The Mather Group CEO Chris Behrens gained’t disclose precisely how his lead engine works, but it surely’s clearly working.
TMG elevated shopper belongings by greater than 700% over 5 years, bolstered by its entrance into the mergers and acquisitions market, a fruitful Constancy partnership and an enigmatic lead engine Behrens stated has been scaled during the last 4 years.
“It’s our secret,” he stated of the RIA’s lead technology initiative, which introduced in roughly 900 new purchasers during the last two years and requires 30 interns every summer season to handle. Describing the method as “well-defined” and “capable of establish purchasers which are much like these we have now,” Behrens declined to reveal extra.
“If you wish to develop,” he suggested, “it’s a must to have multiple technique.”
Behrens took the helm of TMG in late 2019, a couple of yr after the agency accomplished its first acquisition. His appointment heralded the “subsequent section of strategic progress,” stated the late Stewart Mather, who based the Chicago-based follow in 2011 with simply $150 million in belongings.
Previous to the deal to purchase Berman Funding Advisors in October of 2018, TMG had a 52% natural progress fee and $1.8 billion in shopper belongings, in addition to 55 workers and a presence in 4 U.S. markets, together with Atlanta, Dallas and Houston. Berman added one other $1 billion and a fifth location in San Francisco’s Bay Space.
Following 17 subsequent acquisitions, two of which have been earlier than Behren’s arrival, 11 new places of work have been established in as many regional markets. The agency now employs 154 professionals—together with 65 client-facing advisors and 15 govt management positions—overseeing $8.7 billion in AUM throughout roughly 4,000 purchasers.
In response to information analyzed by RIA Edge and WMIQ in partnership with Discovery Information, TMG elevated AUM by 715% between 2017 and 2021, and 180% yr over yr between 2018 and 2021. It then went on so as to add seven extra corporations and one other $1.8 billion in 2022.
On the natural facet, Behrens credit the agency’s service mannequin and in-house lead machine, augmented by Constancy’s Wealth Advisory Options referral program. “We’ve got a really shut working relationship with the Constancy workforce,” he stated. “We’re honored to be part of that.”
“The Mather Group has achieved terribly properly within the Constancy program,” stated Steven Levitt, founder and managing director at Sutton Park Advisors, an M&A advisory agency with a workforce of bankers devoted to the RIA house. “They’re one of many prime individuals and recipients of recent enterprise leads.”
The majority of TMG’s purchasers are workers of Fortune 2000 firms and enormous personal corporations with important retirement planning wants, however Levitt stated the agency has been working to develop that focus and supply its household office-style providers to an expanded area of rich traders.
“We do taxes for about 70% of our purchasers,” stated Behrens, who characterised the typical shopper as round 61 years previous, with between $2.5 million and $2.7 million invested with the agency exterior of its household workplace follow.
TMG’s core focus is monetary planning, he stated, and serving to purchasers work by a profitable retirement and subsequent legacy planning, and is bolstered by a bunch of different capabilities, together with funding administration and tax technique and preparation.
“That’s all a part of our payment construction. I feel it is what makes us distinctive,” stated Behrens. “Therefore, a part of the rationale for the expansion that we have been lucky to attain.”
It didn’t take lengthy for personal fairness to take discover. Within the spring of 2022, TMG was acquired by next-gen personal fairness investor Vistria Group. It’s presently one in every of three firms, and the one advisory agency, in Vistria’s monetary providers portfolio.
“This partnership is according to our long-term thesis in regards to the worth of, and tailwinds in, wealth administration,” Vistria Co-Head of Monetary Providers Boris Rappaport stated on the time. “TMG’s tradition of service, innovation, skilled growth and progress offers an ideal alternative to copy in markets throughout the U.S.”
“The Mather Group is without doubt one of the only a few corporations that really has an expert CEO,” stated Levitt. “He had familiarity as a shopper of wealth administration himself, however he labored in different industries world wide and actually brings an attention-grabbing perspective on how you can run a great enterprise.”
“Scaling and rising a enterprise—and doing it profitably—is a variety of arduous work,” Behrens stated. He defined that TMG is continually creating and streamlining its Salesforce-based tech stack, its second-largest funding after payroll, and has an outlined course of to establish areas the place extra staffing is required in all areas of the enterprise. The agency has positions devoted to human sources, enterprise growth and M&A, in addition to managing the agency’s rising divisions—wealth administration, tax providers, numerous funding methods and the TMG household workplace.
“They proceed to improve the expertise,” stated Levitt. “I do know that they lately introduced in a brand new chief monetary officer and so they’re on the lookout for a chief funding officer. They’re on the lookout for a chief income officer.”
“We have been very lucky to have the ability to rent one of the best expertise that is out within the market,” stated Behrens. “It is a workforce of people who work collectively below a single imaginative and prescient, mission and goal to at all times do what’s in one of the best curiosity of our purchasers. And that is actually our guiding gentle. With out the individuals and with out the workforce that we have now, we’d not be as profitable we’re.”