Bank president ends long career
By Russ Oechslin Journal correspondent | Posted: Sunday, February 18, 2007
SPENCER, Iowa — From the time he got his first part-time job in high school, Farmers Trust & Savings Bank President Gary Tolzmann has always worked with green.
SPENCER, Iowa — From the time he got his first part-time job in high school, Farmers Trust & Savings Bank President Gary Tolzmann has always worked with green.
His first job in Mankato, Minn., was not in a bank. It was in a pickle factory, where he sliced pickles after school and helped deliver those "Wimpy's Pickles" across southern Minnesota on Saturdays. "Butt, butt, slice," he has often explained to his bank staffers, referring to the seemingly endless process used to cut the ends of the pickles off before running them through the slicer.
Now after nearly four decades in the money business, Tolzmann, who turns 63 next month, will ease into retirement, ceding his role as bank president to Dave Woodcock on April 1, while retaining his board seat and CEO title for the next two years.
In between the pickle factory and Farmers Bank there was a finance company job that brought him to Spencer. Then, after a term with what was then Clay County National Bank, Tolzmann joined Farmers Bank as a loan officer in 1978. He has been the bank's president since 1985.
Already one of the largest single-branch office banks in the state with over $220 million in assets, Farmers Trust & Savings is the only bank owned by the Des Moines-based Easter family that was also in the grocery and trucking business for many years.
"Development isn't about hitting home runs," Tolzmann said. "It's about hitting doubles and singles, helping Joe expand his shop from 20 to 30 employees in a community like Spencer. It's about building relationships. There aren't many Eatons that come along with hundreds of employees."
Wide-ranging service
Over the years the banker's community service has ranged from being McGruff the crime fighting dog who introduced Crime Stoppers to Spencer, to serving on the on the Spencer Municipal Utilities board and on the board of the municipal hospital's foundation when it built the Abben Cancer Center, which with the Warner Dialysis Center, to help to make the facility a larger regional draw.
Tolzmann said he always thought it was a good idea to help the hospital develop and bring more specialists and serve more patients from the area. But when his wife Carol was diagnosed with stage-four lung cancer that had metastasized, he quickly realized how important the center would be on a more personal level.
"We went to Rochester and Houston for second and third opinions," Tolzmann relates. "They told us that the care Carol was getting here was the same as what they could do either place. She got all her radiation and chemo here."
While his wife's cancer was in apparent remission for about two years, she died two years ago. "We certainly never thought we’d need the cancer center. But it was good to have it here," Tolzmann says. "It's really sad to see the number of people who are here for treatment. But it is also good to know they don't have to drive such a long distance for treatments anymore."
Customer service, too
Tolzmann sees customer service as a most important function, especially for a community bank. He doesn't just preach customer service to his staff, he demonstrates it. "The two receptionists are to greet everyone by name the second time they see them," he says. "They’re good at that. The most important word a person knows is his or her name. Everyone here works hard to know our customers personally. And customers are the most important thing we have. We want to make them feel at home."
Tolzmann urges staffers to changing their telephone voice mail daily as he does. And, he most often returns customer calls promptly.
Employees key
Tolzmann points to his bank's mission statement as the reason for its growth and success over the years. That statement calls for attracting "highly skilled, motivated, professional employees."
"We don't look at employee turnover as a good thing," he says, adding that it has been his goal to hire for the long-term. Several employees have more tenure than he does, with Marian Appel and Deb Sundall each topping 30 years in various positions in the bank. Another employee, Julie Schultze, has been with Farmers for more than 25 years.
As a part of the management change in April, Sundall will join Woodcock and Mike Bryan as the senior officers of the bank. Sundall will serve as a senior vice president and cashier, while Bryan will move from senior ag lender to executive vice president and senior lender after 12 years at the bank.
And, Wellsburg, Iowa-native Brian Harken will become chief financial officer.
Fishing in his future
Tolzmann says he's going to do the things he enjoys most in his semi-retirement. That would include more walleye fishing in West Lake Okoboji and in Canada than he has been able to do in recent years, some traveling, and time with his two grown children in Des Moines and Colorado. In the not-too-distant future, he also plans on marrying his "special friend," Denise Kramer, of Everly, Iowa.
Tolzmann also will stay involved with business development and community service work. The development work, he said, should benefit his adopted hometown and the bank, which "should get a share of growth from any new businesses and their employees."
"I can't imagine hating a job and going to work for 28 years. I still enjoy working with the customers, the employees and the owners," he says.
Banking has changed dramatically in the 22 years Gary Tolzmann has served as president of Farmers Trust & Savings Bank, both he and incoming President Dave Woodcock agree.
Part of that change has come about as a result of technology and Internet banking. But some involves marketing. When Tolzmann for worked for The Associates, in 1969, banks were reluctant to make consumer loans, and small loan companies like his worked with the philosophy "of keeping people in debt."
And, in 1969 banks were still offering Christmas Club accounts, which Tolzmann admits he still maintains personally, although Farmers doesn't offer the product as such any longer. "We even had "cans of cash," he explains, "where customers put cash in a tin that we sealed for gift giving. It had a gift label on it and everything."
Today, he notes, gift cards, a form of debit cards, have replaced the can of cash.
Banks are no longer repositories for long-term investments, as they were years ago, but more often places to get loans. That means banks have to go elsewhere often to brokers -- to get money to make the loans, Woodcock explains, as the level of personal savings in banks is down.
It was in the middle of the ag crisis, in 1985, that Woodcock also moved to Farmers from the former Clay County National Bank that later became Hawkeye Bank and is now US Bank. At that time more money was going into personal savings accounts, especially certificates of deposit, with less money was going into the stock market and mutual funds, he says
"Today banking is more of a specialty business, just like medicine," Tolzmann said. "You used to go to the same doctor to have your tonsils out and have a baby. Now everyone is a specialist."
While pointing to statistics that show most people know they haven't accumulated enough money for retirement, Tolzmann says "banks have become the safe place for short-term money and loans."
SPENCER, Iowa — From the time he got his first part-time job in high school, Farmers Trust & Savings Bank President Gary Tolzmann has always worked with green.
His first job in Mankato, Minn., was not in a bank. It was in a pickle factory, where he sliced pickles after school and helped deliver those "Wimpy's Pickles" across southern Minnesota on Saturdays. "Butt, butt, slice," he has often explained to his bank staffers, referring to the seemingly endless process used to cut the ends of the pickles off before running them through the slicer.
Now after nearly four decades in the money business, Tolzmann, who turns 63 next month, will ease into retirement, ceding his role as bank president to Dave Woodcock on April 1, while retaining his board seat and CEO title for the next two years.
In between the pickle factory and Farmers Bank there was a finance company job that brought him to Spencer. Then, after a term with what was then Clay County National Bank, Tolzmann joined Farmers Bank as a loan officer in 1978. He has been the bank's president since 1985.
Already one of the largest single-branch office banks in the state with over $220 million in assets, Farmers Trust & Savings is the only bank owned by the Des Moines-based Easter family that was also in the grocery and trucking business for many years.
"Development isn't about hitting home runs," Tolzmann said. "It's about hitting doubles and singles, helping Joe expand his shop from 20 to 30 employees in a community like Spencer. It's about building relationships. There aren't many Eatons that come along with hundreds of employees."
Wide-ranging service
Over the years the banker's community service has ranged from being McGruff the crime fighting dog who introduced Crime Stoppers to Spencer, to serving on the on the Spencer Municipal Utilities board and on the board of the municipal hospital's foundation when it built the Abben Cancer Center, which with the Warner Dialysis Center, to help to make the facility a larger regional draw.
Tolzmann said he always thought it was a good idea to help the hospital develop and bring more specialists and serve more patients from the area. But when his wife Carol was diagnosed with stage-four lung cancer that had metastasized, he quickly realized how important the center would be on a more personal level.
"We went to Rochester and Houston for second and third opinions," Tolzmann relates. "They told us that the care Carol was getting here was the same as what they could do either place. She got all her radiation and chemo here."
While his wife's cancer was in apparent remission for about two years, she died two years ago. "We certainly never thought we’d need the cancer center. But it was good to have it here," Tolzmann says. "It's really sad to see the number of people who are here for treatment. But it is also good to know they don't have to drive such a long distance for treatments anymore."
Customer service, too
Tolzmann sees customer service as a most important function, especially for a community bank. He doesn't just preach customer service to his staff, he demonstrates it. "The two receptionists are to greet everyone by name the second time they see them," he says. "They’re good at that. The most important word a person knows is his or her name. Everyone here works hard to know our customers personally. And customers are the most important thing we have. We want to make them feel at home."
Tolzmann urges staffers to changing their telephone voice mail daily as he does. And, he most often returns customer calls promptly.
Employees key
Tolzmann points to his bank's mission statement as the reason for its growth and success over the years. That statement calls for attracting "highly skilled, motivated, professional employees."
"We don't look at employee turnover as a good thing," he says, adding that it has been his goal to hire for the long-term. Several employees have more tenure than he does, with Marian Appel and Deb Sundall each topping 30 years in various positions in the bank. Another employee, Julie Schultze, has been with Farmers for more than 25 years.
As a part of the management change in April, Sundall will join Woodcock and Mike Bryan as the senior officers of the bank. Sundall will serve as a senior vice president and cashier, while Bryan will move from senior ag lender to executive vice president and senior lender after 12 years at the bank.
And, Wellsburg, Iowa-native Brian Harken will become chief financial officer.
Fishing in his future
Tolzmann says he's going to do the things he enjoys most in his semi-retirement. That would include more walleye fishing in West Lake Okoboji and in Canada than he has been able to do in recent years, some traveling, and time with his two grown children in Des Moines and Colorado. In the not-too-distant future, he also plans on marrying his "special friend," Denise Kramer, of Everly, Iowa.
Tolzmann also will stay involved with business development and community service work. The development work, he said, should benefit his adopted hometown and the bank, which "should get a share of growth from any new businesses and their employees."
"I can't imagine hating a job and going to work for 28 years. I still enjoy working with the customers, the employees and the owners," he says.
Banking has changed dramatically in the 22 years Gary Tolzmann has served as president of Farmers Trust & Savings Bank, both he and incoming President Dave Woodcock agree.
Part of that change has come about as a result of technology and Internet banking. But some involves marketing. When Tolzmann for worked for The Associates, in 1969, banks were reluctant to make consumer loans, and small loan companies like his worked with the philosophy "of keeping people in debt."
And, in 1969 banks were still offering Christmas Club accounts, which Tolzmann admits he still maintains personally, although Farmers doesn't offer the product as such any longer. "We even had "cans of cash," he explains, "where customers put cash in a tin that we sealed for gift giving. It had a gift label on it and everything."
Today, he notes, gift cards, a form of debit cards, have replaced the can of cash.
Banks are no longer repositories for long-term investments, as they were years ago, but more often places to get loans. That means banks have to go elsewhere often to brokers -- to get money to make the loans, Woodcock explains, as the level of personal savings in banks is down.
It was in the middle of the ag crisis, in 1985, that Woodcock also moved to Farmers from the former Clay County National Bank that later became Hawkeye Bank and is now US Bank. At that time more money was going into personal savings accounts, especially certificates of deposit, with less money was going into the stock market and mutual funds, he says
"Today banking is more of a specialty business, just like medicine," Tolzmann said. "You used to go to the same doctor to have your tonsils out and have a baby. Now everyone is a specialist."
While pointing to statistics that show most people know they haven't accumulated enough money for retirement, Tolzmann says "banks have become the safe place for short-term money and loans."
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Paul Tolzmann wrote on Feb 18, 2007 9:51 AM: