COVER STORY

Est. 2003

Pretty Darn Cool John Herges, CEO of Falcon National Bank, has spent his entire career helping small businesses – and communities – grow.

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n July 2003 John Herges walked into his brand-new bank building in Foley. He had four employees, $4.5 million in capital, and zero customers. “What have I gotten myself into,” he asked himself. Herges, CEO of Falcon National Bank, is a hometown boy. “I went to St. Mary’s grade school just down the street. I went to Cathedral High School. I went to St. Cloud State University in economics and accounting. That sounds like a banker’s education, doesn’t it,” he said with a laugh. It is

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an education that has served him well in a banking career that has spanned almost 50 years. Banking always interested Herges. His father, Paul, was a banker and owned the bank in his hometown of St. Martin. “I worked there in the summers as a teller,” Herges said. “It was a very interesting experience. I think back then almost half the people who came into the bank only spoke German.” Though both Herges’ parents spoke German, the children never learned the language. “They only used it when they didn’t want