First Wealth managing director Anthony Villis said as part of the firm’s B Corp initiative, it offsets carbon emissions for both the business and the team’s private lives as well.
The firm, which became B Corp certified in 2020, offsets holidays and other things for the team “because it feels like the right thing to do”.
A B Corp certification measures a company’s entire social and environmental impact.
Speaking to FTAdviser, Villis said: “We do that by offsetting with a tree planting project in Nicaragua, which is a certified project and there's probably about 3,500 trees so far.
“We plant 30 new trees for every new client we take on.”
The total of 3,500 trees also includes an offset for the company and team scope 1 and 2 carbon emissions, which it fully offsets each year.
However, Villis explained that the problem it grapples with as a wealth management business is understanding where client money is being invested.
“All of the companies we invest in for our clients all have their own impact and how do we get our heads around that data when the fund managers are struggling themselves to be able to articulate what that looks like,” he said.
“We're probably ahead of most firms because we're committed to be net zero by 2030. However, I think the whole wealth management space is grappling with how we present that data.”
First Wealth began in 2009 after the financial crisis and two to three years ahead of RDR.
“It's good in a way because we knew what was coming, we were able to set ourselves up as an independent financial planning firm at that stage,” he said. “We were with another network but we joined Benchmark in 2012.”
The firm became a chartered financial planning firm in 2015 and started as 'three people in a room' type of business.
“I think we've got seven or eight chartered financial planners in the team now and there's probably a few that are only a couple of exams away,” he said.
It's how we can use what we know to build some technology to maybe start automating some of the financial advice. After becoming certified B Corp, the process around the wider business changed, according to Villis.
Initially, the goal was to become a chartered financial planning firm and this then developed to become a certified B Corp.
In 2021, the firm was awarded the Chartered Financial Planners award by the Chartered Insurance Institute (CII).
“Rather than just looking at making profit it is more about how you deal with your clients, the value you add, how you treat your team, what's your impact on the environment, what's your community aspect and how you govern yourself?
“It's a combination of a few things. It's being a really good financial planning firm, but then having a bit more of a social conscious."
A duty to make sense
First Wealth's existing client base is high net worth, with around £1mn in assets.
“That's the sort of client we serve every day of the week,” he said.
However, the firm is working on the automation of financial planning in order to provide this service to the next generation of clients.
“[Currently], it's not massively inclusive, because most people don't have that sort of level of wealth. So, again, it's how we can use what we know to build some technology to maybe start automating some of the financial advice.”
“We've got a company called Open Advice that is in the process of building things and we can give that to other financial planners.”
First Wealth has two main projects that it has currently got running.
Villis explained that it has set up a financial education business called Thrive Money, that runs on Instagram.
“It's designed really for sort of next generation of clients, sort of Gen Z and millennials and as a 'here are things that you should probably be doing with your money in a sensible way' from a chartered financial planning firm, rather than 'here is a good opportunity to buy cryptocurrency or Forex'.
“We found that we have a bit of a duty to bring some sense to some of these conversations as a team.”
The firm paired up with social media influencer Zanna van Dijk who has about 380,000 followers on Instagram.
“She's a client of ours. So we're able to use our financial planning knowledge with her marketability to grow."
Proving value
Villis also explained that another challenge he has is around proving value for clients.
“We know we get lots of good reviews and we can say the client says nice things about us but really under BCorp, one of the things we want to be able to do is to say well this is the value that we add for clients.
“There's a bit of head scratching with that but the consumer duty paper is quite helpful.”
He said the regulator’s direction of travel seems to be on a 10-year span for the profession.
“It’s RDR, consumer duty and then there'll be something in 10 years time that sort of completes that,” he said.
“First Wealth and some of the compliance people will be working on that, together with some of the firms in the network, to say what do we think is the best way to articulate a value and come up with a strategy to say, this is what we think looks good.
“This is what I think the regulator will be happy with, but it's an opportunity to demonstrate value.”
He added: “There's a lot of financial planners missing the point where they are all moaning about it and that it's more work but really, should you be able to demonstrate the value of a product or service you sell to someone - it almost feels weird that you wouldn't want to do that.”
sonia.rach@ft.com
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