In the final Peer to Pier Interview of the year, Insurance Town mayor Heath Shearon looks at the biggest changes in how insurance is being bought, sold and valued. In this in-depth interview he also addresses the recent M&A surge, and how the industry can shake off its car salesman image.
00:03 - Paul Lucas: Hello everybody. Welcome to Insurance Business TV. We are here at InsureFest 2026 for one of our peer-to-peer interviews with a man who is no stranger to the camera. That man is Heath Shearon. He is of course the mayor of Insurance Town. Heath, great to have you with us.
00:32 - Heath Shearon: Thank you. I appreciate that.
00:34 - Paul Lucas: So, uh, we're going to talk a little bit about growth and culture in the insurance industry right now. Just tell me from your perspective, what's the biggest change in how insurance is perhaps bought, sold, or valued right now?
00:46 - Heath Shearon: Oh, man. I think that for so long, you know, we were we were training our agent or training our clients to buy on price. You would hear 15% or more in 15 minutes or less and you would see, you know, people selling on price all the time and selling on that. And there's been this abundance of, you know, we have all, you know, the information, we have the knowledge, we have all this. But nowadays with AI, people can find information anywhere. They can search for themselves what coverage they need and what price they should be at. And so now I think it's more about building trust. And I think people are buying, you know, based on trust. I think it's even that old school mentality of trust, building relationships. And I think nowadays, you know, people are wanting that. They're desiring that because they can find the information, but they need somebody they can trust. you know, they need someone that they could ask the questions to and believe them, you know, and, you know, they could find the information here, but they need someone they could verify that with and they could talk through that. So, I think um, you know, people consumers are desiring that in my opinion.
01:40 - Paul Lucas: Yeah. And of course, in your role right now, you're asking a lot of questions to insurance people. Do you think there is a difference in how they perhaps think they're perceived and how they're actually perceived?
01:51 - Heath Shearon: Yeah, 100%. Um, I think that, you know, let's just be honest. You know, people uh still see insurance agents as those sleazy insurance salesmen. They still see us as the car salesman. No offense to car salesman, but they see that side of us. And people I think we as insurance agents think that we've gotten past that, but we haven't. And I think that we're still perceived that way. So, I think that we need to lean in. We are the experts. We are the ones who know the product. We know, you know, the client's needs. We know those things. We need to lean more into that. And I think that we perceive ourselves in a way that we're not. You know, I think we still need to work on overcoming those challenges of being seen as just a commodity or seen as a sleazy car salesman. We're so much more than that. We have, you know, we're been entrusted with their lives, with their businesses, with every like the insurance industry as a whole. Like we the uh global economy, you know, rests on insurance. You know, everything that happens. You can't open a business without insurance. You can't have a home or auto without insurance. Like what we do is so important and I think that we dumb that down too far and we just end up just selling on a price or selling a product just so we can make a paycheck.
02:55 - Paul Lucas: Yeah, absolutely. And of course when we're talking about challenges in the industry, one of the challenges culturally is bringing teams together because there's so much consolidation right now. So what do you think's driving this this sort of M&A surge that we're seeing?
03:07 - Heath Shearon: Oh man, I think that, you know, the M&A activity is being driven. I think more than anything else, I think several different things. I don't think it's any one thing, but I think for these larger brokers that are they're buying some of these smaller houses, it makes sense for them to grow revenue-wise because they've got the operational opportunity there. They've got the things they they've learned how to do things on a smaller scale. So, they can come in and beef up that smaller agencies by bringing in resources and bringing in things like that. And on the flip side of that, I think for the smaller uh broker, you know, that's struggling with, you know, building a tech stack. They're struggling with this idea of I don't have the money to build this phenomenal tech stack or to buy all these things. I need, you know, some influx of cash. I need this or that. So, they're looking for some of these larger houses to come in and help them there. But I think even more than that, I think the smaller agency, they're no longer looking at it as like a money play or a money grab. I think they really want to continue their legacy. And I think they're looking for ways to continue that legacy. And so you're seeing a lot of that in in a way that's positioned of I'm not selling my getting out. I'm selling it, you know, so I could continue my legacy. And maybe they stay involved at a small level or maybe the name doesn't change. You know, I think that we're seeing an offshoot of that brand and maybe they keep the name and they keep the original broker on for a little while because they want to continue that legacy.
04:22 - Paul Lucas: Yeah.
04:23 - Heath Shearon: And I think you're seeing a lot of agents that might sell their agency and they remain, you know, a small equity stakeholder in it. Like they are a stakeholder in the sense maybe they still retain 15% of it and they get out rid of the rest of it. And so I think there's a lot of things going on at play here, but I think for once, you know, right now I feel like both sides are able to win in those M&A activities. There's no longer, oh, the small guys are getting gobbled up or they the bigger guys are just taking over. I think both sides are winning now and there's an opportunity for the larger and the smaller guys to come together and win. Both win.
05:01 - Paul Lucas: Yeah. Yeah.
05:02 - Heath Shearon: That's my shot.
05:04 - Paul Lucas: Yeah. And of course, you know, if we're talking about sort of legacy of the insurance industry, we need to attract new talent as well, don't we? But to do that, we need to change that car salesman image that you referenced. So, uh, how do we go about that?
05:18 - Heath Shearon: Yeah. I mean, I could talk about this forever, but I think what we've got to do is, and I think I talked about this a little bit last year, but, uh, insurance is a sexy industry. I think it's something that's so important and I think when younger people coming into it, they think of as a desk job selling insurance or they think of us selling a product, but it's so much more than that. There's so many avenues to enter this industry. I mean, I've made a career the last six or seven years as a media person, as a podcast host, as a content creator, there's that avenue, there's a salesman, obviously, there's actuaries, there's underwriters, there's so many avenues to get, there's claims, you know, there's so many avenues you can get into in this industry. I think that people just dumb it down to you're a car salesman. Yeah, you're an insurance salesman. There's so much more than that. We got to be able to tell that story and we need to be able to tell the story of we're not selling a product. We're protecting someone's life. We're protecting their business. We're helping them to provide a future for their family or provide a future for themselves or build a legacy for somebody else. The insurance industry is not just some commodity 15%, you know, or more in 15 minutes or less. It's so much more than that. And so I think as an industry, we've got to be able to sell that to the next generation. And I think the last thing I would say to that, um, as I'm getting older in this industry, I think it's time for us to be able to let go and pass on that torch. I think so many times the Gen X, maybe the baby boomers, you know, we're afraid to let go because we don't we built this and we've held on to it so tight. The next generation, they have the capabilities. They can take this industry and do so much more with it. We just got to be able to trust that. Yeah.
06:44 - Paul Lucas: And I think if we can learn to let go and trust the next, you know, generation of industry professionals coming in, I think we can leave it in a good spot.
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