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Black & White Finance is finishing the year 2024 with its biggest month ever, and is doubling down on brokerage service and culture as it seeks to grow the business further into 2025.
Peter Vassilis, managing director of the Sydney-based brokerage, said the firm had grown out of a shoebox apartment in 2017 to purchasing and renovating an office last year in central Sydney.
The vision had been to grow a brokerage built on lifelong relationships with customers, that provides a “simplified, tailored, special lending experience” that turned customers into “raving fans”.
Having grown the business to eight experienced staff, Peter and Jaimee Vassilis, the firm’s operations manager, have seen the team’s hard work pay off with a $35 million month.
“It is our biggest month ever,” Peter told Australian Broker. “Thirty-five is a big month for us.”
“Now that we are more established, it is flowing through into a growing client base,” he said.
“We have had a real commitment over the last 12 months to deliver not just good, but great customer service, and that is really starting to resonate in the market.”
Existing referral partners have started referring a higher volume of clients to the business, Vassilis said, as they have built trust in the standard of service provided by the brokerage over time.
The team’s “incredibly hard work” over the last 12 months has also resulted in a surge in online leads, thanks to the firm’s growing and “flawless” record across 330 Google reviews.
Black & White Finance has an ambitious vision to provide “the best customer service in Australia”.
Vassilis said that, while the team’s official metric is to measure a 10 out of 10 for customer service, the founders’ own working metric is to go above and beyond by pushing for 11 out of 10.
“That’s our benchmark. For us, 10 out of 10 is not enough; 11 out of 10 is the overarching objective.”
The firm hopes its ultra-focus on service will help it write more than $12 million in loans per month next calendar year, with a business “Big Hairy Audacious Goal” set for a total of $200 million.
The firm is also hoping to achieve a total of 500 strong Google reviews by the end of next year.
This success in 2025 will depend on Black & White Finance’s team, and the business is focused on building a culture that fosters both professional growth and ownership of business outcomes.
“Employee satisfaction is huge for us. Every year we need our people to be better as people than they were last year. We need them to morph, almost, so we grow together as a team,” Vassilis said.
The team recently came together for an annual conference and strategy session in Sydney, where an external facilitator was used to help the firm sort through and prioritise business goals for 2025.
While Vassilis said the team works and plays hard at these events in the belief “culture trumps everything”, they also walk away with names and dates alongside clear objectives for the year.
“This is definitely one thing that can help brokers improve culture, because it brings everyone on to the same page, and allows everyone to understand the direction the business is going in,” he said.
Black & White Finance wants the next year to be about giving back as much as it is about service; the firm has previously done work with OzHarvest, the City2Surf and the Royal Flying Doctors Service.
Vassilis said in 2025 the firm will be seeking to partner with a smaller charity organisation that it “can support with action to really make a difference” during the year.
And after a record month, Vassilis said he will also remember to “celebrate the wins”.
“We’re privileged to be able to offer this service to our customers,” he said.
“We have a lot to be proud of this year, and we’re really excited about where we are going next year; so hopefully we’ll be celebrating the wins next year as well.”
