The Middletown Press (Middletown, CT)
Nutmeg Credit Union looks to acquire rival First Bristol Credit Union
One of Connecticut’s highest profile credit unions is looking to acquire a smaller financial institution in Bristol.
Rocky Hill-based Nutmeg State Financial Credit Union is asking the Connecticut Department of Banking to approve its merger with First Bristol Credit Union. The deal also must also be approved by the National Credit Union Administration, which regulates First Bristol as well as that institution’s members.
John Holt, chief executive officer of Nutmeg State, said Thursday that if the merger is approved by regulators, he hopes to have the transition completed by June 1. The vote by First Bristol members would take place between 45 and 60 days prior to that date, according to Holt.
“The combination of the two organizations will make both stronger,” he said. “It will give First Bristol members access to more services and will make them able to access banking technology that’s not currently available to them. At the same time, it will allow us to better serve customers we already have in the Bristol area.”
Holt said Nutmeg currently has just over 44,000 credit union members, including about 1,100 in the Bristol area. The acquisition of First Bristol and its two branches located in the city will enable Nutmeg to better serve those members, he said.
“We had a branch in a Walmart that closed,” Holt said of the June 2017 closure of a Walmart Neighborhood Market location in the city. “Mark Cornacchio (First Bristol’s president and chief executive officer) and I have discussed the possibility of this (merger) for the past five years,”
First Bristol has 5,800 members and 26 full and part-time employees, he said. All of the employees will be retained after the completion of the merger, according to Holt.
Nutmeg has 10 branch locations, spread across the state from Manchester, southwest to Norwalk. The credit union has just over 100 employees, Holt said.
Prior to the announcement of this proposed merger, Nutmeg’s last merger came in early 2017 when it completed its acquisition of Housatonic Teachers Financial Credit Union.
“This probably won’t be our last merger either,” Holt said. “Members of smaller credit unions want more technology, they want more product and services.”
First Bristol traces its roots back to 1935 when what was originally known as Bristol Teachers Federal Credit Union was established by educators in the city. In the years that followed, other school systems like Plymouth and Terryville were added to the credit union’s field of members.
That field of membership was expanded even further in 1999 when anyone who lives, works, worships or attends school in Bristol became eligible to join the credit union.