Branch State of the Business, Part 1

It’s been over two years since we first launched Branch. Since then, we’ve been hard at work, carefully laying the foundation to build a major national home and auto insurance company — one with the scale to help us accomplish our mission of driving the cost of insurance down, so more people can be covered. 

2021 was a major year on our journey, a year where we passed some huge milestones. So, over the next few weeks, we're going to look back at some of the big stories for 2021 before we start on our path to make even bigger moves in 2022.

Branch State of the Business, By the Numbers:

• Part 1: Geographic Expansion 
• Part 2: Bundles of Bundles — Coming Soon
• Part 3: New Partnerships — Coming Soon
• Part 4: The Rise of Independent Agency — Coming Soon
• Part 5: More Branchers — Coming Soon
• Part 6: The Branch Effect — Coming Soon

Part 1: Geographic Expansion

It’s worth starting by saying that to launch an insurance company in a new state, you need to file mountains of paperwork, build trust with regulators and gain approval through each state's Department of Insurance. Doing this in just one state is hard business. 

But it’s important business as far as the Branch mission is concerned. Being national is a key enabler of how we plan to make insurance less expensive. First, it brings scale, which helps us lower costs. Second, it opens up opportunities for more partnerships, which allows us to embed Branch into the moments customers need insurance — unlocking savings that we can pass back to our members (we’ll release a post about our partnership growth in a few weeks). 

This past year, we took our geographical expansion to the next level, turbo-charging our rollout to bring more convenient, more affordable insurance to more people across the U.S. 

👋 In 2021, we welcomed Alabama, Colorado, Indiana, Kansas, Kentucky, Maryland, Michigan, Nebraska, New Mexico, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, Utah, West Virginia, and Wisconsin. 

That’s a total of 14 states last year alone — an average of more than one new state every month. We’re now live in 19 states across the nation.

And we’re not just offering standalone home or car insurance in each of these states. We’re also rolling out renter’s and umbrella, as well as ATV, boat, motorcycle, and condo insurance in many markets — always with the opportunity to bundle as fast as humanly (and technologically) possible.

A few facts about Branch coverage, as of December 31, 2021: 

• Branch now offers coverage to more than 134 million Americans
• Branch is currently available to 42.53% of the United States population
• We’re pacing for the fastest home and auto insurance rollout in insurance history
  

👀 Looking ahead at our momentum going into 2022

It’s been a record-setting year. We’ve optimized how to launch new states and do it faster than any other home and auto insurance company. Yet what the numbers above show is that — despite all the success we’ve had to this point — there’s still so much opportunity. Some might say “room to grow.” We’ll go ahead and call it “31 more states.”

Our goal is to make Branch available in all 50 states by the end of 2022. Not only spreading our leaves from sea to shining sea, but doing it efficiently. 

We’ve built the technology. Just as importantly, we’ve seen how well new customers respond to instant Branch coverage and the savings that come when they make the switch.

Reaching true nationwide status this year will allow us to scale up our partnerships like never before. We’ll staff up even further and stack up our capabilities with a remote workforce that’s spread throughout the country. All while reaching new Branch members all over the country in the process.

This year, there’s really no limit to how far Branch can grow. 

NOTE: Check back next week for Part 2 to see why more than half of all Branch members bundled their coverage in 2021 (spoiler: they’re saving hundreds of dollars in mere seconds)!