UK SME digital bank Zempler Bank says rebrand costs hundreds of thousands of pounds

UK SME bank Cashplus has this week officially rebranded as Zempler Bank, in a brand overhaul which the bank says has cost hundreds of thousands of pounds and was two years in the making. The bank made the change, because the name Cashplus, launched in 2005, had become outdated for a digital bank in an increasingly cashless age.

Asked about the cost of the rebrand, Rich Wagner, founder and CEO, Zempler Bank, said: “I would say it costs in the millions. These ad agencies and these marketing creative people do cost quite a lot of money. "And then if you labour on the internal costs, the IT costs, websites the need to be updated, design over a two-year period.”

The rebrand to Zempler (which combines the words “simple” and exemplary”) took two years to complete. However, the millions figure, stated by Wagner, includes operational costs that would exist without the rebrand, such as salaries.

The standalone cost of the rebrand, including agency hire, internal hours, and production costs, is around the lower six-figure mark, it is understood. Zempler Bank is now planning to carry out some above-the-line advertising, showcasing its brand overhaul.

Amid the brand overhaul, Zempler Bank warned its customers on its website of fraudsters piggybacking on the name change.Its website says: “Fraudsters may use our name change to pretend to be Cashplus or Zempler Bank to get you to do something so they can access your account."

Wagner says it had “prepared heavily” for fraud attacks, but to date it had avoided them.

He said:

“Never say you are ever safe from cyber or from economic crime, but so far so good. And we have been able to gently migrate our customers over without any material negative impact to them.”

How will Zempler Bank judge whether the rebrand has been a success? “It’s a difficult thing to measure,” says Wagner, but a jump in new account openingS and brand awareness would be some measure of success, he says.

Separately, Zempler Bank’s CFO Leigh Bartlett has left the bank after less than a year in the role. Bartlett has been replaced by former NatWest executive Dominic Wade in the role.