My mouth was already watering with anticipation, my stomach growling like a pit bull.

 

It was a great Saturday plan.  First take the grandkids to the playnasium and let them work off some energy and build an appetite, then introduce them to one of Austin’s originals, the Airport Haven hamburger joint.

 

I could already taste the fat homemade onion rings that I would chase with one of their creamy malts.  It would be a great departure from my usual Saturday lunch cuisine, but after all it is hard to get two-year-olds interested in chicken Caesar salads.

 

I must have eaten there a thousand times.  It was just a stone’s throw away from my high school, and it was one of our regular hangouts at lunch or following most Thursday or Friday night football games.  The Big Chief Drive-in Movie Theatre was just down the street, and Airport Haven was a great late night venue after the drive-in.

 

This place was a comfort place for me.  The food and atmosphere provided many a refuge from the realities of adolescence.  It was a haven indeed.

 

As we made our way down Airport Boulevard just blocks from the restaurant, I couldn’t help but notice the unfamiliar surroundings.  Most of the storefronts were Vietnamese.  The old garage right next to the railroad tracks had turned into a fish market of sorts.  How strange it was not to see the old light bulb supply. 

 

I was so taken with the new storefronts that I blew right by the joint.  Or so I thought.  It was gone.

 

The bright red roof and white brick building was there.  So was the old photinia bush where we threw the speaker that somehow didn’t detach itself from my ‘65 Impala at the Big Chief.  There was no Airport Haven.  There would be no double-cut onion rings or malteds on this day.

 

I couldn’t help but wonder about that great old place the rest of the day.  Had the owners just retired with no family succession?  Had they moved?  Or most likely, had they failed to become aware that their surroundings were changing…a hamburger joint in the middle of a Vietnamese neighborhood?

 

I guess I shouldn’t have been so surprised.  Such is the world we live in today, and such is business today.  It was a stark reminder that no business, no trade association, no bank is immune from the forces of changing culture, demographics or customer preference.

 

It made me contemplate the changing financial services marketplace…our industry in transition and just how many of you are constantly evaluating changing market conditions, competition, or customer preference.  How many of you have plans in place to capture Texas’ growing Hispanic markets?  How are we positioned to deal with tomorrow’s banking customer, a generation of new banking customer that will seek to find an institution and delivery channels much different than today.

 

Or perhaps more important from my perspective, what are we doing as your industry partner to inform, educate and develop cooperative services that will assist you in competing and thriving in the years ahead?

 

It is a daunting proposition indeed.  But I am confident we are up to the challenge.  We will be successful so long as we ask ourselves every day whether or not our traditional product and service line is still applicable today as it was yesterday, just as you must do.  IBAT did not become the premiere state banking association in the country today by adopting a “me too” attitude.  Nor will we ever forever hold that distinction by just doing as we have always done.

 

As always we will be relying on you to point the way.  Plans are in place to create facilitated think tanks to harness the great ideas and identify the megatrends and elements of social change that will keep both you and me relevant in the future.  This research will be made available to every IBAT member in the months ahead.

 

In the meantime can someone point me to a good hamburger joint?  I just hate to get started on an empty stomach.