Credit union beginnings
This year at Cobalt Credit Union we celebrated 75 years of serving our members! We were founded in 1946 as SAC Federal Credit Union to serve Strategic Air Command (SAC) at Andrews Air Force Base in Maryland. When SAC moved to Offutt Air Force base in 1948, we moved along with them. For many years we served the military community exclusively before expanding our membership to include our local communities. This allowed us to add more branches and serve more counties in Nebraska and Iowa. Seventy-five years of growth has resulted in a total of 26 locations, with a branch in Lincoln coming in 2022, and over 108,000 members. We are proud to be Nebraska’s largest locally owned credit union.
Tech savvy from the start
We have been quick to embrace new financial technology to better serve our growing membership. We introduced Automated Teller Machines (ATM) in 1984. In 2001, CU@Home brought online banking into our members’ homes. Virtual Tellers aided members through Interactive Teller Machines (ITM) as early as 2016. Just a few short years later in 2019 we introduced video banking. These technologies have allowed us to reach more members in more ways than ever before. This fiscal year we have had well over 757,000 in-branch transactions, more than 197,000 in-bound calls to our call center and helped more than 3,700 new users through video banking.
Giving back to our communities
Part of credit union culture is giving back to the communities that we serve. We have a healthy track record of community sponsorships and activities. In 2016 we took it a step further and launched our charitable arm, the SAC Foundation. The SAC Foundation exists to be a steward of economic and social sustainability in the communities we serve by focusing on financial literacy and supporting the military by supplying funds to and taking part in events with aligned organizations.
Remembering our credit union history
To celebrate our 75th anniversary, we unveiled a historical timeline in our headquarters atrium showcasing these major milestones in our credit union’s history. We were honored to have so many of you there to celebrate with us at our annual meeting and look forward to serving you for many more years to come.
To see our highlights of the year, view our Annual Report.
