Marketing's Role in the Evolvig: Many Things About the Branch--Its Role, Location, Design, Staffing, Technology--are Facing Transitions Due to Rapidly Changing Customer, Regulatory and Technological Conditions. Marketers can Make a Valuable Contribution in This Conversion

THE DEMISE OF THE TRADITIONAL BRICK-AND MORTAR BRANCH is again being predicted. The advent of ATMs elicited the first forecasts of branch obsolescence. During the tech boom of the late '90s, Internet banking supposedly signaled the end of branch banking. And still, throughout much of the last decade, the number of bank branches industrywide grew at a record pace. Clearly, earlier prognostications of decline of the traditional branch proved erroneous. Will this Cassandra's prophecy finally come to pass?