Vision Financial Merger Creates $2B Financial Integrators

Des Moines, Iowa-based Vision Financial Group announced that it is merging with two other firms to create a practice whose team would oversee $2 billion in client assets and plans for future acquisitions.

Vision Financial Group is in the process of combining with Business & Financial Strategies of Iowa City and Clevenger Financial of Joplin, Missouri, to become the rebranded Financial Integrators, offering services including financial planning and asset management, insurance, accounting, tax and estate planning, along with a growing retirement plan and business services division.

The merger stemmed in part from Vision’s work as a national Office of Supervisory Jurisdiction serving independent advisers with compliance, back-office support, investment management and other services. Business & Financial Strategies and Clevenger Financial were both OSJ clients initially, and the three firms, aligned by service model and shared values, agreed combining would bring both scale and added capabilities, says Clark Buss, a partner and managing director of practice management for what is now Financial Integrators.

“We brought different and additional strengths to the table for the benefit of the clients and the advisers we serve,” Buss says. “We are working to create a legacy and build something special for the future.”

The firm, which brokers through Cambridge Investment Research Inc., will now have 23 financial advisers and 77 subject matter experts, according to the announcement.

“Our clients’ needs are growing more complex, and we believe integrated financial planning is the future,” James Wessels, founding partner of Vision Financial Group, said in a statement. “With Business & Financial Strategies and Clevenger Financial, we found partners who not only share our values but also our holistic approach to client service. Together, we are excited to expand our footprint and elevate the client experience as Financial Integrators.”

The firm will have expanded capabilities to serve clients and advisers, says managing director Buss. He cited, as an example, merging partners Lane Clevenger and Greg McLaughlin have credentialed expertise in business owner succession planning and strategy which complements our focus on working with business owners.

The resulting combined scale, capital and book of business will also help the firm as it considers M&A opportunities in 2025 and beyond, he says.

“We are looking to be active in the M&A space,” Buss says. “We’ll be looking for complementary services that we are not yet offering today, as well as to scale the existing parts of our business such as employer-sponsored retirement plans, accounting, tax and asset management. The three firms are all coming together with a growth mindset.”

The newly branded entity will also continue to offer OSJ services for advisers nationally, a practice that Buss says has been successful in helping other advisers free up time to focus more on client services and growth.

“There’s so much more than the supervisory role to the OSJ,” Buss says. “When we meet advisers we hear the same story across the board—they are out of time, and that is putting a cap on their business …. “They can leverage us as their expert investment committee to manage client assets, as their insurance brokerage arm, financial planning back-office, employer-sponsored retirement plan team and more so they don’t have to do those functions. For advisers, we’re on their team, not their payroll and they really appreciate that.”

In addition, Buss says the firm also has a strong focus on building it’s employer-sponsored retirement plan division, which goes hand-in-hand with its strategy of working with business owners.

The firm announced in September of 2024 that it had hired Rob Edwards, formerly of Principal Financial Group, to head its retirement plan relationships.