Designing Your Branch Prototype

Your branch is the physical manifestation of your institution, oftentimes a critical beacon for attracting new members or customers in the market and in growing the client relationships you already have. That’s why it’s so important to make sure you get branching right. 

With your branch space, you’re providing a place where people can interact with an actual person to provide solutions. It’s the arena for primarily opening accounts, having questions answered or taking care of larger or more complex transactions. Digital channels simply cannot provide the desired human element, or solve the complex issues your clients face every day.

When looking to reinvent your brand, sometimes the branch, and a new prototype at that, is what is needed to begin anew. 

Why? Because a new prototype branch universally establishes and dictates your brand and culture. It should provide the functionality and services needed to fit the changing requirements of your modern clientele.  

In fact, almost all of LEVEL5‘s projects involve a new branch prototype. Wise financial institution leaders truly see the value of it. 

In this article, we’ll cover the purpose and successful implementation of a prototype and what it means for you in 2022 and beyond.

When Do You Need A Branch Prototype? How Is It Developed?

You need a branch prototype when you want an effective, uniformed, comprehensive way to optimize your entire branch network. Notice we said your entire branch network, not just the future locations that are built to turn heads in newer markets.  

Once your critical branch elements have been identified and put into the design, they can be translated into all of your existing branch spaces too. 

This is monumentally important to point out since many credit union and community banks often look up one day and find themselves with multiple locations having a stale, unengaging ambience to them. A prototype helps with needed rejuvenation as well as future builds.   

So how is it developed? 

While putting your prototype together, we work closely with you and key stakeholders through an in-depth Programming and Visioning phase to identify and deeply understand your: 

• Needs 
• Goals
• Retail Strategies 
• Influences 
• Brand Elements 

We then synthesize all of this into a design with our experienced Design team.

Once finished, your prototype branch will include the basic structural outlines, preferred technology, design choices, banking equipment, brand deployments and iconic elements, narrowing down to aspects like your furniture style, tile selections, and carpet color.

Tweak Your PROTOTYPE to Fit Varying Needs

Having an excellent branch template makes it more convenient to proliferate uniformed locations in a myriad ways, allowing you to minimize time and cost spent re-designing as the prototype can simply be adjusted to fit.  

Your standard-sized floorplan can be seamlessly translated into micro branches, stand-alone kiosks in smaller towns or even for your regional offices or Ops Center, keeping your design components and customer experiences in lock-step with your strategy. 

Contact our team now to discuss your new branch prototype. For nearly 20 years, we’ve utilized best design build practices to help a multitude of clients create and implement effective, beautiful branch templates.