Honoring Excellence in Small Business: The Vanguard Group

Pictured above: Bill McNabb, The Vanguard Group, celebrates at the 2010 Excellence Awards Dinner.

One of the eleven winners of the Chamber's 27th annual Excellence Awards Honoring Small Businesses is featured in this issue: 2010 Visionary Award, The Vanguard Group. The 2010 Visionary Award is sponsored by Stradley Ronon.

Highly regarded for its unique ownership structure and low investment costs, The Vanguard Group exists solely to serve its mutual fund shareholders. Vanguard's tradition of stellar leadership began in 1975 with John Bogle founding a small administrative company with 28 employees, 11 funds, and $1.8 billion in net assets. A year later, the fledgling company introduced the first index mutual fund for individual investors.

Today—with 12,500 crew members worldwide, 160 funds for U.S. investors, 50 additional funds in foreign markets, and $1.3 trillion in U.S. mutual fund assets, including $350 billion in employer-sponsored retirement plans — it is the world's largest mutual fund firm.

In 2008, after 22 years with Vanguard, Wharton graduate Bill McNabb took the reins. He is only the third CEO in as many decades. He continues to emphasize Vanguard's bedrock principles of providing clients with outstanding performance, superior service, and low costs. He is focused on making Vanguard the best place to invest and the best place to work.

After years of leasing space in Chesterbrook, local architects and developers built Vanguard's headquarters in the early 1990s on 200 acres purchased in Chester County. In addition to this 10-building campus, Vanguard owns or leases 16 other buildings along the Route 202 corridor. Regional employment opportunities expanded along with the company, with 9,900 of its 12,500 crew members in the Greater Philadelphia area. Vanguard also has thousands of small business firm relationships, from printers and consulting firms to telecommunications companies and temporary help services.

Not just an investment leader, Vanguard takes great pride in its community leadership role. United Way of Southeastern Pennsylvania counts on it for nearly 10% of its overall contributions—more than $5 million annually—as well as for 1,700 volunteer commitments for its annual Day of Caring.