On Thursday afternoon Nov. 6, the typically slow and steady flow of customers through the doors of the Farmers & Merchants Bank in the Rossmoor Shopping Center swelled to a steady stream of faithful clients and well-wishers, gathering in the expansive lobby to celebrate the bank’s 40th anniversary of serving its customers in that location. In 1985 the old Fox Theater multiplex was converted into a spacious bi-level bank and executive offices which became the flagship of the now 27 bank branches known as Farmers & Merchants.
They were there to recognize the bank’s longevity and its importance to the West OC communities it serves. The gathering included members of the local chambers of commerce from both Seal Beach and Greater Los Alamitos. Also present were representatives from state legislators Tony Strickland, Tri Ta, and West Orange County Supervisor Janet Nguyen, as well as representatives from the UCI Medical Center in Los Alamitos and scores of longtime bank customers. Commendations of recognition were presented to F & M’s Branch Manager Marsha Evans and Bank President Kevin Tiber followed by a ribbon cutting ceremony commemorating 40 years of professional commercial and personal banking services to the Los Al, Rossmoor and Seal Beach communities.
The key to F & M’s longevity and loyal client base, bank president Tiber told a supportive crowd of about 100, is that they treat their personal banking customers with the same focus as their commercial accounts, and their commercial clients with the same personal touch as their individual customers.
“We are more committed than most banks to the longevity and safety of our customers, that’s job number one,” Kevin Tiber told me moments before the dual chamber ribbon cutting ceremony. “We run a very conservative balance sheet compared to our peers. We could make more money, perhaps, if we took a different approach. For example,” he points out, “We did not participate in the subprime lending surge back in 2009, which subsequently brought the banking world down.”
Tiber was quick to add that despite F & M’s steady growth they remain a “family” bank still controlled by the Walker family of Long Beach where one of the earliest branches was established by F &M’s first bank president C.J. Walker. To this day the bank counts among its many employees five generations of Walkers among them.
But F & M Rossmoor’s greatest asset may be with its own investment in the surrounding communities it has served for four decades. From its longstanding commitment to both the Seal Beach and the Greater Los Al Chambers of Commerce to its unflagging year to year support of local non profits like the Los Alamitos Educational Foundation, the Los Al Youth Center, annual Seal Beach Car Show, Band on the Sand event and many others, the F& M philosophy remains, from its origin stories to the present, a true “family bank”, one that invests the time to understand the communities it serves, and what they need to thrive.
One of the familiar faces of F & M’s community outreach is senior bank manager Al Stone. He sums up F&M’s civic commitment and the importance of the day this way: “There are plenty of banks in this city, but the customers we attract are looking for that point to point contact between people, whether it’s a business, a nonprofit or an individual client. It’s about taking the time to understand what is important to our communities.”
Farmers and Merchants Bank has taken the time, 40 years, to build that business to business, person to person connection, one relationship at a time, proving its commitment to community with the many contributions and local collaborations it has formed over the years with its civic partners. And judging by the crowd of well-wishers who filled F & M’s expansive lobby last Thursday for this 40th celebration, those community collaborations will continue for the next 40 years.