Powhatan’s New Horizon Bank opens its first office in the city and branches to Hampton Roads

One of the region’s smaller banks is poised to expand beyond its hometown of Powhatan.

New Horizon Bank, a $128 million bank headquartered on Anderson Highway, announced the opening of a new credit office at 2800 Patterson Ave. signed at their first location in the city of Richmond.

Further afield, the bank also recently expanded its operations to Norfolk, where it hired an experienced banker to open its first office in the Hampton Roads region and its first outside the Richmond region.

These two moves come less than a year into the tenure of CEO Will Groves, who took the helm at New Horizon in early 2024.

Groves said the two new lending offices are spurred by the recent addition of new talent to the 14-year-old bank, allowing it to further expand its commercial banking business.

“My vision is to get really good at commercial banking,” Groves said. “We are focused on growing old-school banking and marrying it with the new technology that exists today. To achieve this, we focus on attracting the right people.”

In the Richmond region, the company recently hired commercial bankers Ron Simms, previously of Chesapeake Bank, and Sarah Mayfield, previously of TowneBank.

Terri Ruby, who most recently served as regional president for Hampton Roads at Blue Ridge Bank, was hired in Norfolk.

For the Patterson Avenue office, Groves said the bank signed a lease last week to take over a portion of the first floor of the wedge-shaped building in the Devil’s Triangle neighborhood. Groves said the office will open in January.

The bank will share the building with One South Commercial. Several One South agents and investor Dave McCormack of Waukeshaw Development recently purchased the building for $2.6 million.

“We wanted to be in Richmond. That was strategic for us. And we just fell in love with this building,” Groves said of the lease.

The bank expects to have two of its commercial bankers based in the Devil’s Triangle, and Groves said he will also use the office often. The plan is to eventually employ seven to ten people. Groves said the building will not serve as a full-service branch.

Groves said the Norfolk office will have a three-person team and the bank is optimistic about growth in the area.

“I thought, let’s go to Norfolk, it’s a great market,” Groves said, adding that a full location there could be a possibility.

Groves joined New Horizon in the summer of 2023 as Chief Banking Officer. He took over the role of CEO when his predecessor, Doug Mitchell, retired.

Mitchell, who had been CEO for about four years, was brought in when New Horizon was acquired by CSBH LLC, a holding company formed by Mitchell and New York investor Uriel Cohen.

They infused the small bank with $5 million in fresh capital and had a plan to grow it primarily through online banking. New Horizon was founded in 2009 as a $10 million bank.

While Mitchell has moved on, Cohen remains an investor and board member.

Groves began his career as a bank examiner at the FDIC. He then moved into industry, working for County First Bank in Maryland and Community Bank of the Chesapeake. He came to the Richmond area to work for Locus Bank, formerly known as Virginia Community Capital, before joining New Horizon last year.

He said the bank’s current course is a new kind of strategy for the region’s smallest bank.

“It’s something different. I saw 2024 as a building year for us to prepare for strong growth through 2025,” he said.

According to Groves, New Horizon is aimed at growth-oriented business customers who want to keep their deposits with the bank while taking out loans.

According to the latest FDIC reports, New Horizon posted a first-half loss of $988,000.