Lafourche Booking Log – August 8, 2019
August 9, 2019
State Police sends out school bus safety reminders with school here
August 9, 2019
Around 50 business leaders, bankers, and customers held a celebration of the successful launch of a new bank on the east side of Houma on Thursday.
At 912 Grand Caillou road, Hancock Whitney held a ribbon cutting ceremony, for its East Houma Financial Center.
This marks Hancock Whitney’s 10th location in the Terrebonne, Lafourche, and St. Mary area.
“I like it,” said Robert Palmer, who has been a client for many years. “Easy to get in – easy to get out.”
Palmer came in to meet with a teller during the celebration. He said he appreciated most being able to exit on a side road and use the traffic light to merge onto Grand Caillou.
According to Renate Dehart, Retail Sales Leader, the new venue’s larger size allows for members of the staff to meet personally with more customers at a given time, while the location allows ease of access to the building.
“They’re not walking into a branch with total automation and our clients like this face-to-face,” she said.
The 6,000 square foot facility – 4,125 inside and 1,728 drive-through – houses 5 offices, 4 teller windows, and 4 drive-through lanes, a drive up ATM and a night depository. The range of services available are consumer, business, and commercial banking as well as investments and mortgage services.
The bank itself has been in operation since July 8th. Dehart said the bank decided to wait on the ceremony to allow employees and customers time to become accustom to the new location.
“Even after we closed the doors, we still had people going to the old ATM machine and trying to enter the old building,” she said.
Gary Lorio, the Senior Regional President of Hancock Whitney, told guests that Hancock Whitney would be purchasing MidSouth at the end of September which would bring the company to about $30 billion in assets, “which is a nice size for a regional bank, but more important is still local.”
Hancock Whitney’s Vice President and Senior Communications Officer, Paul Maxwell, explained that at the end of 2019 Hancock Whitney had $28.8 billion in assets, MidSouth reported $1.7 billion, and once the merger was completed Hancock Whitney would have more that $30 billion.
“Assets are, essentially, the bank’s loan portfolio and securities portfolio,” said Maxwell via email.
Terrebonne Parish President, Gordon Dove, was in attendance and spoke briefly to guests. He described Hancock Whitney as “good corporate citizens,” and that he and the parish both bank with them. He said they had a great location and told the audience he had been looking at the spot too.
“I was going to put our police department here, but they beat us to the punch,” Dove said. “It’s a beautiful building I’ve got to give it to them. Congratulations.”
