“Cafaro Greenleaf is constantly evolving our comprehensive service model to reflect where the industry is going, not where it is today,” says Jamie Greenleaf. “As advisers, our role is to push the industry out of its comfort zone, and to collaborate with our clients to find new solutions and to embrace evolution.”
Since its founding in 1981, Cafaro Greenleaf, in Red Bank, New Jersey, has wanted to be on the forefront of trends. Its clients were among the first U.S. plan sponsors to embrace automatic enrollment, back at its beginnings in the industry, and, as a result, participation, deferral rates and balances in these plans are higher than industry averages, Greenleaf notes.
“We believe we need to show more value than being a retirement plan consultant alone, as that’s only one part of the benefit dollar our clients are reviewing. We show that by designing more targeted, successful benefit packages.”
Last year, Cafaro Greenleaf launched a personal financial planning division, Greenleaf Financial, which offers financial wellness, investment management, insurance strategies and retirement planning for individuals, including monthly educational webinars.
Recently, the firm began promoting health savings accounts (HSAs) to its clients, and it believes the next stage for the retirement planning industry is to develop decumulation strategies and products.
Greenleaf says these strategies have enabled her firm to successfully help participants retire by age 67 and reduce future health care costs and liabilities. “This allows us to become a real partner to our clients,” she says. “We have always viewed ourselves as an extension of their organizations.”