Must-read local business coverage that exposes the trends, connects the dots and contextualizes the impact to Buffalo’s economy.
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You would never guess the home of Chase’s new location on Transit Road in Amherst used to be a KFC and Taco Bell.
The building in Eastview Plaza has been transformed into a sleek-looking branch, and marks Chase’s return to retail banking in a region where the brand has been absent since 1999.
The branch opened for business on Tuesday. Chase – the retail and commercial banking business of JP Morgan Chase – is returning to the Buffalo market in a significant way. Bank officials have announced six locations in the region, and are finalizing plans for two additional locations, for a total of eight.
That’s a lot of new branches at a time when many other banks are cutting back their networks.
Cynthia Frederick and Robert Recla in the lobby of the new Chase Bank on Transit Road in Amherst.
“We get that all the time: ‘Everybody else is closing. How are you opening branches? Everybody’s going digital,’ ” said Robert J. Recla, vice president and regional support lead for Chase’s New York North and Connecticut region. “We understand that. We want to be where our customers are.
“At the same time, we want to allow them to bank when, where and how. We see the branches as advice centers, across the entire spectrum of customer segments.”
The News’ Buffalo Next team covers the changing Buffalo Niagara economy. Get the news in your inbox 5 days a week.
Bank branches, and how customers use them, have changed dramatically since the Chase name exited the local market more than two decades ago. Branches are typically smaller, with so many routine transactions handled online, instead. The new Chase branch on Transit has just two teller windows inside.
Chase is re-entering the market through a mix of property types. Only one of the six locations – at Broadway and Penora Street in Depew – used to be a bank branch, with First Niagara Bank.
Chase refurbished a former insurance office at Amherst and Bridgeman streets in Buffalo. At Sheridan and Alberta drives in Amherst, the bank is moving into a new retail development.
Two other locations, at Crossroads Centre in Orchard Park and Southwestern Boulevard and McKinley Parkway in Hamburg, will be newly built branches.
New competition
Chase is a banking powerhouse, with more than 4,700 branches nationwide. In the Buffalo area, Chase will face competitors such as M&T Bank and KeyBank, which have dozens of local branches between them and are the leaders in deposit market share.
“We have a strong competitive landscape here in Buffalo,” said Cynthia Frederick, managing director for Chase’s New York North and Connecticut region.
“We don’t go into markets thinking about, ‘This bank is in the No. 1 spot or that bank is in the No. 2 or 3 spot in terms of market share, and necessarily targeting that bank,” she said. “We come to deliver the e-service that we know we provide and we know we’ll bring to customers as a result of that.
“We still grow,” she said. “We still move into new markets, and we earn our market share when we build it.”
Besides, Chase isn’t exactly starting from scratch in Buffalo, Recla said.
The lobby of the new Chase branch on Transit Road in Amherst.
The bank already has customers with Buffalo addresses who have accounts in Rochester, the closest market where Chase has had branches. Chase is letting customers know that branches are opening closer to home.
And JPMorgan Chase has maintained commercial banking operations in Buffalo, even without any Chase branches in town.
Recla said Chase has strong brand familiarity, and already does business with households around the country, even if only through a credit card or a mortgage.
“The octagon shines blue, and people recognize it,” he said. “We feel like there’s a lot of pent-up demand.”
The six Chase branches will employ a combined 42 people. Recla said hiring has gone well at a time when many employers are struggling to find workers. Most of Chase’s new employees have experience in banking – and some have become unofficial recruiters.
“They promoted us to their best people from where they came,” he said.
Recla said Chase’s corporate culture, emphasizing diversity, equity and inclusion in the workplace, appeals to the new hires.
“We feel very strongly that diverse opinions and perceptions matter, and everyone be part of something.”
Here’s when the rest of Chase’s local branches are due to open:
• Amherst and Bridgeman, February 2023.
• Sheridan and Alberta, February 2023.
• Broadway and Penora, March 2023.
• Southwestern and McKinley, July 2023
• Crossroads Centre, fourth quarter 2023.
• Two additional locations, one in late 2023 and the other in early 2024.
Want to know more? Three stories to catch you up:
• Chase bringing branch banking back to Buffalo
• M&T remains dominant in attracting local deposit dollars
• M&T Bank acquires 29 branches from Chase Manhattan
Laying the Cornerstone
Cornerstone Community Federal Credit Union is making headway on its new branch at headquarters, at South Transit and Strauss roads in Lockport.
Cornerstone is renovating a building it acquired at 5810 S. Transit Road, and making an addition to it. The branch will include a nod to Lockport’s history, with teller stations resembling the Lockport Locks Flight of Five. A grand opening is planned for next year.
Another of the credit union’s locations – 55 Stevens St., which is two miles away – will remain open until the new location is open for business.
Catch up on the latest news from the Buffalo Niagara economy:
Norstar Development USA is selling its New York operations and real estate to a Boston-based real estate developer that specializes in affordable and mixed-income housing
An Albion nursing home where 23 residents died from Covid-19 is being sued by the State Attorney General’s office.
Roswell Park Comprehensive Cancer Center launched its mobile cancer screening unit, aimed at bringing services to areas where they aren’t readily available.
Sonwil Distribution Center is seeking nearly $12 million in tax breaks to build a massive warehouse in the North America Center Industrial Park in West Seneca.
Holiday shopping is off to a fast start, but inflation is squeezing shoppers’ budgets.
Graduate students at the University at Buffalo are looking for better pay.
How did Mercy Hospital in South Buffalo get through the snowstorm? Sleep quarters for staff, and even snowmobile rides for staff.
A Genesis showroom may be coming soon to Clarence.
A Buffalo firm has acquired a nursing home in Pennsylvania.
Unemployment has dropped to a modern-day low of 2.7% in the Buffalo Niagara region, despite sluggish job growth.
Bank on Buffalo is launching a mobile branch to bring banking services to areas without traditional bank offices.
Thousands of local Teamsters retirees will have their pension benefits restored, and will be compensated for past payment reductions, with help from the federal government.
New York handed out the first licenses to open stores for legal cannabis sales – but none in Western New York.
Five reads from Buffalo Next:
1. The Buffalo Niagara economy usually recovers more slowly from recessions than the rest of the country, and the latest downturn is no different. The region has had the fourth-slowest recovery among the 100 major U.S. metro areas.
2. New rules are allowing college athletes to cash in on endorsement deals and commercial use of their likeness, but the impact has been minimal at colleges across Western New York.
3. 10 ways Christmas shopping will be different this year: Despite all of retailers’ worries through times of recession, pandemic and inflation, consumers have kept spending. But this year plenty will be different.
4. When Covid hit, it shut down professional sports. It also essentially shut down Delaware North’s sports concessions business: No fans meant no one to buy hot dogs and beer. Now, fans are back, and Delaware North’s Sportservice business is back, too.
5. ‘We’ve had high caseloads nonstop’: There is a critical need for mental health and addiction workers in Western New York, as told by two longtime employees in Warsaw.
The Buffalo Next team gives you the big picture on the region’s economic revitalization. Email tips to buffalonext@buffnews.com or reach Deputy Business Editor David Robinson at 716-849-4435.
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Email tips to buffalonext@buffnews.com.
Must-read local business coverage that exposes the trends, connects the dots and contextualizes the impact to Buffalo’s economy.
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The project will retain 26 full-time jobs, and create 10 new positions.
Cynthia Frederick and Robert Recla in the lobby of the new Chase Bank on Transit Road in Amherst.
The lobby of the new Chase branch on Transit Road in Amherst.
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