A Letter from CEO, Tony Mazzali

Historical insight — Originally published December 29, 2021. Preserved as historical content; information may have changed.

Happy Holidays,

As another year draws to a close, it is time to look back and review the initiatives CG Financial Services relayed to you for 2021. As we move to 2022, I would like to thank every one of our clients for your support. I am proud of what CG Financial Services and our people have achieved during 2021, and I am happy to share some highlights with you.

– I am extremely proud to officially unveil the new branding our team has been working on for several months. This new branding marks a significant milestone in our journey, providing an opportunity to reflect on everything that the original CG Financial Services brand stood for and recognizing the importance of having a future-focused and effective brand in place.

Our new logo distills the underlying promises we make to our clients:

• – Life-centered financial planning
• – Proactive team service attention to client needs
• – A symbolic sign of our evolving & adapting relationship with our clients as they travel through stages of life

You will see it is not just our logo that is changing. We’ve changed our website, our social media, our messaging, and our focus to better reflect the way we help our clients succeed. I am excited to showcase our new website in 2022. The new website is intuitive and offers a more robust platform for user experience and feedback. Look for more content specific to our advice and engagement as well as important topics tailored to our client’s journey.

Benefit to the Client (BTC): The branding redesign was the result of thought and hard work to provide a visual that not only displays our name but more importantly visually shows the continuous circular nature of our ongoing engagement with our clients – as their life changes and evolves, so does our advice to adapt to those changes. Our branding also reflects the commitment that CG makes that all the parts of the Company are necessary to ensure the satisfaction of our clients’ experience.

Major strides to report on the development, continued education and mentoring of our emerging leadership team. This year, we spent countless hours advising and helping our talented leaders to overcome challenges and achieve success; building their confidence and strength in the evolution of the firm to continue growing for the future to benefit the client. Through this development, Senior Management threw out job aids, online help, FAQs, and video to educate our leaders about new systems or software, attending virtual meetings, peer-to-peer mentoring, etc. – the list goes on and on. As we continue to evolve our leadership and progression practices to align with our 5-year strategic growth agenda, CG Financial Services leaders will serve to provide the foundation for tomorrow’s challenges and future successes our clients have come to expect.

BTC: Our focus in this area will ensure the necessary skills and people to sustain the growth of the Company and the evolving needs of our clients. Clients can feel confident we invest in our most valuable asset – our people.

Along with growing our leaders, this year we have reimagined our total client experience to provide enhancements, depths and breadth of our advice and service to better serve clients. With the development of our secure online client portal, CG Wealth Access, clients can view all investment accounts, financial assets, and liabilities in one place with real-time status updates. This incorporates best-in-class visibility, control, and security, combining all the digital tools our clients love. We are committed to working diligently over the next several years to refresh all client information in our system to ensure accurate reports and timely information our clients deserve. While we are proud of our success, we recognize that we are only just beginning. We will continue to grow, evolve, and transform with the ever-changing needs of our clients.

BTC: It has become clear we need to continue to focus on our commitment to advise our clients with the necessary information. It will require a continued investment of systems and technology to enable our firm to offer our clients independent, skilled advice delivered to them in an understandable concise manner.

I recognize there are a lot of other companies in which you could invest. On behalf of CG Financial Services, my sincere thanks for your continued trust and support. We strive to always act in your best interest in the advice we give, in the administration of your accounts, and in the management of your assets. We do not take that responsibility lightly, nor do we take it for granted. The future presents both challenges and opportunities for us, which we take on from a position of trust. We remain deeply committed to your future vision and will continue to reshape our engagement in response to the needs of our clients. To that point, we have grown to size that allows our Advisor’s to specialize in content areas to deepen our firm IQ as well as deepen advice to clients.

I would like to start by telling you how much I appreciate each member of the CG team and that I recognize we wouldn’t be where we are without the contributions made by every one of our employees. We had a great year growing our offices. We acquired three locations in Pinehurst, Raleigh and Wilmington, North Carolina. We have 65+ talented employees to ensure that we continue to provide the best possible service to our clients, while also providing our people with fulfilling career paths at CG Financial Services. Our growth has allowed us to better serve our clients and expand the breadth of expertise that CG Financial truly represents.

We do not have control over the direction of the movements in investment markets, but we do have influence on many other factors that lead to successful outcomes. Over the past year we have made large investments in technology used to deliver great outcomes for our clients. This will continue into 2022. Taxes, investment costs, historically low interest rates, and inflation are persistent trends that we will continue to position ourselves ahead of by utilizing both active and passive investment styles.

CG Financial Services is also rolling out a new look on our Investment Platform which will give faster turnaround times and more functionality on client data. The goal is to provide a superior investment journey and streamlined standardized implementations for all clients. This platform will also give a better display of information, more efficient operational experience, and will translate to an overall enhanced experience for our clients.

Our “Bringing Buckets to Life” strategy is a plan to increase client satisfaction and match the overall level of engagement needed for you. Some examples of short, medium, and long-term “buckets” include superior tax control, investment committee led allocations and streamlined digital onboarding and service.

As a response to the global pandemic and the evolving financial services industry, we have continued to prioritize and enhance our digital experience. Over the past year, we have provided the option to meet in person, or via Zoom from any location of your choosing. Additionally, to meet shifting schedules, we have begun scheduling meetings using a technology called Calendly, which takes the back and forth out of the scheduling equation and provides an easy way to reschedule if a conflict appears. Finally, we are making great strides to digitize the account opening and maintenance processes to reduce turnaround time and ensure we can better meet your needs. All these enhancements allow us to continue to meet the evolving needs of our clients.

Over the past 1 ½ years, our firm has focused our effort and energy to keep you, our clients, front and center in delivering financial planning services. Specifically, we have organized and implemented “Advice Teams” that are in place to make your client journey as enjoyable as possible. Each team consists of multiple advisors and a lead customer service representative whose purpose is to facilitate and implement both strategic actions and administrative tasks unique to you and your overall financial plan. This includes taking a holistic approach to planning and having dialogue around all aspects of your financial life including lifestyle and retirement planning, protection planning, and legacy planning. This approach allows our clients to feel confident their plans are being taken care of every day. Our focus has been, and will continue to be moving into 2022, each of our clients’ specific life journey and understanding what is most important to them so that our firm can be the guide to help you live your best life possible with the resources you have.

We remain committed to providing clients with the same exceptional level of service, respect, and dedication to quality on which we have built our company over two decades. I am incredibly proud of the work that we do at CG Financial Services and thankful for the employees and clients that have accompanied us in our growth. As always, we appreciate your loyalty to us and will continue striving to deliver the best client experience to serve you and your family.

From all of us at CG Financial Services, Merry Christmas, Happy Holidays and Happy New Year! I hope you and your loved ones have a blessed and peace-filled year ahead.

Anthony J. Mazzali

CEO, CG Financial Services

Advisory Services offered through CG Advisory Services, an SEC Registered Investment Adviser. Securities offered through Geneos Wealth Management Inc. Member FINRA/SIPC.