Ingram's August 2022

Edward Jones Among financial-services firms in Mis souri, it’s hard to think of one with more brand clout than St. Louis-based Edward Jones. There are a great many good rea sons for that: The firm is managing more than $1.6 trillion in client assets. The company, which celebrates its centennial this year, has steadfastly defied corporate trends that define many financial-services organizations of that scale and cherish es its status as a privately-held entity.

There is, within that structure, a particu lar brand appeal all its own: “We’re able to focus on relationships, rather than shareholder returns,” the company says. Its namesake founded the company in a single room with a desk, three chairs, and a hat rack back in 1922; today, it has more than 15,000 offices in the United States and Canada, providing investment advi sory and other services to more than 8 million clients.

Evergy Merging two well-established brands in the investor-owned utility world presented a chal lenge when Great Plains Energy got together with Westar Energy in 2018, after years of failed courtship attempts. What to call it? Great Star? Western Energy? Turns out, something newwas waiting behind Door No. 3: Evergy. Company of ficials say they dove deep into responses from customers and employees before coming up withwordplay that combined “ever”—for reliabil ity— and “energy” for … well, of course, energy. “Evergy conveys our proud history as a reliable,

enduring source of energy for our community and our vision to continue being so far into the future,” they declared upon the unveiling of the brand. The Evergy name now shows up monthly on the utility bills of roughly 1 million customers in a market that runs from western Missouri to south-central Kansas. It carries more than just a power-source identity for customers: Evergy is also an active partner in helping residential con sumers and businesses manage their consump tion patterns and volumes to keep the power flowing affordably during times of peak demand.

H&R Block Another Missouri brand that started small—two brothers working out of a Mid town Kansas City office in 1955—but is now global is that of H&R Block. It’s not just Kan sas City’s leading provider of tax-prepara tion services; neither is it just the biggest one in Missouri or the U.S. Block is the world’s biggest in that space. The public ly traded company draws on a network of 60,000 tax professionals, prepping 21.6 mil lion individual returns in 2021 and provid ing guidance for 8.9 million more who opt

to file themselves. Commercial clients can also tap into H&R Block’s expertise with payroll and business consulting services. Combined, the various service lines spit out $3.4 billion in 2021 revenues. And its brand appeal extends beyond those needing help navigating IRS forms: In 2021, Forbes mag azine designated it among the best employ ers for new graduates. It previously recog nized Block as being one of the world’s best companies to work for, as well as one of its Best Employers for Women.

Hallmark Once upon a time, Hallmark sold greeting cards. But this isn’t 1910, and it’s not Joyce Hall’s start-up dream: Today’s Hallmark is a global brand in the expanded field of per sonal expressions, and its 27,000 employ ees worldwide help generate a $3.5 billion revenue powerhouse based in Kansas City. It’s hard to overstate Hallmark’s impact on this region’s creative class, as hundreds of its employee alumni have moved on to start their own enterprises in graphic design, pho tography, print production, and other lines of creative output.

Consider this: Hallmark’s army of artists and designers crank out 10,000 new and re designed messages a year, and you can find that not just on their greeting cards but on gift wrap, invitations, announcements, keep sakes, and other products. And you can find those in dozens of languages at retail outlets in more than 100 countries. Online competi tion has been an ongoing challenge for more than 25 years, but Hallmark continues to assert its brand in that hyper-charged com petition, with 2,000 of its 27,000 employees worldwide working at the headquarters.

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