As banks increasingly grapple with trying to reduce the high cost of their branch networks, one would think that more institutions would look at lower-cost in-store branches.

It’s become conventional wisdom in the banking industry to say that the “branch of the future” must evolve from a place where customers primarily conduct transactions to one in which they can seek advice, guidance and professional service on all things financial.

The decline in branch transactions that has been predicted for the last 30 years is finally happening.

The world is changing and the traditional bank branch needs to change with it.

It’s a truism in the industry to say that retail banks need to experiment more with change in an era of shrinking revenue and declining branch traffic but the fact remains that few institutions go beyond cosmetic modifications.

Many industry analysts and practitioners clearly believe the future of retail banking requires a dramatic reduction in the absolute numbers of bank branches across the U.

Mired in a long-term revenue drought, the retail banking industry now must deal with the reality that the current branch banking model is unsustainable.

Channel management is arguably one of the most important functions in today’s banking industry as institutions are caught between the eroding viability of traditional branches and the need to accommodate emerging channels such as mobile.

Conventional wisdom holds that technology is changing the way a bank branch operates.

At a time when roughly 40% of U.