Bankwell recommits to Connecticut with HQ plan
NEW CANAAN — The sole publicly traded company headquartered in town will continue to do so for at least another decade.
Bankwell Financial Group, the parent company of Bankwell bank, has signed a 10-year lease to take the entirety of the approximately 30,000-square-foot office building at 258 Elm St. The relocation will keep one of New Canaan’s largest employers in the town center and also see it consolidate its footprint by bringing in about 50 employees from other locations.
“The operations of a bank are more like a football team — you can’t play one-on-one,” Bankwell CEO and President Chris Gruseke said in an interview. “There are so many different things that have to occur simultaneously for it to work, that it’s just better suited on our scale to have an essential place where you can get your message across more effectively, your team is more cohesive and you have more collaboration.”
Committed to New Canaan
With the move, Bankwell will take over a threestory building next to the downtown Metro-North Railroad station. Sold last year for nearly $7 million, 258 Elm had served for about 30 years as the home of a predecessor firm of minerals company Covia before the closing of its local offices.
Set to open by the end of this year, the new offices will accommodate up to approximately 120 employees. The contingent will include about 40 non-branch staff who are now based in offices at 208-212 Elm and
220 Elm and about 50 who are based in Wilton and Fairfield. In total, about 160 work for the firm.
“We would have had to move anyway, at some point,” Gruseke said. “Having this opportunity in a great location next to the train station, with parking underground, was an opportunity we couldn’t pass up on.”
New Canaan First Selectman Kevin Moynihan said he worked with Gruseke for several months to develop the relocation plan.
“Having Bankwell headquartered in New Canaan with an expanded employee base is very important to the town of New Canaan as it validates New Canaan as a location that mid- and smallsize financial firm executives can
work closer to home and avoid having to commute to Stamford, Westchester (County) or Manhattan for high-paying jobs,” Moynihan said.
The consolidation solely affects Bankwell’s non-branch operations. Bankwell is not closing any of its 12 branches across Darien, Fairfield, Hamden, New Canaan, North Haven, Norwalk, Stamford, Westport and Wilton.
Demand for Bankwell’s services has remained high amid the coronavirus crisis. In-person appointment banking started on June 8. Some of the branches that do not have drive-through service are set to re-open with shortened hours on June 15.
Among its top priorities, Bankwell has approved more than 380 small-business loans, worth a total of about $60 million, that have been distributed through the federal
Paycheck Protection Program.
“After a couple of weeks getting used to things (during the crisis), we were running this bank with over 100 people who were not working in branches who were logging on daily and running the bank remotely,” Gruseke said.
In the first quarter of this year, Bankwell revenues totaled about $14 million, down 8 percent from the same period a year ago.
Profits totaled $1.4 million, compared with $5.1 million a year ago. The decline reflected a $3 million increase in the provision for loan losses, to prepare for potential disruption from the pandemic.
Its assets totaled about $2 billion, compared with about $1.9 billion a year ago.
Bankwell traces its origins to the 2002 founding of the Bank of New
Canaan. In 2013, the merger of that bank with the Bank of Fairfield and Stamford First Bank created Bankwell. A year after that, Bankwell became a publicly traded company.
Industry resilience
Bankwell’s headquarters project reflects an industry that has so far withstood the coronavirus crisis better than most other sectors in Connecticut.
Financial activities in the state lost about 2,600 positions in the state in April — a small fraction of the tens of thousands of jobs lost in the same period in other fields such as leisure and hospitality and retail.
There are 28 Connecticut-chartered banks that are regulated by the state Department of Banking and eight national banks headquartered in the state that are overseen by federal regulators.
Banks headquartered in southwestern Connecticut include Bridgeport-based People’s United Bank, Darien-based DR Bank, First Bank of Greenwich, Newtown Savings Bank, Ridgefieldbased Fairfield County Bank and Stamford-based First County Bank and Patriot Bank.
“Our banks continue to offer good jobs to employees, contribute to local nonprofits and incentivize volunteerism in their communities,” said state Banking Department spokesman Matt Smith. “This continued dedication to the communities they serve has been rewarded with a loyal customer base, signaling that Connecticut is indeed a good place to do business and to raise a family.”