MANSFIELD – A business headquartered in downtown Mansfield has been recognized on a national level.
Pinnacle Wealth Planning Services was recently listed among the top 300 financial advisers in the United States by the Financial Times.
The firm works with more than 500 clients and has more than $680 million assets under its advisement throughout the United States and Puerto Rico.
“I was very proud of my staff and my family,” CEO, Jennifer S. Henderson said of the award.
The business is family-owned and operated. Her father, Bill Heichel, who has worked primarily as a lawyer since the 1970s, began offering financial planning when he saw the need.
“I had no idea what my father did while I was growing up,” Henderson said. “He did this on Monday nights, it was financial planning night, Lifetime night.”
He called his business Lifetime Planning and offered financial planning services.
Later, in 1998, he and his son, Keith, who worked for Ameriprise, formed Pinnacle Wealth Planning Services.
The Heichels offer investment and financial planning services, but the latter discipline remains the company’s focus and is required for all clients.
“The financial plan is mandatory. We don’t do investment-only clients. We don’t believe in that,” Henderson said. “The investments are just a vehicle to get you to your goals, but if we don’t know your goals and all the situations surrounding those goals, then we can’t really tell you how to invest your money.”
The whole family relishes financial planning, she said.
The youngest, Scott, works in Pinnacle’s Columbus office. Henderson serves as CEO from Mansfield, and Keith serves as president from the Medina location.
“We get along really well, we have different strengths,” Henderson said. “(Keith and I) actually split our duties up. My duties focus on my talents and his focus on his.”
Their brother David dares to be a little different. He owns Professional Investment & Insurance Planning, but his office is housed at 6 West 3rd St., the same building as Pinnacle. He manages investments under $250,000, while Pinnacle handles those of $250,000 or more with an average investment of $1.3 million.
Though the family now owns and runs Pinnacle, Bill Heichel still hasn’t retired. He sworks as both a lawyer and financial planner, even making the occasional trip to their fourth and final location in St. Petersburg, Florida.
“He’ll never stop,” Henderson said, describing her father as a hardworking, motivated man.
Henderson attended college for chemical engineering, but was doing more managing than engineering when her father and brother offered her a job managing the company.
Pinnacle employs 15 people at its Mansfield location and 20 in total. Thirteen are certified financial planners. They serve clients who are mostly doctors or small business owners.
In past years, Bill Heichel was included in the Medical Economics Magazine’s list of 150 best financial advisers for doctors and the Worth Magazine’s top 100 most exclusive wealth advisers.
Pinnacle has been recognized as a leading registered investment advisor firm by the Financial Advisor Magazine and one of America’s top wealth managers by Bloomberg’s Wealth Manager AdvisorOne Magazine.
