NAMIC Chief Executive: Mutual Insurance Has Appeal for Younger Insureds
January 23, 2017 by Meg Green
NEW YORK – Chuck Chamness, president and chief executive officer of the National Association of Mutual Insurance Companies, said the mutual insurance sector aligns the interests of policyholders with the company, which should resonate with younger prospects.
Chamness spoke with A.M. BestTV at the Property Casualty Insurance Joint Industry Forum in New York.
View the video version of this interview at: http://www.ambest.com/v.asp?v=chamness117
Following is an edited transcript of the interview.
Q: What is the state of the mutual insurance industry today?
A: As the president will say in his State of the Union, I’m sure, the state of the mutual insurance association and the state of the mutual insurance industry is strong. It’s huge. No, in all seriousness, the mutual industry is strong, stable, competing very well in the marketplace. As you know, NAMIC represents a mutual insurance industry. We’ve got about 1,400 member companies, just under 40% of the entire property/casualty insurance market covered by our membership by the mutual segment. It’s doing very well. We think that the mutual industry has more than 200 years’ experience insuring America.
Today happens to be the birthday of the founder of the mutual insurance industry, Ben Franklin, 311 year ago Ben was born and he, of course, founded the Philadelphia Contributionship back in colonial America. Mutual insurance industry has been strong for those 250 plus years. I think we go into the new year with a nice wind at our backs.
Q: Are you seeing any growth among mutuals?
A: We are. We have seen a trend that started really post-financial crisis. We think it’s because of a lot of factors, but when you look at consumers today, millennials, Main Street versus Wall Street interest, they love to have access to local insurers.
We, of course, have national writers that are within our membership but also many regional and state-based insurers that are local and can present a local identity to their policyholders. We also think the interest of policyholders being aligned with the company, which is really the secret sauce of mutual, is a key ingredient that’s really resonating with younger people today.
Q: Given current market conditions, do mutuals have an advantage over their for-profit counterparts?
A: Of course, our response is yes. We think that the alignment with policyholder helps our mutual insurance companies really understand the markets that they serve, the policyholders that they serve and the fact that they don’t have to worry about a separate entity or interest, a stockholder interest, it really is an enduring model that has worked very well for a long time and continues to be a benefit today.
View this and other interviews at http://www.ambest.tv
(By Meg Green, senior associate editor, A.M. BestTV: Meg.Green@ambest.com)