Integrity extends summer buying spree with Heartland purchase

Integrity Marketing Group continued its string of acquisitions Thursday by announcing its plan to purchase fellow insurance and retirement services provider Heartland Financial Group.

Kansas City, Missouri-based Heartland was founded in 1992 by industry veteran Chris McDaniel. In 2015, McDaniel transferred day-to-day leadership of Heartland to Todd Hill following a serious health challenge. Hill and his executive team will now become managing directors at Integrity, while McDaniel will retire. Financial terms of the transaction were not revealed.

Integrity, a Dallas-based life insurance provider and wealth manager that boasts nearly 6,000 employees, will be adding Heartland’s Missouri operations, as well as additional office locations in Mississippi, Florida, Oklahoma and California. In 2021, Heartland completed approximately 165,000 applications and placed $270 million in annual premium, according to the company’s statement.

This is the most recent in a series of high-profile purchases by Integrity. In August, the life insurance provider and wealth manager bought Gladstone Wealth Partners, an advisory firm with more than $13 billion in assets under management. That deal came barely two weeks after Integrity agreed to acquire Annexus, an insurance and financial product design and distribution company.

"Heartland Financial Group is a proven industry leader and their mission of supporting and helping Americans prepare for retirement aligns perfectly with Integrity," Bryan W. Adams, co-founder and CEO of Integrity, said in a statement. "We're grateful for Chris McDaniel's vision, which has thoughtfully positioned Heartland into an organization we're proud to partner with. We're also grateful to Todd Hill and the experienced executive leadership team at Heartland for embracing our vision of strengthening their technology and offerings in ways that will help them serve even more consumers.”

Adams added that the deal has been “a long time in the making.”

For his part, Heartland CEO Hill said in the statement that he found Integrity to be a “perfect fit in terms of culture and vision right from the beginning."

"As a true partner, Integrity allows us to continue to lead the agency while optimizing processes and reinforcing its success with improved technology and shared services. This partnership will help us serve more Americans in countless ways, and we can't wait to see how we'll grow together," Hill said.

The deal will enable Heartland to provide its agents with access to Integrity's end-to-end insurtech platform, supplementing its own systems. Heartland will also be able to utilize Integrity's centralized business services to increase procedural efficiencies in areas such as technology, finance, legal and compliance.