The Tide® Problem in Financial Planning — And Why We Chose a Different Shelf

Todd Pouliot
45 minutes ago
5 min read

What Merrill Lynch, Morgan Stanley, Edward Jones, and LPL Don't Put in Their Ads

You've seen it at the grocery store. The name-brand laundry detergent sits front and center, boldly packaged, heavily advertised, and priced significantly higher than the store brand sitting right next to it. But if you flip the bottles over and read the ingredients, they're often remarkably similar. You're not always paying for a better product. You're paying for the logo.

Financial planning works the same way.

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The Name Brands of Finance

Merrill Lynch. Morgan Stanley. Edward Jones. LPL Financial. These are household names, and they should be. They've spent decades and billions of dollars building brand recognition. They have sleek offices, national advertising campaigns, and more locations than most coffee chains.

Edward Jones alone employs over 19,000 financial advisors operating out of more than 15,000 physical locations across the United States and Canada. Morgan Stanley is a global powerhouse spanning institutional securities, investment management, and wealth management. Merrill Lynch is a wealth and investment management division of Bank of America, a firm with one of the most recognized names in all of American finance.

All of that infrastructure, all of that marketing, all of that overhead somebody pays for it. And that somebody is you, the client.

Merrill Lynch advisor fees can run up to 1.75% of assets. The maximum annual Morgan Stanley asset-based advisory fee is 2.0%, plus an additional platform fee. Edward Jones charges 1.35%–1.5%, depending on Assets Under Management (AUM) size, plus additional expense ratios in the funds they use. Keep in mind, their sales strategy might be to lower your fee to 1.0% and claim you're receiving a significant discount.

That's the cost of the logo.

The Automatic Raise Nobody Talks About

Here's something worth understanding about how AUM fees actually work in practice. When the market goes up and recently it has gone up significantly your AUM advisor's fee goes up automatically, without any renegotiation and without any additional work on their part.

The S&P 500 delivered a return of 23% in 2024, following a strong 2023 return of 24%. In 2025, the index climbed another 16.4%.

Run that math on a $1 million portfolio at a 1% AUM fee:

2023: Market up 24% → fee jumps from ~$10,000 to ~$12,400
2024: Market up 23% → fee climbs to ~$15,252
2025: Market up 16% → fee rises to ~$17,692

That's nearly $7,700 more per year than when you started automatically with no conversation, no performance review, no added services. The name-brand firms built this right into their model. That's a 77% raise, ouch!

We didn't.

Complexity, Not Balance, Should Drive Your Fee

Another dimension of the big-firm model rarely gets discussed. AUM models charge clients the same amount for a given level of assets, even though one client may have a much more complicated financial situation than another.

Think about two clients both with $1.5 million invested. One is a retiree drawing a pension with a simple, well-organized portfolio. The other is a business owner with equity compensation, multiple real estate holdings, a complex tax situation, and an estate to structure. Under a standard AUM model, they pay identically. That doesn't reflect the actual work involved, and it doesn't serve either client particularly well.

While more affluent clients may require more ongoing service, it doesn't take three times the hours to serve a $3 million client as it does a $1 million client, even though the former often pays nearly three times the fee.

We look at each client individually. Your fee is based on the complexity of your financial life, not the size of your balance. A more complex situation means more work, and we price accordingly. A simpler situation means you're not subsidizing someone else's complexity.

What Only About 1 in 10 Advisors Offer

Industry research shows that roughly 92% of advisory firms still charge based on AUM, meaning only about 1 in 10 advisors operates under a flat-fee model. We're in that minority, and we think it makes a meaningful difference.

Our flat-fee model covers comprehensive, holistic financial planning, not just investments. That includes:

✅ Comprehensive financial planning tailored to your full picture

✅ Tax planning and tax preparation coordinated with our CPA

✅ Estate plan documents prepared by our attorney, when your situation calls for it

✅ Zero commissions — ever, on anything

Flat-fee advisors are not incentivized to "push" you to keep assets under management. Their fee isn't tied to your asset total. That means when we recommend you pay off debt, restructure an account, or draw down assets in a specific sequence, you can trust that recommendation came entirely from what's best for you.

Flat-fee advisors charge a fixed amount. Their revenue does not depend on gathering more

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of your assets or encouraging unnecessary transactions.

No commissions. No automatic raises when the market goes up. No paying for a logo you'll never use.

You Deserve to Know What You're Actually Paying For

Just like that store-brand detergent cleans your clothes just as well, sometimes better, an independent, flat-fee advisor can deliver comprehensive, personalized, conflict-minimized financial planning without the brand-name price tag.

The most important question to ask any advisor isn't "Have I heard of them?" It's "What am I getting, what am I paying, and are those two things connected?"

Let's Talk About Your Situation

Every client is different. We evaluate complexity, not account size, and we'd love to have a real conversation about where you are and where you want to go.

If you’re ready to experience a family-office level of service without the $10 million minimum, consider exploring Gateway Financial, LLC. We bring together investment, tax, and estate planning expertise under one roof, with a commitment to independence and fiduciary duty.

Taking control of your financial future starts with one conversation. Why not make that call today? Your future self will thank you.

👉 Visit us at mygatewaymoney.com and book a time directly on our calendar. No sales pitch. No pressure. Just an honest conversation about your financial life.

📅 We only work with the best salt-of-the-earth people. We interview you as much as you interview us.

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