Finding a No-Handcuffs Insurance Network
You should stay in a relationship because you want to, not because you have to. It’s true in love and it’s true in business. Harold Salant, owner of Harold J. Salant Insurance Agency, appreciates that the Smart Choice insurance network doesn’t try to lock him in with restrictive terms. “Either party can go at any time,” Harold says. “This way, people are willing to work to keep it together.”
A Series of Unfortunate Events Leads to Good Fortune
Harold’s insurance story begins over 20 years ago. After being laid off four times in three years, he was searching for a solid career path. He decided to try insurance and quickly hit his stride selling property and casualty insurance as a MetLife agent stationed inside a real estate office.
The arrangement worked for him – but it didn’t work for his manager, who wanted Harold to focus on life insurance. “I was closing a lot of sales, and he wasn’t getting residuals because he didn’t have a P&C license,” Harold explains.
Ultimately, Harold left and started his own P&C agency, which went well for a while. However, 10 years into the arrangement, his carrier went out of business. He had 15 people working for him and he had to lay most of them off. He knew he could regroup, but it was a major blow.
Avoiding a “Hotel California” Scenario
Harold knew he had found a secure career in insurance, but he still needed to find a solid partner. After being burned by relying on one carrier, he started exploring insurance networks and aggregators.
The groups he researched had some appealing features, but Harold didn’t like the details. After dealing with hefty contracts and restrictive terms in the captive world, he’d learned to read everything. What he read convinced him that he’d be locked in if he signed. “Their contracts are like Hotel California,” he says. “You can get in, but you can never get out.”
Eventually, three options rose to the top of his list: Smart Choice, a smaller network, and an aggregator. These three had the least restrictive contracts. However, upon further investigation, it became clear that the other two couldn’t come close to competing with Smart Choice.
“They don’t have the footprint, the horsepower, the size that Smart Choice has,” Harold says, estimating that they had about 30 or 40 agencies compared to the 10,000 agency partnerships Smart Choice boasts. “They couldn’t bring anything to the table that compared to what I get with Smart Choice.”
Looking for the Catch
At the Massachusetts Association of Insurance Agents (MAIA) “Big Event” Conference and Trade Show, Harold talked with Joe Tulli, a State Director at Smart Choice.
“I probably grilled him a bit,” Harold admits, explaining that he kept asking Joe questions to figure out what the catch was. But there was no catch. Unlike many aggregators, Smart Choice didn’t try to lock him in. They also had low productivity requirements. “As an entrepreneur, you need the flexibility and freedom to work how you want to work,” Harold says. Since Smart Choice could give him that (along with access to attractive markets), joining just made sense. “It was a no-brainer,” he says.
That was 10 years ago.
Surviving and Thriving in a Tough Insurance Market
Over the past decade, Harold has enjoyed access to multiple programs and has tried a few different strategies to figure out what works for him. He has some business with Smart Start commercial, but the majority of his growth to date has been through Smart Start personal lines.
“Probably about 70% of my business is personal lines,” he says, explaining that this is changing as commercial lines are now accounting for a slightly larger share of his book.
Being able to adapt has been critical. Just like in many other markets, Massachusetts has seen carriers pull out. “Some of our carriers are leaving Massachusetts due to the environment,” Harold says. “Everyone is facing these challenges – it’s not isolated to Smart Choice.”
Fortunately, Smart Choice has helped him find new opportunities. “If there’s a new product, he tells me about it,” Harold says, referring to Joe at Smart Choice. “I think getting these extra contacts has helped me grow, so I can add support staff, which takes a lot of pressure off.”
When new commercial opportunities arise and Harold isn’t sure of the best path to take, Smart Choice provides the guidance he needs. Without this access and support, he may not have been able to survive the market disruption, much less prosper. “A lot of independent agents died on the grapevine because they had nothing else,” Harold says.
"Your program has allowed us to grow in a market that has been challenging …Without Smart Choice, we would not have been able to survive, and I am grateful”
-Harold Salant, Owner Harold J. Salant Insurance Agency
Still Thankful, 10 Years Later
Many relationships start out great but lose their shine over time. That’s not the case with Harold and Smart Choice.
In November of 2023, Harold wrote a letter to Smart Choice’s president to express appreciation for the support he’s received over the past decade. “Your program has allowed us to grow in a market that has been challenging…Without Smart Choice, we would not have been able to survive, and I am grateful,” he wrote.
Are you interested in exploring your options with a “no-handcuffs” contract?