Becoming HeartStone

When we moved to Montana we knew many things would change. We knew we would spend more time outside, we would drink more beer, and of course, we would soon be carrying bear spray with us at all times. But for all the things that would change with our move, we knew one thing would not – our love of helping people. Our business, financial services, is really the business of advice. For over 60 years we’ve given advice on everything from which home to buy to which cell phone plan to choose. Because finances are an integral part of one’s personal well-being, we’ve had the unique opportunity to make very meaningful connections with our clients. We were eager to continue this tradition in Montana – with easy-going, outdoor oriented folks like ourselves. We knew we wanted to continue business in Montana. The only question was – what the heck would we name it?

We went through the typical options. “Great Northern _______” “Glacier ________” “Big Mountain _______” “Big Sky ______.” None of these well-trodden names seemed genuine.  Disheartened, we decided to go forward with something even more generic – “Flathead Valley Financial Advisors” We liked the acronym FVFA, but we all were a little apathetic to the overall idea.

It wasn’t until we were on a backcountry hike through Glacier National Park that my mom picked up a giant heart stone on the trail and said “what if we call it HeartStone Advisors?” My mom and dad had been collecting heart stones for years. She went on about how we could design the logo with the heart stone, and how we could connect the stone to our passion and love for helping our clients. We all took a second to let it process and decided that it was perfect. The rest is history.