It's a split decision for Cherry Hill's Commerce Bank.
Commerce will keep its name - with a TD in front - and it's "America's Most Convenient Bank" slogan when it is acquired by TD Financial Group, of Toronto. The combined TD Commerce will have 1,100 branches from Maine to Washington and in Florida.
But Commerce's bright-red color scheme will be swapped for TD's green, and the widely recognized red "C" will be retired after the $7.3 billion deal closes by the end of this month.
One customer at a Cherry Hill branch took the changes announced today in stride.
"My only concern is that it remains as good as it is," Sondra Kaye, a Cherry Hill resident, said of the bank she has used for 10 years. Above all, she cares about Commerce's evening and weekend hours. "That's the main thing."
Ed Clark, chairman and chief executive officer of TD Financial, said during a visit to Kaye's Cherry Hill branch today that his company planned to expand the combined bank after the purchase. The goal, Clark said, is not to cut costs but to build more branches and sell more services, such as investments through its TD Ameritrade brokerage arm. The expansion, however, is likely to be slower than the pace Commerce maintained.
The combined TD Commerce will be the second-largest bank by deposits in the Philadelphia market. TD Financial, through its TD Banknorth Inc. banking unit, is 15th.
Clark said the bank would try to expand market share in existing locations from Maine to Washington, "and then we'll head south, following the Commerce model" of building new branches.
Commerce had $15 billion in deposits at 127 branches as of June 30, according to the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. That was well behind Wachovia Corp.'s market-leading $24.5 billion and just ahead of Citizens Bank's $14.1 billion.
TD Banknorth had 41 branches with $965.6 million in deposits in the region. Commerce's average deposits per branch in the region of $118.2 million were five times those of TD Banknorth, whose branches here used to be Hudson United Bank, Jefferson Bank and Interboro Savings.
Bharat Masrani, president and chief executive of TD Banknorth, which is based in Portland, Maine, said the bank would open 25 to 30 branches in Commerce's markets this year and five or six in TD Banknorth's.
By comparison, Commerce opened 47 branches last year, even though it was embroiled in a struggle with federal bank regulators for half the year and did not get any approvals for new branches.
The regulatory struggle stemmed from the bank's business relationships with companies linked to founder Vernon W. Hill II and culminated in his departure last June and the company's sale.
The October agreement to sell likely protected Commerce shareholders from a painful financial loss. While Commerce's shares have fallen 10 percent since the deal was announced, the 24-member Standard & Poor's 500 Banks Index is off 32 percent over the same period as mortgage-related turmoil has ravaged the industry.
Amid a widespread sell-off of financial stocks, Commerce's shares lost $1.03 today, or 2.81 percent, to close at $35.61 on the New York Stock Exchange.
One person saddened by TD's decision to stop using the stylized "C" logo was Richard Yeager, who designed it in the early 1970s, during the bank's formative stages.
"The red C is now the dead C," he said.
Peter Madden, founder of AgileCat, a Center City marketing agency, said he understood Yeager's dismay. "From a design standpoint, it was a really strong stamp," he said.
Madden, who is a TD Banknorth customer dating back to the days of Jefferson Bank, praised other moves by TD.
"I think it was certainly smart on their part to keep the Commerce name around," he said.