Business Owners

You know what it takes to build a successful business. It takes vision, preparedness, skills and desire – not to mention a focused dedication to achieving your goals. If you are like most business owners, you’ve worked hard and made many sacrifices to grow your business. That’s why you should put just as much energy into protecting it as you did building it.

Ask yourself these important questions:

Do I have a plan for my business when I retire?
Is my business capable of continuing its success in the event of my or my partner’s untimely death or disability?
Is my family adequately protected if something were to happen to me?
Have I done everything I can to attract, retain and reward the key employees that are critical to my business?

If you answered “no” to any of these questions, you may want to consider implementing a formal business planning strategy. Proper planning can help you protect your business, attract and retain key employees, and help ensure that your business transfers in the manner in which you choose.

No business plan is complete without a financial strategy for the unexpected. Start by exploring all your protection options. Then develop a long-term strategy that can help protect the continuity of your business should you, a partner, or key employee decide to retire, leave the business, or unexpectedly dies or becomes disabled.

Most business owners spend the majority of their time working in their business instead of on their business. We can help ensure that the business protection needs that are critical to the long-term success of your business are taken care of.

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RETIREMENT PLANNING

In today’s highly-competitive marketplace, it is becoming increasingly difficult to attract and retain top talent. Salary is no longer the sole compensation driver. Employees are also looking at an employer’s overall benefits package and its potential to help protect their families and adequately prepare them for retirement. These concerns are heightened by ever-changing tax laws, pension plan uncertainties, and Social Security shortfalls. As a business owner, you can offer insurance and retirement benefits that can make a difference for both your executives and your business.¹

Providing for your employees’ retirement can create a loyal and dedicated community around your business. A variety of retirement-planning products exist to provide the benefits that support your employees’ commitment to your business.

Consider a few of the following retirement planning options.

Annuities: Establishing individual retirement arrangements funded by annuities is easy for small business owners. It may also help you and your employees achieve your retirement savings objectives.

Disability Income Insurance: Disability income insurance can replace a portion of an employee’s earnings in the event of a disability. It can also help protect an employee’s ability to plan and save for retirement.

Life Insurance: Learn how life insurance can supplement² your employees’ retirement planning strategy to help align with the goals of their golden years.

Long-Term Care Insurance: Long term care insurance helps protect an employee’s assets and retirement plan, and is part of a complete financial strategy.

Retirement Plans: Reward and attract talent to your company by helping them prepare for retirement. A wide range of group retirement products and services can help you maintain a long-term retirement strategy.

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PROTECT YOUR BUSINESS

As a business owner, you know being prepared for anything is part of who you are. If one thing is certain today, it’s that you can’t be certain about what will happen tomorrow. You can, however, be certain that you’ve taken action to help protect yourself and your business from the unexpected.

Think about what would happen to your business if you, your business partner, or a key employee were to unexpectedly die or become too sick or injured to work. There’s no doubt that this would have a tremendous impact on your business and its continued success. But there’s good news: this is something you can plan for.

Having the foresight to protect your business against the loss of an owner or an essential employee—perhaps the company's most valuable asset—can mean the difference between business as usual or closing up shop. Just as you would insure your business property, you should also consider insuring the people who have the biggest impact on your company’s success. We can help with business planning strategies that are designed to protect your business from the unexpected and help ensure the business you’ve worked so hard to build withstands the test of time.

A few options to help protect your business:

Disability Income Insurance: Most likely, your company has already taken the appropriate steps to protect the business in the event of the death of an owner or partner. But have you protected the business in the event of a more common scenario - an owner’s or partner’s long-term disability?

Life Insurance: Learn how life insurance can help you protect your business from the unexpected death of a key employee.

Long Term Care Insurance: Having long term care insurance is part of smart business planning and can help protect your business and family if a long-term care need should arise.

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¹ There may be implications under the Employment Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA) depending on how certain types of insurance policies are made available to employees and whether such an arrangement constitutes an “employee benefit plan” under ERISA. Employers should consult their own tax and legal financial professionals for further information on potential ERISA implications.

² Distributions under the policy (including cash dividends and partial/full surrenders) are not subject to taxation up to the amount paid into the policy (the cost basis). If the policy is a Modified Endowment Contract, policy loans and/or distributions are taxable to the extent of gain and are subject to a 10% tax penalty. Access to cash values through borrowing or partial surrenders can reduce the policy’s cash value and death benefit, increase the chance the policy will lapse, and may result in a tax liability if the policy terminates before the death of the insured.