Inland Empire Trades Credit Union, of Spokane, like many other small credit unions across the nation, is working hard to stay afloat in a competitive marketplace filled with banks and larger credit unions that provide similar services.


What Inland Empire Trades is doing, including teaming with other small credit unions to cut costs by sharing some services, seems to be working. In the last five years its loans have grown 77 percent, to $6 million from $3.4 million; its assets have grown 76 percent, to $5.8 million from $3.3 million; and its membership has grown 40 percent, to about 3,300 members.


Our niche is to work with union members and their families to provide the same products and services as large financial institutions, says Demaris Krummel, CEO of Inland Empire Trades.


About two years ago, faced with escalating costs for data processing, Inland Empire Trades joined with three other small credit unions here to form a credit union service organization (CUSO), says Krummel. That organization, called CU*Northwest, of Liberty Lake, was set up as a for-profit company to provide data-processing services for the four credit unions, and also to form a shared-branching network.


Krummel says the other participating credit unions are the Spokane Firefighters Credit Union, Spokane Media Federal Credit Union, and Spokane Catholic Credit Union. She adds, though, that 10 additional credit unions, some from as far away as Portland and Seattle, are expected to join CU*Northwest by the end of this quarter.


Data processing is the biggest line item in a small credit unions budget, next to staffing, she says. With a staff of eight employees at Inland Empire Trades office at 2004 N. Hamilton, she says, Its unheard of for us to do data processing on our own, and for-profit data-processing entities were squeezing small credit unions out of the market.


A future goal of CU*Northwest is to hire a compliance officer to help keep member credit unions informed about, and in compliance with, complicated and stringent government regulations that apply to financial institutions of all sizes, she says.


In another effort to augment its services, and to make itself more attractive to trade-union workers not currently affiliated with it, Inland Empire Trades is negotiating service rates with two national shared-branching credit-union networks. Krummel says she expects that by this summer the credit union will sign a contract with one of those two network providers, enabling its members to do their banking at many other credit unions nationwide without being charged transaction fees.


That would be a major extension of the shared-branching network formed when the four small credit unions launched CU*Northwest two years ago


CU*Northwest has allowed us to afford products and services that allow us to grow, Krummel says. In addition, we are able to develop and enhance our services based on information it has provided to us.


One such service for Inland Empire Trades members would be the national shared-branching service it plans to introduce this summer. Thats when Inland Empire Trades anticipates paying what Krummel calls a substantial fee, the amount of which is still being negotiated, to either San Dimas, Calif.-based Financial Services Centers Cooperative Inc. or Duluth, Ga.-based Credit Union Service Corp. to provide that service free to its customers, she says.


Since at least 1999, Inland Empire Trades also has offered free financial literacy training to its members, Krummel says. That program, taught by a trained high school teacher on its staff, is expanding this year to include giving one or two hours of free financial training each week to supplement apprenticeship programs offered by trade unions.


Membership


Krummel says the credit union launched in 1968 as Bricklayers Local No. 3 Credit Union, and has since grown through mergers with four other small credit unions. Yet, she says, the bulk of Inland Empire Trades growth has occurred over the last two years.


Part of that growth can be attributed to added customer benefits related to forming the CUSO, but Krummel says a bigger factor was a change made in the credit unions charter in 2003. That change opened Inland Empire Trades membership to all trade-union members from throughout Washington. Its charter formerly limited its membership to those employed in seven union construction trades based in the Spokane area, she says.


We needed to expand the charter to allow for future growth in the next 10 to 20 years, says Krummel. She says nurses, ironworkers, and members of many other trade unions have begun banking there since that change was made.


Most Inland Empire Trades members are individuals who belong to trade unions and choose to do their banking there, Krummel says. She adds, though, that the credit union also counts as members some trade union members who have retirement fund accounts there, but dont do their banking there. Some trade unions, through contracts negotiated with their members, mandate that their union workers set aside a certain amount of money, as much as $2 per hour worked, toward retirement. Some of those unions choose to set up those retirement fund accounts at Inland Empire Trades, she says.


Although membership now is open to union members from all trades in Washington, what began as a bricklayers credit union branched out through a series of mergers and philosophy changes that have played out over the past 39 years.


Major changes came through mergers with four small Spokane-based credit unions. They included a 1972 merger with the Plasterers & Cement Masons Credit Union, a 1992 merger with the Plumbers & Pipefitters Credit Union, a 1998 merger with the Sheet Metal Workers Credit Union, and a 2004 merger with the Columbia Employees Federal Credit Union.


Inland Empire leases its 2,250-square-foot office building on north Hamilton from the Spokane Firefighters Credit Union, which occupied that space until about two years ago when it moved to 2002 N. Atlantic.


Contact Rocky Wilson at (509) 344-1264 or via e-mail at rockyw@spokanejournal.com.