We Asked Financial Advisors Why They Make Connections Among Clients. Here’s What They Told Us.

(By Steve Garmhausen) –

Max Kulyk, CEO of Chicory Wealth says, “Our firm is focused on clients who are politically progressive and have a very strong sense of social justice. A disproportionate amount of our clients are politically progressive women. Last spring we had a client event here in Atlanta where we invited folks to come hear specifically how they could participate in giving money to 501(c)(4) organizations [tax-exempt, nonprofit organizations primarily operated to promote social welfare]. We expressly invited people who we knew were doing political giving.

We have a program called Chicory 1% for Social Justice, where we connect our clients to organizations in the community that we’re supporting. This year, for example, we’re supporting eight different organizations across the country that are supporting immigrants, and we’re having small niche events in cities where we have advisors located to connect our clients to those charities.

A lot of our clients and our advisors are active in political and charitable organizations where there’s a lot of crossover. For example, there’s a group of 250 very progressive women donors, and our money goes to grassroots social-justice organizations. I’ve been a member for 15 years. I have a number of clients who are members. I’ll meet a client, a woman who I think is the perfect fit, and I’ll bring them into this organization, so there’s this interesting cross pollination. I didn’t become a member of that organization to get clients so much as I now have clients who have become members.