Once upon a time, there was only one King Price…
When entering the huge glass doors that lead into the castle’s foyer, mere mortals are greeted by two huge playing cards – a King posing with a Financial Services Board (FSB) Certificate of Registration, and a Joker holding the FSB License Certificate to verify that this kingdom is licensed to trade as an Authorised Financial Service Provider (FAIS).
These certificates are the only indicators that King Price Insurance is actually into serious business. The décor and culture demonstrate something far more unusual and totally different than other insurance companies.
The pop-art painted on the office’s walls, funky red carpets rolled out on the floors, modern bar counters and refreshment stations, rocket shaped dustbins, huge open plan areas with all the king’s men sizzling all-bright with headphones tending to phone calls, speak of frankness, liveliness, and playfulness – a place where all rules and conformity were broken long-long time ago.
In his private chamber, one strongly feels the sparkling presence and antic vivacity of CEO Gideon Galloway, aka king of King Price Insurance. Parts of his personality are scattered across the walls with retro hip artwork and a selection of model vintage cars.
The King Price Insurance revolution was born four years ago from frustration and eagerness to change the way ordinary insurance companies worked. At the time, Galloway was marketing director for advertising and direct sales for Telesure Investment Holdings, and served as the youngest member on the boards of Upstream Advertising and Dial Direct Insurance.
He was at the height of his career with more than 12 years of experience in short-term insurance. One of his portfolios was e-business and he traversed all the mighty kingdoms across many oceans, looking at various insurance models. “I was quite frustrated as companies were reluctant to change,” growls the king with a frown. “Most of the big insurance companies are very conservative, all working on the same old formulas.”
Further disgruntled for paying more than what was necessary for car and home insurance, Galloway left his cushy peasant job to pursue his quest, which at the time, seemed like a distant fairytale.
“Was the quest too big to conquer?” He often thought, rubbing his chin with worry after each unsuccessful pitch to investors. The pursuit in finding over R1billion to start his insurance empire was an enormous and daunting one.
Fortunately, there were a number of mean and lean mortals who shared his vision, as they too spotted the loopholes in the markets. The king’s knights pledged their alliance to the cause, and Galloway formed a regiment with the finest insurance experts and technology gurus.
With a clear and focused vision, very little gold, and the assistance of these talented knights, the king entered the dungeons for more than three years. “We literally built this company from a garage,” says Galloway.
Together, they boldly marched towards freedom from domination of the conventional insurance stratum rule. They engineered state of the art software regarded as the most intelligent, accurate and fastest risk rating engine in South Africa.
Then one fine day, powerful noble shareholders, who trusted and admired the gutsy young king, stuffed his coffers from their treasure-holds, and global reinsurance provider Munich Re became Galloway’s reinsurer of choice.
Launched on 2nd June 2012 on the king’s 34th birthday, King Price Insurance challenged old and outdated insurance models. He entered the realm with super cheap premiums, “All delivered with royal service,” vowed the king.
He embarked on a country wide campaign addressing the mortal masses and bellowed, “Hear one… Hear all… King Price is the cheapest of them all.” The mortals looked at him askew, his rival lords cried in protest, “You won’t last a day in this big bad world, young king.”
They looked upon his friskily gilded coach, un-regal garb and coloured wild horses, whispering more doubts in their cuffs. Then they bellowed with laughter when learning the high targets he has set to reach, “You won’t get past another full moon, cheeky king.”
The king calmly smiled and said, “Price is king – bottom line.”
As foretold, it seems the king was just. The King Price court was blown away by customers’ responses and their playing along in the theme. “Their appraising comments rushed onto the website HelloPeter.com and I was ready to respond to each one with the help from my PA, Snow White,” says a pleased Galloway.
“We put the customer first, price ways, and service ways,” claims Galloway. “For sure we encountered a few hiccups right after the launch, normal teething problems, but we quickly sorted it out. In such cases, you just need to communicate openly with the customers so they fully understand,” says Galloway.
It’s not normal practise for traditional insurers to communicate with their customers. Galloway says, “When working for other insurance companies, I always felt, but why can’t we communicate with them? They are our customers, we should be able to serve them in a personal, respectful way.”
“We walk customers through every step with every change we make, sending updating sms-es all the time to keep them in the loop. We continuously send welcoming letters, presents and hampers, and give the mortals the attention they deserve.”
It took six months to come up with the right name for the business and the king-fairytale-theme just grew from there. “Sometimes it gets crazy and wild but we have so much fun with it,” laughs Galloway. “But actually, I don’t like to be called king at all, so I tone it down by spelling the ‘k’ in king in lower case.”
The king says his business just works better and is far more productive when having fun, which classifies King Price along with the famous Google dynasty, young and energetic. “I like that, yes. Actually, Google was here the other day and they loved our glitzy offices.”
King Price launched with only 25 employees, they now have just under 100 and aim to have around 200 staff members by end November 2013.
The members of the King Price court don’t take themselves seriously but they do take their work very seriously. All staff members are geared to streamline related processes, take full responsibility of their duties and work it through till each issue is resolved with comprehensive service and acute attention. “We don’t have meetings, we have an open resource set up and decisions are made immediately and effectively.”
The launch of King Price was Galloway’s biggest accomplishment so far he says, “On Sunday night, the first ads were aired. That Monday morning, when the phones started to ring, was my biggest moment.”
Galloway took out policy number one, “And I actually also had my first claim in December last year when I accidently connected my car to a barrier. Accidents happen, that’s what insurance is for,” he laughs. “I went through the entire claiming process, just as my customers would, and was quite impressed with the service.”
The company grew from that one policy to 1,000 policies in the first two weeks. “We then reached 5,000 then 10,000 breaking records every week, each time throwing a huge party on the beach.”
The beach is the outside balcony fashioned out with a bar, synthetic lawn and wide views over Pretoria East. An area which he would like to change into an outside call centre for smokers, “So they can be more productive,” he says.
Another big accomplishment for King Price so far, is generating a handsome return from its marketing campaign investments. The company runs effective ads across the internet, trendy billboards and bizarre television adverts.
Galloway received mixed comments about his advertising, “Some love it, some don’t, saying our television adverts are silly. But we knew that from the start. We had to break through all the clutter, it had to be high risk and it had to be different. I know we might never win a Lourie,” chuckles Galloway, “But it’s working very well for us.”
Nelspruit born Galloway is determined to reach all his set goals, “I deliver results, fast and continuous.” Even while studying at University of Pretoria towards BSc Computer Science and BA Multimedia degrees, “Which I didn’t finish due to discovering beer,” he already started a branding company.
“I had always been an entrepreneur,” he says. “I’m a calculated high risk person, not afraid of losing.” Galloway confirms he will stay in insurance for a long time. “I like insurance, I like the scalability of it, the scope is big. And it pays well.”
In 2003 Galloway was awarded manager of the year at Telesure Investment Holdings. “My passion has always been to drive and grow my staff in as much freedom as possible. They’re in charge of their own results, they work hard and know what they need to do to excel. We don’t work in silos, we work as one big team. We understand each other’s responsibilities, the whole mechanics of the business and the industry.”
The king is going big and planning to sweep his sceptre across the globe with exciting new offerings and campaigns, “In the long run, we’re going to roll out business insurance, life insurance, and then go global. We’ve already talked about possible global partnerships.”
The other kingdoms might come in uproar. “Pressure will come from competitors, for sure. But we’ll keep on changing models and play even bigger roles to remain competitive,” promises the king.
He also wants to create half-day working opportunities for stay-at- home moms in line with his future vision for the company and its role in SA’s industry, economy and society. “In business one can make a huge difference,” he says. “Not by only spending money on uplifting projects, but also creating more jobs. I think I’m already making a huge difference in offering such low premiums which benefit all policy holders for sure, but I want to do more.”
The king’s day consists mostly of, “Eating popcorn, drinking Red Bull and playing table tennis. I’m an optimist and can’t wait to wake up in the morning and seize the day. I get up at 4am, go to gym at 5am, and then go to the office. My whole idea is to create a journey when going to work. When I park my car downstairs, I want to already warm up to the King Price feeling. Then I go through emails, prepare for the day’s tasks, then just take 30min to have fun. I yell in the microphones, set a prank and just joke around with the staff.”
He doesn’t book a full day’s diary, as he wants time available to develop and motivate his staff, and still wants to go home early to spend time with his family.
“I have a lovely wife, Annelize, who is originally from a farm in Bronkhorstspruit. We’d been married for nine years and have twin sons of six years and a 14-month daughter. We’re a nice Afrikaans family,” says Galloway proudly.
Annelize had a very successful salon before, but is now a loving home staying mom. “I’m very lucky,” blushes the king. “But it’s sometimes difficult to find a balance between work and family as it can get very busy, like with the launch. But I believe family comes first. I try to do that and play with my kids every day.”
It is the general feeling in the king’s court that the king will reign with supremacy. “One only lives once upon a time,” he says. “There’s no rehearsal, and I don’t want to regret not doing something. I want to live life, I want my company to achieve and be successful.”
Galloway says being successful means having a balance of success stories across the many areas of one’s life. “I’m very passionate about life, family, work, sport and everything else I set my mind and body to. I truly value relationships, honesty and integrity. One of his favourite quotes is that of Zig Ziglar, “You can have anything you want in life, if you find a way to help enough other people get what they want in life.”
The king is driven by good ethical causes and learned from various role models in different areas and circumstances. “But Francois van Niekerk, a huge philanthropist, is one of my big role models. Then also my business partner, Marius Venter who is a great mentor and friend.”
Galloway says he learns something from everyone. He likes all sorts of people, he learns from different personalities and from his colleagues. He relates to passionate people who want to lead a significant life. “I want to be myself but take the best from everyone around me, even from Emily that washes the dishes.”
The king is confident and optimistic about his future. “King Price offers insurance deals that simply cannot be matched, let alone be beaten. Ever,” he concludes assuredly. “Even if I sit on the carpet all day and play with my toy cars.”
And that’s the tale of King Price Insurance, living and serving happily ever after.
SIDEBAR
“Hear thee, hear thee your premium has just decreased, spread the word…”
The king promised three important things during his reign. He promised the masses the cheapest and best premiums, a sustainable kingdom to do business with, and personal royal service.
There are two key elements that differentiate King Price from other insurers: customers can expect premiums that are between 60% and 70% cheaper most of the time which decrease monthly as their cars depreciate; and King Price says ‘no’ to no claim bonuses.
“Most insurers inflate premiums so their customers can have the benefit of a no claim bonus at a later stage,” clarifies Galloway. “But what customers don’t realise is insurers are regulated to reserve a percentage of premiums for the no claim bonus fund. At King Price, all our customers will rather reap the benefit of a substantially discounted premium immediately.”
King Price Insurance provides comprehensive car insurance that extends to theft, hi-jacking, accidental damage, damage to third parties, additional cover for car hire, car sound equipment and other accessories. “But unfortunately not motorcycles yet,” says Galloway. “They are high risk items, but we’ll soon find the right policy model for motorcycles. We have to offer the right cover, the cheapest premium whilst still making it profitable.”
King Price also offers buildings insurance, home contents insurance, portable possessions insurance, trailer insurance, and caravan insurance. “And in the case of emergency, the king will be there. We made lavish provisions for roadside emergency assistance, accident and medical assistance, and home repairs.”
The king takes much pride in its royal treatment saying, “Your safety is our concern, always,” and further pledges to all existing policy holders, a discounted service of the king’s cab with a personal chauffeur for when planning a night out on town. ”But not to worry, our cabs won’t change into pumpkins,” bellows the king. “We will serve night owls long after midnight and take them home safely.”
Topic: King Price Insurance South Africa
Word count: 2500 | Main story: 2178 | Side Bar: 322
Written for: Cape Media | Leadership Magazine
Editor: Lindsay King
Deadline: Monday 18 Feb 2013