Banks A Helluva Lot

Banks A Helluva Lot
By Bob Coskrey

Banks, they’re all over the damn place. I counted 30 of them, including savings and loans and credit unions, in the Greater Charleston Area phone book, some of which have as many as 10 branches, and there are new ones springing up on a seemingly daily basis. My God, the competition must be ferocious, assuming they still want to make loans to us high risk, over-mortgaged, Joneses-envying material boys and girls.
I imagine their advertising budgets are quite impressive, though ironically, their efforts are blatantly lacking in creativity. So many of the names sound very much the same, and this is not a recent problem. They will either try to appeal to your city, state, or country loyalty, although state fealty seems to predominate here, with inspiring appellations such as National Bank of S.C., S.C. State credit Union, or Carolina First Bank, but with this state having supplanted Illinois in the area of embarrassing publicity recently, you would think the banks might want to disavow any relationship, or better yet, just incorporate the name of a state whose governor doesn’t require a governor for his “little Governor, whose lieutenant governor doesn’t think giving poor school children free lunches is akin to giving aphrodisiac laced feed to livestock, and where tea parties haven’t become Confederate Flag day celebrations, with middle aged, angry, white guys waxing nostalgic for the “50’s,” the “1850’s,”that is, instead of a social event for little girls.
And why is it that banks all over the country have continued the inane practice of referring to themselves as “first.”: First Citizens, First federal, First national, First Trust, Community First, etc. In the first place ( sorry ), how can all these institutions be first? Well, I guess a bank could possibly claim that it was the first in a specific category, such as the first to offer free candy to customers, the first to install security cameras, or the first to stay open during lunch hours, but this would be hard to confirm, not that anyone would care enough to check them out.
However, banks could take the initiative to establish new and imaginative categories of firsts, such as the first bank to employ a security guard under the age of 75, the first to discontinue the somewhat tedious groundbreaking ribbon-cutting ceremonies for new banks and replace it with an umbilical cord-cutting procedure, medically supervised, of course, for the first proud customer to give birth, or being the first to acknowledge John Dillinger’s birthday by having the tellers wear ski masks ( millinerily incorrect, certainly, but banks are not likely to spring for snap-brim fedoras ) and installing brown paper bag dispensers beneath their windows.
On the other hand, why not take the honesty track and admit your rank by calling yourself 132nd Federal or 27th national, for example, but perhaps, I am asking too much.
Then there are the weird names that make you question the message they are conveying. Such as Wachovia, which sounds like one of those make believe countries in an old Disney film. I’m surprised their security guards are not resplendent in colorful braided uniforms with epaulets, a plumed shako, and packing a sabre.
Then there’s BB&T, a name that might indicate they are in the witness protection program, and who knows whether it could actually stand for Bankruptcy and Breach of Trust.
Then there’s State Farm Bank. Just what does that mean? If I went there to open an account, would there be people dressed in overalls dragging in 300pound pigs for loan payments and tractors lined up at the drive-in windows?
And what’s the story with Carolina Federal Saving?. Are customers there greeted by visored, humorless federal bureaucrats or “Carolina Girl” tellers shagging in a lobby bedecked with sand drifts and swaying palmetto trees?
I guess all I’m really saying is that if you bank people want to stick around, you need to do more than use the stimulus money for your personal aggrandizement or seeing how many banks you can fit into a city block. You also need to put more thought into naming yourselves. Be a little more imaginative, truthful, and less ambivalent. And to show I’m not just here to kick you when your deposits are down, here are a few suggestions to get you started:
Self-deprecating:
Another Damned Bank
The Money Pit
Last National Bank of S.C.
Bank of No Returns
Mountebank
Boastful:
Itz Money In The Bank
Sufficient Funds Are Us
Bucks A Million
Good Credit Union
Big Bucks S&L
Take It To The Bank

TV/Nostalgic:
Bob EuBank
The Loan Ranger
Movies/Nostalgic:
George Bailey S&L
I Vant To Be A Loan Company
Political:
Special Interest Bank
Trust Us
Francophile:
Left Bank
Right Bank
Cubs Friendly:
Ernie Banks And trust
Tar Heel State friendly:
The Outer Banks, Inc.
And I’ll throw in a few slogans to further substantiate my magnanimity:
We turned down the stimulus package. We’re not a sperm bank!
Show us you don’t need a loan and we’ll give you one.
Need a loan? No problem. We’ve got more money than vice presidents.
Goldman Sucks. Invest locally.
Pssst, got a second? Mortgage, that is.
Our talkers can’t stop talking about our excellent interest rates. That’s why we don’t call them tellers any more.
In closing, it seems quite apparent to me that if you are going to be serious about not just renaming, but repackaging yourselves, that I am obviously the one to lead you out of your creative quagmire. So, I invite you to contact me while this offer lasts. However, you should be aware that I only conduct business between the hours of 6:00 and 8:00AM, since I don’t observe bankers’ hours.






















Banks A Helluva Lot
By Bob Coskrey

Banks, they’re all over the damn place. I counted 30 of them, including savings and loans and credit unions, in the Greater Charleston Area phone book, some of which have as many as 10 branches, and there are new ones springing up on a seemingly daily basis. My God, the competition must be ferocious, assuming they still want to make loans to us high risk, over-mortgaged, Joneses-envying material boys and girls.
I imagine their advertising budgets are quite impressive, though ironically, their efforts are blatantly lacking in creativity. So many of the names sound very much the same, and this is not a recent problem. They will either try to appeal to your city, state, or country loyalty, although state fealty seems to predominate here, with inspiring appellations such as National Bank of S.C., S.C. State credit Union, or Carolina First Bank, but with this state having supplanted Illinois in the area of embarrassing publicity recently, you would think the banks might want to disavow any relationship, or better yet, just incorporate the name of a state whose governor doesn’t require a governor for his “little Governor, whose lieutenant governor doesn’t think giving poor school children free lunches is akin to giving aphrodisiac laced feed to livestock, and where tea parties haven’t become Confederate Flag day celebrations, with middle aged, angry, white guys waxing nostalgic for the “50’s,” the “1850’s,”that is, instead of a social event for little girls.
And why is it that banks all over the country have continued the inane practice of referring to themselves as “first.”: First Citizens, First federal, First national, First Trust, Community First, etc. In the first place ( sorry ), how can all these institutions be first? Well, I guess a bank could possibly claim that it was the first in a specific category, such as the first to offer free candy to customers, the first to install security cameras, or the first to stay open during lunch hours, but this would be hard to confirm, not that anyone would care enough to check them out.
However, banks could take the initiative to establish new and imaginative categories of firsts, such as the first bank to employ a security guard under the age of 75, the first to discontinue the somewhat tedious groundbreaking ribbon-cutting ceremonies for new banks and replace it with an umbilical cord-cutting procedure, medically supervised, of course, for the first proud customer to give birth, or being the first to acknowledge John Dillinger’s birthday by having the tellers wear ski masks ( millinerily incorrect, certainly, but banks are not likely to spring for snap-brim fedoras ) and installing brown paper bag dispensers beneath their windows.
On the other hand, why not take the honesty track and admit your rank by calling yourself 132nd Federal or 27th national, for example, but perhaps, I am asking too much.
Then there are the weird names that make you question the message they are conveying. Such as Wachovia, which sounds like one of those make believe countries in an old Disney film. I’m surprised their security guards are not resplendent in colorful braided uniforms with epaulets, a plumed shako, and packing a sabre.
Then there’s BB&T, a name that might indicate they are in the witness protection program, and who knows whether it could actually stand for Bankruptcy and Breach of Trust.
Then there’s State Farm Bank. Just what does that mean? If I went there to open an account, would there be people dressed in overalls dragging in 300pound pigs for loan payments and tractors lined up at the drive-in windows?
And what’s the story with Carolina Federal Saving?. Are customers there greeted by visored, humorless federal bureaucrats or “Carolina Girl” tellers shagging in a lobby bedecked with sand drifts and swaying palmetto trees?
I guess all I’m really saying is that if you bank people want to stick around, you need to do more than use the stimulus money for your personal aggrandizement or seeing how many banks you can fit into a city block. You also need to put more thought into naming yourselves. Be a little more imaginative, truthful, and less ambivalent. And to show I’m not just here to kick you when your deposits are down, here are a few suggestions to get you started:
Self-deprecating:
Another Damned Bank
The Money Pit
Last National Bank of S.C.
Bank of No Returns
Mountebank
Boastful:
Itz Money In The Bank
Sufficient Funds Are Us
Bucks A Million
Good Credit Union
Big Bucks S&L
Take It To The Bank

TV/Nostalgic:
Bob EuBank
The Loan Ranger
Movies/Nostalgic:
George Bailey S&L
I Vant To Be A Loan Company
Political:
Special Interest Bank
Trust Us
Francophile:
Left Bank
Right Bank
Cubs Friendly:
Ernie Banks And trust
Tar Heel State friendly:
The Outer Banks, Inc.
And I’ll throw in a few slogans to further substantiate my magnanimity:
We turned down the stimulus package. We’re not a sperm bank!
Show us you don’t need a loan and we’ll give you one.
Need a loan? No problem. We’ve got more money than vice presidents.
Goldman Sucks. Invest locally.
Pssst, got a second? Mortgage, that is.
Our talkers can’t stop talking about our excellent interest rates. That’s why we don’t call them tellers any more.
In closing, it seems quite apparent to me that if you are going to be serious about not just renaming, but repackaging yourselves, that I am obviously the one to lead you out of your creative quagmire. So, I invite you to contact me while this offer lasts. However, you should be aware that I only conduct business between the hours of 6:00 and 8:00AM, since I don’t observe bankers’ hours.