People's Bank of Commerce

BVM: What plans do you have for growth and diversification? Trautman: “In 2017, we bought a 36-year-old factoring company that buys receivables from truckers, predominately on the east coast, to diversify our income streams. We need to get 40 percent of our income from non-interest income. Traditional community banks have about 85 percent of their income from interest income. It’s really challenging to make a living as a community bank when interest rates are as low as they are right now and there’s no value on earning rates on deposits. So we were successful with that. We also have a mortgage division that has taken advantage of this low interest rate market and has grown substantially. “Southern Oregon is a unique market. It used to be a timber community – and it’s the gateway to recreation. We’re 90 miles from the coast on I-5, so Medford is the first major city you’ll hit in Oregon if you’re coming from California. A lot of our growth over the years is from Californians office to a new building. We built a three-story commercial building about 21,000 sq. ft. with the bank and lending on the first floor. We leased the second floor to the medical community and the third floor was our administration offices. “That served us well until about three years ago, when there was a change in the customer dynamic. People wanted a more open environment, where they could see their loan officers and key decision makers. So we built another three-story building in a different part of town, this time with limited offices. The whole ground floor is wide open. It’s a throw-back industrial look building, long and narrow with exposed ceilings. It has rounded corners and is totally unique in our market. We use the entire space and ended up moving our admin from the five-year old headquarters on Barnett to the third floor of the new building to centralize our services. We’re building our sixth branch now in Klamath Falls. We also have a branch in Grants Pass, Oregon.”