Principal

Principal Financial Group provides retirement savings, investment, and insurance products and services worldwide. Dedicated to improving the wealth and well-being of people and businesses around the world, helping more than 45 Million customers plan, protect, invest, and retire. 

Committed to supporting the communities they do business with. Improving the planet. And building a diverse, inclusive workforce. 

1882: The number of memberships required the hiring of the association’s first employee, John Tibbs, who acted as a General Agent.

1893: With its selective standards and frugal operation--it had no paid staff until this year, relying instead on volunteer labour, it was able to keep assessments low, and agents' sales pitches emphasized the low cost.

1911: His successor as president, Ernest E. Clark, was more sympathetic to the idea, and the conversion was effected, with the association becoming The Bankers Life Company. The conversion was not an immediate hit; within the following three years, 195,000 of the 245,000 assessment certificates that had been in force this year remained so.

1916: George Kuhns, who was elected president after Clark resigned because of ill health, set out aggressively to make Bankers Life Company grow once again.

1925: Insurance in force grew to $844 million.

1926: Gerard Nollen had become president of Bankers Life Company after Kuhns's death.

1927: The drive ended with about 40,000 of the certificates still in force, and Bankers Life Company had to drastically raise quarterly assessments for the certificate holders, as the emergency reserve fund that had been used to supplement them was depleted.

1930: Both stations protested the Federal Radio Commission, to no avail, and WHO was sold to WOC. Bankers Life ran WHO until this year. Prior to the Great Depression, the company was closing in on the $1 billion landmark.

1934: Bankers Life Company had more money going out in loans than coming in through premium payments.

1939: Continued growth required the company to relocate its operations to a larger facility.

1952: During the booming postwar years, Bankers Life Company entered new fields and offered new products. It began selling individual accident and health insurance.

1957: It began offering holders of ordinary life insurance policies the option to buy extra coverage for a small extra premium without taking a medical examination--an innovation that soon caught on with other insurance companies.

1968: As Bucknell was moving up to chairman and chief executive officer and Harold G. Allen was succeeding him as president, Bankers Life Company went into the mutual fund business.

1977: Bankers Life Company went to market with an adjustable life insurance policy, in which holders could adjust premium costs and coverages.

1985: Principal Financial Group and a subsidiary, Invista Capital Management--which was formed this year as Value Investors--manage more than $18 billion for pension funds and other tax-exempt fund sponsors. The Bankers Life group adopted the name The Principal Financial Group as the trademark identity for all its companies because the name The Bankers Life no longer suited the company; its clientele had grown far beyond the bankers and bank employees it originally intended to serve.

1989: He succeeded John R. Taylor, who also turned the titles of chairman and chief executive officer over to Hurd.

“To help growing businesses, individuals and institutional clients achieve financial security and success, resulting in excellent shareholder value.”

“Our expertise spans the globe, but we’re bound by one common purpose: to give you the financial tools, resources and information you need to live your best life.”