Over the past 10 years, we have seen the benefit broker segmentmore than double its sales. (Image: Shutterstock)

This is the last in our series of columns on the voluntaryindustry sales results for 2018. The first article looked at overall voluntary salesfor the year, while the second reviewed sales by product line andplatform. This column takes a closer look at sales by the followingdistribution segments:

Bonnie Brazzell and Nick Rockwell,Eastbridge Consulting Group, Inc.

Career agents—These producers work primarilyfor a single company and sell that company's voluntary/worksiteproducts. Aflac and Colonial reps are examples of careeragents.

Classic worksite brokers—These producers focusprimarily on voluntary sales. Their operations may be small ormedium sized, and they typically sell directly to employers and mayoffer support services to their clients.

Related: BenefitsPRO 2019 voluntary survey: Change is in theair

Worksite specialists—This segment consists oflarge marketing organizations whose primary focus is voluntarysales. Benefits communications is a key service offered by thisgroup. Most specialists work on cases brought to them by otherbrokers who need their expertise in voluntary.

Benefit brokers—These producers typically focuson employee benefits, particularly traditional group benefits. Someare actually benefits agencies inside of a commercial lines agency.For all, voluntary products are generally offered as an additionalline.

Occasional worksite producers—These producersare insurance generalists. They have a small agency that sellsinsurance products other than voluntary/worksite—group, individualor property/casualty. Worksite products are a small part of theiroperation.

The benefit broker segment continued to take the largest shareof voluntary/worksite sales at 59 percent; the segment accountedfor almost $5 billion in sales. Career agents continued to have thesecond highest share, at around $1.5 billion. Voluntary brokers(classics and worksite specialists) accounted for about $1.9billion.

All segments except the worksite specialist and occasionalproducer saw sales increases this year. Classics showed the biggestgain, with an increase of 16 percent. Benefit broker and careeragent segments showed modest growth, with increases of 3 percenteach.

Over the past 10 years, we have seen the benefit broker segmentmore than double its sales. The compound average growth rate forthe segment is 7.7 percent. Specialists and classics have also seengood growth at 6.9 percent and 4.5 percent compound growth,respectively. Career agent growth has been relatively flat, whileoccasional producers have experienced volatile growth.

The graph below shows the mix of sales by distributionsegment.

The annual U.S. Voluntary/Worksite Sales Report is theindustry's most comprehensive and reliable source of data onvoluntary/worksite sales and inforce premium. This year's studyincludes data from 1997 through 2018 and detailed results for over65 carriers. The report is available only to carriers participatingin the survey. For more information about participating in nextyear's survey, contact us at [email protected].

Read more: 

• How do you measure the success of the voluntarybenefits industry?
• 10 tips for selling voluntary and newproducts
• How technology is transforming the voluntarybenefits industry