ABD Insurance to change name to Wells Fargo Jan. 1

PETALUMA – The ABD Insurance and Financial Services banner will officially be retired Jan. 1 and be replaced with its parent company brand, Wells Fargo. But Managing Director Mark Stokes said the brokerage with a history spanning close to 60 years will never lose its North Bay independence.

“It’s not like we are going to have bankers hanging over our shoulders telling us what to do. We are very independent. This company has a very long history in this community, and we will continue to act that way,” Mr. Stokes said.

Last year, ABD officially became a Wells Fargo subsidiary when the company purchased its parent, Greater Bay Bancorp, in October 2007 for $1.5 billion. At that time, ABD officials said the merger would not change the team or services, just increase its pool of resources, and more than a year later they’ve stood by their word.

Mr. Stokes, whose business card now carries both the Wells Fargo and ABD name, said the name change has occurred in phases, but Jan. 1, 2009, will mark the official departure of the ABD logo and Web site, www.cybersure.com, which will be accessible with the same services on that date through www.wellsfargo.com/wfis.

The ABD Insurance Services name was officially born in 1990 from the merger of two homegrown brokerages, Belmont-based Alburger Basso de Grosz Insurance Services and San Mateo-based Mario L. Basso Agency, as well as an investment from Transamerica Insurance Group. Both brokerages have a cumulative history of more than 100 years in Northern California, and the Basso agency founder’s son, Bruce Basso, is a current co-chair for ABD.

In 1993, Transamerica decided to leave the property-casualty business and sold its 50 percent ownership back to its founders, who then looked to add their first North Bay office. That year the company acquired Ellingson & Jones Insurance Services of Santa Rosa, whose founder, Sam Jones, was president and chief executive officer of ABD and is now executive vice president and West region manager for Wells Fargo.

The company continued to nab other agencies around Northern California, including $40-million-premium-volume Willis Corroon Group of Sacramento and 25-employee, Petaluma-based Metzger & Wilkey Inc., both in 1996. In total, the company grew from about $300 million in premium volume in 1993 to $425 million in that year.

Then in 2000, ABD further increased its North Bay presence, assuming a then 20-year Sonoma County agency veteran, Dranginis & Associates, run by Michael Dranginis. In the latest acquisition completed this summer, ABD took on the expertise of Santa Rosa-based Martin Financial/Insurance Services founded in 1981, expanding Wells Fargo’s total Northern California presence to 2,500 employees in 51 cities.

The ABD office in Petaluma, which also recently consolidated with Wells Fargo’s Santa Rosa office on Aviation Boulevard, accounts for $102 million in premium volume and employs 92. “Wells Fargo has done a stellar job of maintaining stability during these times. While other companies have had to cut services, we’ve continued adding, including new staff. We hired about 15 or 20 just this year,” Mr. Stokes said.

Wells Fargo has agreed to purchase banking company Wachovia for about $15 billion, which officials say will likely be completed by the end of this year. The deal would move Wells Fargo to the fourth-largest insurer.