‘I’m Mike Cvitkovich, VP customer service at Humungous Bank. Y’know, I hear people say big banks don’t care. At Humungous, that just isn’t true. Example: Customer wants a loan. Our policy is, don’t say, ‘No, we won’t lend you money.’ Say, ‘Yes, we won’t lend you money.’ Same message, sounds nicer. Know what I mean?’

The bank that British Columbians love to hate has rung up its last exorbitant service charge. For now, at any rate.

After four years, Richmond Savings Credit Union has decided to shut down Humungous Bank – the fictional financial institution that provided the focal point for one of the most successful branding campaigns the B.C. Lower Mainland has seen in some time.

But don’t cry for Humungous. It’s quite possible, in fact, that Canada’s most famous non-existent bank – with its celebrated commitment to customer dissatisfaction – will be coming to other towns in the near future. Maybe even yours.

The Humungous Bank campaign is indeed on hiatus for the time being, confirms Brent Cuthbertson, vice-president, marketing for Richmond Savings. But the Richmond, B.C.-based financial institution is now looking at the possibility of licensing components of the brand program to credit unions elsewhere in North America.

From the outset, the campaign had a clear, simple goal: to position Richmond Savings as an alternative to the big banks by highlighting its key point of difference – namely, superior customer service. The target? Disgruntled bank customers.

It was the credit union’s ad agency, Vancouver-based Palmer Jarvis DDB, which created the Humungous Bank concept. With its bureaucratic inefficiency and cheerful indifference to the basic principles of customer service, Humungous embodied precisely the kind of big-bank experience that the target audience so desperately wanted to escape.

British Columbians got their first taste of the Humungous experience in 1995, with a series of satirical radio spots that depicted customers suffering painful humiliation at the hands of the bank’s representatives. So enthusiastic was the initial public response that the credit union quickly decided to take the concept and run with it.

Since then, the campaign has evolved through a number of phases (most memorably, a series of Humungous Bank print ads with slogans such as ‘We built this bank one service charge at a time’), and spun off a popular Web site (www.humungous.com).

What’s more, it has helped bring about some significant bottom line results. Since the campaign launched, Richmond Savings membership has grown 55%, to 80,000, and assets under management have increased nearly 100%, to $2.8 billion.

Clearly, the Humungous campaign struck a real chord with consumers, says Chris Staples, senior vice-president, national creative director with Palmer Jarvis DDB. ‘We were able to anticipate the movement against the big banks by customers and get out in front of it, so that we were sort of seen as the leader of that parade.’

So why shelve such a popular campaign?

Well, complications arose earlier this year when Richmond Savings entered into discussions with a number of other leading credit unions across the country about banding together to form a single national organization. Under the existing regulatory framework, Cuthbertson says, this could only happen if the participating credit unions were to structure themselves, collectively, as a bank – to be known as the National Community Bank.

And therein lay the dilemma. Could Richmond really continue to slam the banks – the campaign theme line, after all, was ‘We’re not a bank. We’re better’ – if, in fact, it might become a bank itself in the near future?

‘We didn’t want to be contradictory and create potential confusion on the part of our customers,’ Cuthbertson says.

So it was, with a heavy heart, that the Richmond Savings marketing team elected to put Humungous Bank on hold – at least until discussions regarding the National Community Bank initiative have reached some resolution. (Cuthbertson expects the picture to have become clearer by the end of the year.)

By that point, however, the credit union had already begun formulating a plan that would allow Humungous to live on.

For some time, Cuthbertson says, credit unions from other regions had been asking if they might buy rights to some or all of the Humungous Bank creative. The more inquiries the Richmond Savings folk received, the more they thought about possibly bundling up the various elements of the brand campaign – from radio advertising to in-branch promotional materials – and offering the package to interested parties.

‘We saw that there is a business opportunity here,’ Cuthbertson says.

Richmond Savings took its offering out into the marketplace earlier this summer, and has had discussions with a number of smaller credit unions in Canada and the U.S. To help generate interest in the program, Richmond has produced a ‘greatest hits’ CD featuring 10 of the best Humungous Bank radio ads of the past four years (including the 1997 spot quoted above).

Cuthbertson says Richmond Savings intends to take a flexible approach, allowing institutions to pick and choose those campaign elements best suited to their needs, rather than compelling them to purchase the entire brand program.

In addition to selling rights to the creative, Richmond is offering consultation services, to help organizations integrate the Humungous Bank strategy into their own marketing programs. These services would include assessing a credit union’s readiness to adopt the positioning – a critical step, since the advertising will almost certainly backfire if the institution in question can’t live up to the promise of superior service.

‘There’s more to this than just the creative materials,’ Cuthbertson says. ‘This is an integrated brand process. You have to have your organization and your values aligned to support it properly.’

It is exceedingly rare for a client to license out a brand advertising concept to other parties in this fashion, Chris Staples says. That Richmond Savings saw an opportunity to do so with Humungous Bank is proof positive that the campaign is built on ‘a real universal truth,’ he argues.

‘I think the sentiment is timeless,’ Staples says. ‘Certainly the banks haven’t improved since the campaign was launched. They seem to have been more preoccupied with finding partners for themselves through mergers than with serving their customers.’

While Humungous Bank is out of action, Richmond Savings continues to maintain an advertising presence in the Lower Mainland market.

During the summer, Richmond launched a series of radio spots intended to underline the credit union’s commitment to customer service. Similar in tone and style to the Humungous Bank creative, the ads used comic scenarios to illustrate the poor quality of service that Canadians have grown used to receiving, and then suggested that consumers should raise their expectations by sampling the Richmond Savings experience.

A promotional campaign, offering a customized Volkswagen Beetle convertible as the grand prize, has also helped drive traffic to branches.

Depending on the outcome of the National Community Bank initiative, it is possible that Richmond Savings may return to the Humungous Bank concept. But if this should prove to be the end of the line…well, Cuthbertson for one is satisfied that the campaign has made its mark. And then some.

‘I think this was probably the first campaign in the financial services industry that took a stand against the banking establishment and tried to elevate an important dimension that had been lost and forgotten – namely, the delivery of customer service,’ Cuthbertson says. ‘It spoke on behalf of customers who were frustrated with lack of control and lack of value. It also did wonders to position us as a strong competitor to the banks, and encouraged people to take a fresh look at credit unions.’

Sidebar: Radio spots carry on in satiric spirit

Richmond Savings may have retired Humungous Bank for now, but the campaign’s satiric tone lives on in the credit union’s latest pool of radio spots. Here’s a sample:

‘Computer’

Announcer: Richmond Savings presents yet another tale from the world of low expectations.

SFX: Phone on hold

Woman: Technical support, may I help you?

Man: Yes, uh … oh, I got through! My new computer keeps crashing.

Woman: It is a computer, sir.

Man: I guess you’ve got a point there.

Woman: Thank you for calling.

Man: No, no, wait, miss … ma’am, uh … See, I think it crashes too often.

Woman: All right, let’s give the wheel a spin.

SFX: Wheel of fortune spinning.

Man: Uhhh…What are you doing?

Woman: Solving your problem, sir.

Man: Oh!

SFX: Wheel stops.

Woman: The wheel says, ‘Check power outlet.’

Man: Well, you know, funny thing, I’ve done that, and there’s nothing wrong with the power.

Woman: Well, let’s try again.

SFX: Wheel spins again.

Man: Don’t you actually know anything about computers?

Woman: Sir, you could fill a warehouse with things I don’t know.

Man: Oh…

SFX: Wheel stops.

Woman: It says, ‘Turn computer off.’

Man: Well, how would that help?

Woman: The wheel doesn’t say, sir.

Announcer: At Richmond Savings, we believe low expectations shouldn’t be a way of life. In fact, our members own us, which means they have a say in the way we operate. So come to Richmond Savings, and let us raise your expectations. Richmond Savings is Canada’s third-largest credit union, with locations throughout the Lower Mainland.

Also in this report:

– BC Gas goes on the offensive: Launches pre-emptive branding campaign in anticipation of deregulation p.30

– BC Hydro opts for emotional appeal p.30

– Vancouver market still hot, hot, hot: Buyers hope proposed new station will relieve shortage of inventory p.35