around the country. Because, you know, advisors are great practitioners. They’re great at relationships and getting outcomes for their clients. They’re not necessarily all great at managing teams. You do get the unicorns that can do it, but we just thought having sort of managers in that support all of those advice teams would be a more successful structure to support everyone into the future, especially with all that bolt ons and all the acquisitions that will continue to come,
Rob Pyne
You got a big team now. Do you have the numbers on what the team structure looks like?
Ben Calder
I knew you were going to ask me, I think roughly as at the end of next week, because we do this, because we’re hiring a lot of people organically, because the organic this just the normal clients, referring friends, family, centers of influence, referring that part of the business is still going berserk as well. So that M A obviously super charges a little bit, but I think we’re at about 150 staff currently. We got 30 advisors, which includes some specialist insurance advisors, mortgage broking, aged care as well, in addition to the Wealth Advisors. And we’re sort of forecasting forward. We’ve got a Planning Day in Melbourne tomorrow just to work through future oil charts and all that sort of stuff. But we’re sort of, you know, we think we’re going to be well north of 200 in 12 months or so time,
Rob Pyne
happy to share what your growth ambitions are, where you are now as a business, in terms of, talked about head count there, in terms of revenue, and where you think this business is going, you’ve got a lot of acquisition opportunities that you’re actually exploring now and talking to where do you think let’s roll forward two years or five years? What does the business look like?
Ben Calder
Then I think we can be pretty selective in the businesses that want succession and either want to join us, or they’re looking for I find they’re looking for an exit. Some of those advisors leave it pretty late. I’d say start having those conversations earlier. If there’s anyone in that boat that’s watching. But we are having conversations with businesses that they’re all sorts of different sizes. There’s some large ones like sort of like call to wealth was, I guess, and smaller ones where that you’ve got business owners in there that love being advisors. They’re not ready to hang up their boots yet, but at the same time, they don’t want to deal with all the compliance stuff, run all the people and run the business anymore, so where they can sort of come and plug in and roll the business in and still keep an interest in that
Rob Pyne
Give us an idea of the range there Ben from those smaller ones are looking to tuck in and just sort of leverage all the benefit of systems that you guys can bring to the table, versus those larger ones that were more like your size. What’s that sort of bottom to top range there that you’re talking to
Ben Calder
In regards to revenue, maybe, or, yeah, yeah, revenue is probably the best indicator. Probably entry in is around, sort of the, you know, 600 a sole practitioner, 600 fees, ish, something like that. I’m sure it might be less than that, or a bit more, all the way, sort of through to firms doing sort of, you know, so far from a tuck in, roll in, probably up to sort of 10 million revenue.
Rob Pyne
So that’s a sizable business that you’re bringing into the picture. If you’re bringing in a 10 million firm,
Ben Calder
Yeah, we’re having discussions with some of those businesses. So Calder wealth was sort of, you know, almost eight, something like that. So sort of similar size. We sort of, I guess, know what the issues are having done that one of the things you asked was post merger, yeah, we’ve aligned all of our back office systems like straight away. And that’s really painful, very painful to do for a period of time. In fact, sort of the teams are still catching up a little bit from that.
Rob Pyne
So tell us a bit about those specific back office systems that you’re referring to there, and the bringing them together, what ones we talking about.
Ben Calder
So we operated in a different x plan, CRM to coastal. And with, you know, x plan, when you sort of buy it off the shelf, you develop it out. My view was that coastal was significantly more developed. And I think we were talking about the other day, there was systems, processes that we had to build in call to wealth for sort of the next phase. And I think, you know, Daniel and the team had done a really great job at doing that and having that, so I sort of made the decision that we would roll our x plan. We still operate on two separate licenses, etc, and there’s various differences that the advisors do. We both use wealth Central. They probably use wealth central more. We use probably X tools plus more. But I think we’ll keep both of those systems and look for efficiencies out of that as we go. But essentially pulling all of that data out of 1x plan site, uploading all the data in. When you do that, it breaks a lot of the tasking that. So I think we moved about 1300 or something active. That’s just CSA. That doesn’t even include insurance or mortgage broking clients. That’s just wealth clients. Yeah, cross. So they all have to be reestablished. There’s a whole lot of work where the systems, these, IT systems don’t work as seamlessly as they should. Anyway, that’s for sure. So that was almost we’re offline for a few weeks, really still seeing clients and doing it, but we couldn’t enter in live data back into the system to then run through all the processes, to do the advice and do the implementation packs and all the other stuff that fires off everywhere, but that’s done incomplete now,
Rob Pyne
Yeah, that post-merger, integration stuff is kind of where it’s right at the pinch point, isn’t it? Because you’ve got the merger done, and then it’s that integration piece and all the systems that go with it. It’s where most of the pain is experienced, I think, trying to actually get data in the right spot and get the common approach. But yeah, I know that from our own experience, it wasn’t smooth sailing there either, and everyone should prepare themselves for having to do a bit of painful work there if they are going to tuck businesses together.
Ben Calder
Well, I think even with the smaller businesses where we’ve acquired them, or coastal have acquired them, we’re genuinely having a look at the way that they do things and saying, you know, most of the time it’s like, okay, need to align to this process. But we are absolutely looking at ways they do it and go, you know, that’s interesting, or that’s really good. Maybe we can. We might not be able to incorporate it on day one, because sort of, I think whatever we are approaching 4000 whatever it is clients nationally, to make those changes in the systems, is training and rolling out. So we just need to think a bit more about those things and then how we incorporate them. But ultimately, we want any clients that meet with us in Perth, we would love for them to have the same outcome as if they’re meeting with an advisor in Newcastle. So we’re just creating that consistency across the whole business, and systems and technology can help with all of that stuff. So that’s been a lot of the first phase of things, and then things where we’re still looking at going is the colder way of doing that work better for this circumstance or as the coastal so we’re still working through a lot of that, but we will have that all as one way in the coming months, hopefully, I’d like to say by Christmas.
Rob Pyne
But how did you approach conversations with clients to make sure they understood what was happening? Have you had that broader conversation with your client group? But. Because obviously you’re still called to wealth. There’s some back office connection that you guys are obviously pushing through now to make things seamless behind the scenes. But what did you say to clients, if anything, about the merger, and what sort of feedback did you get from clients?
Ben Calder
We haven’t said a great deal, because, to be honest, nothing’s really changed. I mean, part of the plan, and we talked about all the meetings that we had is, you know, one of the things was this can’t affect what a client feels and sees from us. It has to be seamless, even if we’re, you know, the duck on the water and paddling like hell underneath, even if we’re running like crazy, they don’t need to see that and whatever. So really aligning the systems, nothing’s changed from the client that receiving the same services, same level of service that they got before, same communication, same look and feel for everything. I think that we will change that over time and bring that closer together. I think it makes sense for us to be one national business into the future at some point. But at the moment, it hasn’t really change really. All that’s really changed is script, shareholdings, effectively, yeah,
Rob Pyne
So it’s behind the scenes, integration work and ownership, but materially, the client’s experience hasn’t altered at all.
Ben Calder
And that’s been done on purpose as well, like for the call, because it’s a bigger business and we’re integrating it. We didn’t want to create too much change for the advice teams either. So the way that the processes work out of x plan and stuff is different, and they’ve had to get their head around and it’s probably frustrating in the earlier weeks, for sure, but otherwise, everything they’re doing for their clients around investment portfolios hasn’t changed. In fact, we’ve got lots of different types of portfolios, managed accounts across different platforms, and we’re putting a lot of rigor and rationalizing around all of that to offer that out across both businesses.
Rob Pyne
So with the scale that you now have and the capital support that you have as a combined business, what are the new capabilities or services that clients will ultimately expect to get? Do you think or things that you have ambitions to kind of deliver you wouldn’t have been able to get access or give access to for your clients from before. So what things are you now thinking? Well, now we’ve got this scale, what we can invest in the business? What’s the ambitions for the client experience? If there are ambitions there that you’ve got sketched out,
Ben Calder
Probably the first one from scale will be pricing around investment solutions, and I think we will be looking to use our scale to access better pricing on market leading investment solutions and custody services and all that sort of stuff. That’s a bit of a no brainer. The other stuff is we’ve got across both businesses. So in the cold world business, we sort of have a mortgage broking business that’s really complementary. There’s a lot of accumulated clients in there, so we’re sort of rolling that out and looking to provide those services across the country within anything that we do really well. We want to own all of we’re not really interested in joint venturing or any of that. That’s another benefit of scale is that we can back ourselves and invest into creating new processes for everything, and we’ve got people there that can do all of that. So very much. So the aged care space, we need to be better at that. We’ve got resources in both businesses that are doing that. But I think there’s a really big opportunity for us to invest into those services. You know, with the demographics and it’s becoming hard to ignore. I think the advice sector wanted to for a long time, because it’s really hard to do that work and do it profitably, and so I think we’re trying to solve for that. I think the other thing with scale is that it’s something like 16% of Australians receive advice currently, we know just this retirement wave that’s pushing through over the next 15 years. Things are complex. They’re not getting any simpler. They’re getting more complex. We know the benefit that we provide to clients around advice for their families and feeling secure and knowing they’re going to be okay. I just think we’re going to be able to do a lot more of that nationally, and why wouldn’t we? So I think there’s some of the things with scale. There’ll be lots more, you know, technology and I guess also the ability to build things that we think don’t make sense with products off the shelf, around technology and all that sort of stuff, will be very much looking to develop a lot of that sort of stuff in house.
Rob Pyne
That’s what it’s really about, isn’t it? You know, you’ve said right from the outset here wasn’t about trying to get cost savings. It was about trying to merge businesses together that both were aligned and had growth ambitions, and looking to build advanced capabilities, better client experience, perhaps, or more services to clients, but actually build better back office systems. You said there that merchants help kind of think more strategically about how to be good, on governance, how to run a larger enterprise. You’re becoming a larger enterprise by virtue of putting the two businesses together and the rate at which you’re growing. So what excites you most about your role, the head of advice role, the chief advice officer. We’ll call the CAO at Coastal advice group, or it’s called a wealth coastal combined, and you’re running the two brands. US, albeit you’ve got that common ownership now behind the scenes. Let’s roll forward five years. What would have to have happened in Ben’s life in five years from now for you to go like that? Worked out really well. Looking back five years from now, what are you going to be looking at and saying things worked out.
Ben Calder
I think expanding the shareholder register in the business, for me is a big one. I’ve wanted to do this in the call to wealth business for a long time, and that shareholder register isn’t really bringing on. Hence we took a minority partnership with merchant. And really we want the team, those people in the team that can show those leadership qualities and to be the future of the business. It certainly won’t be Daniel or I. You know, we want to see this thing go on beyond us. But also, you know, we’ve got this big business, and I shouldn’t say really, but we don’t know what we’re doing to some extent in that, you know, we weren’t running a business of this size yesterday, so we’re absolutely working it out as we go. I like to think we’re pretty humble about it, and we’ll say when we don’t know or get counsel and all those things. But really, for me was being an advisor was great. I’ve loved being an advisor, and I’m still involved in a few key long term family group clients of the firm, but the advisors sort of look after that. But probably the biggest thing for me has been seeing advisors. You know, we’ve got admin staff who started with the business, who are now senior advisors in the firm, running their own books, and that’s something probably on most probably I’m most proud of. So seeing where that’s going to go, the opportunity we can create. We’re investing heavily in our associate and py program, like, really, really heavily. We are farming our own in that regard, which is, you know, it’s an investment into the future. But all those Gen twos or Gen threes, wherever we’re at, I don’t know, probably Gen three. I guess I’m a gen two. And so them being able to develop, have the careers that they want and be an owner in the business, and the benefits that come with that for them, their families and the rest of the teams they work with, that’s probably what I’m most looking forward to seeing. And then there’s just all the work that you do day to day in between that around compliance and Investment Committee reporting and yeah,
Rob Pyne
What you shared there about bringing others through and giving them ownership opportunity, it’s a super rewarding part of the role, isn’t it, when you start to move beyond you being the primary advisor, but more now bringing others through, helping them build their career, helping them get an ownership opportunity. And I should at this point, point out that episode one of the trusted advisor podcast, was you asking me about our employee share plan, and that was in October of last year, yeah. And so you at that point obviously had begun talking to Dan. In fact, when did we go to New Zealand? Because I was there with you in New Zealand. Was it October? Was about that same time? Yeah, it was skate season. Yeah, so it was about then that was obviously the time where you and Dan kind of bonded over Rob and coke and said, like, start talking more seriously. And you did say, I think just recently in this conversation, or just before when we spoke, that really, that opportunity to have an ownership plan for your next generations was a really important part of your ambitions. And that’s something that Dan had spent some time on, and you were wanting to make that a core part of your proposition as well. So clearly a common ambition there for both of you to not just grow this as a kingdom for Dan and Ben, but actually to help others become owners in this thing and grow this enterprise for the benefit of all, because they’re sitting there in front of clients doing it. So why not help the people that are doing that to grow their own career financially as well?
Ben Calder
Absolutely, and Daniel and I already talk around who’s going to take our roles like we’re looking to hang around. I think, you know, we had a huge amount of value strategy wise, at board level, but like in an operations role, as the business continues to grow, it’s going to need people with different skill sets to probably what I have, or what Dan has, etc, so we’re pretty open to all that sort of stuff and where that goes. And it’s good feeling.
Rob Pyne
Yeah, what you are is pretty humble, because recognizing that you’ve got great skill set the two of you and together, it’s a pretty powerful combination, but actually recognizing that bringing others to the table that have skill sets complementary will only make you stronger anyway. So yeah, no, it’s going to be an exciting journey. I’ve got one more question for you. Ben appreciate your time again today, because I know we’ve we chatted as recently as a week ago. But one more question for other principals listening, who are starting to think about their own succession or merger journey, potentially. What’s the one piece of advice you’d give them from your experience over the past couple of years?
Ben Calder
Have conversations call us, but yeah, I think just back to that sort of alignment piece. And you know, I think when you go and sell the business, there’s a lot of people that you talk to, they’re like, I want to stay, and I want to get a really good salary. I want all my staff to stay, and I want absolute market premium price. You need to probably work out of those things. What’s your priority? Because they change, and you sort of work that out having conversations. But I would start that conversation. Process earlier. If you’re thinking about retiring in a couple of years, you should absolutely be having that conversation now, because there are requirements when you do sell the business, you are going to need to give a lot of yourself, as you’ve had Rob with the principles, and I guess it’s just getting educated and understanding expectation that a buyer’s going to have from you and whether that meets with what you want to do. But I guess ultimately, if you’ve got real clarity around what your retirement looks like, what you want for your staff, all that sort of stuff, I don’t think any deal that we’ve done, not one of the deals have we done is the same as any other deal. So I guess like with the advisor, talking to their clients and working out their goals and what they want to do. It’s really no different for those principles when they sell their business.
Rob Pyne
Yeah, it’s really about starting early, communicating as often as you need to, to kind of get that alignment across the businesses, making sure there are inconsistencies being ironed out, if there are any, but communicate early and often. It sounds like the key message there. Ben and I look forward to seeing how you and Dan build an empire together, even though I know not just about the two of you and you’re keen to bring your next generation through and become a part of that in a big way. So I look forward to staying connected as people that I trust and respect. Great deal. So thanks for joining me today, Dan on the trust advisor podcast, my pleasure. Thank you very much.
Rob Pyne
Thanks for tuning in to the trusted advisor. I hope today’s conversation brought you new insights and inspiration for growing your business. If you enjoyed this episode, please subscribe on your favorite podcast platform, leave a review and share it with others in the industry, and don’t forget to connect with us on LinkedIn for updates on future episodes until next time, keep building trust, embracing innovation and driving success in your practice. You.