The Planning Center continues its acquisition strategy, merging with a New Orleans firm

A New Orleans-based wealth planning firm is the latest partner to merge with The Planning Center Inc., headquartered in downtown Moline.

by Jennifer DeWitt of QCTimes

September 25, 2017

Jude BoudreauxUpperline Financial Planning, an independent firm founded in 2010 by H. Jude Boudreaux, combined practices with The Planning Center effective Sept. 1. Upperline, which is assuming The Planning Center’s name, will remain in New Orleans with Boudreaux and his three-person staff.

Marty Kurtz, The Planning Center’s founder and CEO, said Upperline is another in a string of “like-minded” firms to join The Planning Center.

Launched in 1998 in Moline, The Planning Center has been growing its footprint largely through mergers with other financial planning firms over the past five years. The new merger continues its efforts to build a younger base of financial planners.

“Jude is another one of those minds I’ve been so fortunate to have around me,” Kurtz said. “Those young guys bring a lot of energy, commitment and ideas.”

Boudreaux was a former president of the Financial Planning Association’s NexGen, a network to encourage young planners. Through that, he had met some of the leadership of The Planning Center, including new company president Eric Kies. 

When Boudreaux went to open Upperline about five years ago he modeled it after The Planning Center’s process.

“In addition to sharing the same investment philosophy, The Planning Center shares our main core values of providing our clients with the highest in ethical standards, putting our clients and their needs first, and offering our clients a well-defined financial planning process,” Boudreaux said in a news release.

With the addition of Upperline, The Planning Center’s team grows to 27 with 10 partners and 12 professionals in six U.S. cities, including its Moline headquarters and offices in Chicago; the Twin Cities; Fresno, California; Anchorage, Alaska; and New Orleans.

Boudreaux, who now is a senior financial planner and partner with The Planning Center, will work in New Orleans as well as in Chicago.

“Each of The Planning Center partners is committed to blending the ’best’ practices of each individual office, and making our new combined firm the leading financial planning enterprise in the country,” Kurtz added.

According to Kurtz, each merger has been relationship driven. “It’s people who believe what we believe and want to work with clients the way we work with clients.”

Read the whole article in at the Quad Cities Times online here.


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