RetireInvest has revamped its advisory offering and introduced a new sub-brand as it attempts to appeal more broadly to a younger client base. RI Advice is one of four key strategic initiatives in the firm’s 2008 business plan which includes growing adviser numbers, broadening estate planning, tapping into generations X and Y, and honing the business’s financial focus.
“A lot of people see RetireInvest as only retirement planning, so we’ve set up a sub-brand which is RI Advice,” says Greg Dunger, managing director of RetireInvest. “We’re concentrating on how we can [apply] the knowledge and client relationships we currently have [to] that next generation.”
RetireInvest set up the pilot program in March, which involves 12 of its franchises and 20 offices around the country, in response to its ageing client base. The average age of the firm’s clients is 68. Dunger hopes to shift the proportion of pre- and post-retiree clients from 95 per cent to 75 per cent, and risk and wealth accumulator clients from 5 per cent to 25 per cent, by 2017.
“I see the evolution of RetireInvest over the next 15 years as going from working with just retirees to working with Generation X, doing more around wealth creation and the estate planning side of the market,” he says. RI Advice will be reviewed at the end of June. Under its growth plans, RetireInvest aims to boost its financial planners from 223 to 258 by year-end.
