SandAire, the multi-family office based in the West End of London, has been revamping its branding to emphasise its USPs for today’s ultra-wealthy families. Here, director Karen Clark outlines the rationale behind the changes and what she sees as SandAire’s main strengths.

SandAire, a fifteen year-old multi-family office based in the West End of London, has been revamping its branding to emphasise its USPs for today’s ultra-wealthy families. Here, director Karen Clark outlines to WealthBriefing the rationale behind the changes and what she sees as SandAire’s main strengths.

Watchers of the industry will know that there has been a marked rise in the prominence of multi-family offices in the past few years; previously very low-key MFOs have become much more visible in marketing their services to HNW families who are disillusioned with the offerings of the big banks, but who lack the critical mass to warrant forming their own family office (net assets of $200 million is generally thought to be the minimum to make this practicable).

SandAire was set up by chairman Alexander Scott to manage his own family’s fortune after it sold Provincial Insurance in the mid-1990s. It has since grown to serve 17 client families with an average of £100 million (about $155 million) in assets – most of whom are now truly international and entrepreneurial in character.

Why rebrand?

Branding experts generally hold that all brands – no matter how strong – should be periodically “refreshed” to maintain focus and staff buy-in. However, SandAire’s recent rebrand is more about clarity and making the proposition clear to prospective client families. The feeling was that there wasn’t enough emphasis on SandAire’s tactical asset allocation, for example, “so we needed to make things clearer”, explains Clark. As such, the firm’s website (which was relaunched in February) now puts portfolio construction front and centre.

Clark also notes that there is an educative element to SandAire’s new marketing literature, since the very concept of an MFO still needs to gain traction among a client base who may be more used to dealing with the private office division of the big banks. “Clients can find it hard to grasp that 26 people based in London can do a better job than a global bank with 85,000 employees. We’re still an outlier in terms of the solution… it’s still a leap of faith to an extent,” she says.

USPs

One recent development at SandAire which will no doubt be very useful to its marketing staff on this front is the formation of the Wigmore Association. This is a collaborative agreement amongst six family offices to share knowledge and research on investment managers, investment strategies and products so that each member can tap the local expertise of its peers. As well as SandAire, its members are HQ Trust (Germany), The Myer Family Company (Australia), Northwood Family Office (Canada) and Pitcairn and Progeny 3 from the US – a geographical mixture which looks to be most useful when it comes to selecting local investment managers, for example.

For Clark, the Wigmore Association is a manifestation of SandAire’s collaborative approach which seeks to maximise – and share – intellectual capital. SandAire is in fact very happy to share its 15 years of experience and likes to be completely frank about it as part of maintaining what Clark calls “a solid and sterling reputation.” “We don’t claim to be a solution for everybody,” she says, agreeing that an important part of branding is not being afraid to say who you aren’t.

What SandAire is not about is aggressively chasing stellar returns, as its focus is firmly on wealth preservation and risk management, says Clark. “After all, if our client families doubled their wealth under our tutelage, their lifestyles would not change; if their wealth halved under our tutelage then their lifestyles would change dramatically,” she points out.

Risk management is clearly a top priority at SandAire, as it typically takes 18 months to take clients from an initial conversation through to full implementation. It is also noteworthy that not only will every client get a bespoke investment policy, but so too does every portfolio (each client family tends to have an average of five portfolios for various purposes and domiciles). “The risk characteristics for each are thought of individually,” explains Clark, adding that SandAire uses a robust mixture of quantitative and qualitative methodologies for risk-profiling, including psychometrics.

This emphasis on risk management chimes with a heightened focus on the issue right across the industry internationally; regulators such as the UK’s Financial Services Authority, Switzerland’s FINMA and the US SEC all have wealth management firms in their sights and the FSA in particular has fired several shots across the bow of the UK’s firms warning them about clients being put into unsuitable investments.

In fact, the role of the single or multi-family office being predominantly that of a risk manager was the main message of a new study released by US consultancy and member network Family Office Exchange last week (to read a Family Wealth Report article on the study click here).

Striking a balance

In fact, avoiding getting things wrong seems to be a top priority for SandAire – the MFO isn’t afraid to outsource elements of the service mix where it isn’t the expert, such as in finding top-notch schools for clients’ children. “If we know the area as well as we should then we do it in-house; if not, we outsource,” says Clark. This balance of in- and outsourcing is clearly a delicate balancing act, but this seems to be what SandAire is all about, particularly when it comes to telling clients honestly “how it is”. “We are of service to our clients, but we aren’t servile to them,” Clark says.

Visitors to SandAire’s new-look website will actually see much more evidence of this type of refreshing candour – which is not something one typically associates with the rarified atmosphere of the family office space. Sections entitled “What we do” and “How we do it” have clearly been designed with those new to the concept in mind. SandAire’s clients are in fact typically first or second generation wealth and they really appreciate the fact that “Alex [Scott] has walked in their shoes,” explains Clark.

This sense of shared experience is another important facet of SandAire’s branding, since the MFO is “all about competency and chemistry…this is what gives families the trust to delegate things to us,” says Clark. The emotional side of wealth management is also clearly front of mind at SandAire, as evidenced by its marketing literature. “Ultimately, we simplify our clients’ lives by taking care of their wealth,” declares SandAire’s website. Would that the brand positioning of all MFOs (and private banks) was so frank.

SandAire may have historically been “under the radar” and that is regarded as a good thing at the MFO. “Clients really appreciate our relatively low profile,” says Clark. But we can expect SandAire to become at least a little more visible; the firm is currently devising a social media strategy and so we might be seeing tweets and the like from the MFO soon. SandAire is also close to launching a new Singapore office as a response to its growing international client base. When asked “why Singapore” Clark’s response is typically frank.  “Where we go is where our clients lead us,” she says. Where its clients will lead SandAire in the years to come remains to be seen, but if the trajectory of the past 16 years is anything to go by, we can expect a lot from this West End MFO yet.