The Gather Financial® Story
Our story began in June, 2009 in Kansas City at the annual conference for the Garrett Planning Network (GPN). Michael was attending as a new member of GPN, attracted by the group’s commitment to making professional financial advice available to average people. Michael was contemplating a career change and planned to start a financial coaching practice emulating the Garrett model.
Abby was already a few steps ahead of Michael on this path. She had been a member of GPN for several years and already had a growing financial planning practice in North Carolina, where she resided at that time. But on that day in June she jogged to catch up with Michael on a lunch break because she had heard a most unusual fact – Michael lived in Maine!
Michael is a Mainer-by-choice, but Abby is a native of the Pine Tree State. With a population of just over 1.25 million in all of Maine, and only a few hundred financial planners pursuing the Garrett model in the whole U.S., Abby was surprised to find a kindred professional residing in her home state. What were the odds?!
Indeed, both Abby and Michael had taken a road less traveled in financial services and somehow arrived in the same place. Much of the industry is focused on selling financial products and catering to the ultra wealthy. A fee-only, planning-centric firm focused on regular people is still a rare find. Abby and Michael struck up a conversation and a friendship on that lunchtime stroll that continues to this day.
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I—
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference
—Robert Frost, “The Road Not Taken”
Fast forward a few years to 2013. Michael had just recently established Goldman Financial Planning (GoldmanFP) in Portland, Maine offering hourly, fee-only services to “everyday” people. It turns out that there are a lot of regular folks who need trustworthy financial advice, so in a matter of months Michael had more clients than he could handle on his own. By another bit of great luck, Betsy answered the ad Michael placed for a part-time assistant. Betsy was part-time and an assistant for just a blink of an eye before she became the backbone of GoldmanFP’s operations and a favorite of every client she came in contact with (which was all of them). Over the next several years, Michael and Betsy grew GoldmanFP and were fortunate to attract other like-minded team members focused on helping people navigate their financial lives.
Meanwhile, Abby found her way back home to the Bangor, Maine area and moved her also successful practice, SagePath Financial Planning, with her. She and Michael would get together periodically at the A-1 Diner in Gardiner, Maine to catch up on life and talk shop over pie and coffee. Michael proposed merger almost every time they would meet. GoldmanFP and SagePath were so closely aligned in values and approach, it seemed like a perfect match. Finally, Abby agreed and the two firms merged officially in summer of 2018, almost exactly 9 years from that stroll in Kansas City. Indeed, it has been a perfect match.
Gather Financial® Planning is a group of like-minded financial professionals, focused on truly helping our clients. We continue to grow, now serving several hundred clients each year spread across a handful of states. But we remain true to our values and small-town roots. In our opinion, that’s the way financial life planning should be.