Reg restructuring is not quite law yet but essentially a foregone conclusion. Time to quit whining over the loss of interchange fee income and figure out what to do about it. Face your new reality.

Replacing most of what some have estimated at $2 billion in noninterest income across the industry will not be easy. It will take not only sweat equity but creativity. The obvious place to look is eliminating free checking, but once you've given consumers something, it can be difficult to take it back. Rewards checking make a fee a less bitter pill for members to swallow. Pushing members toward online banking by setting certain e-requirements such as e-statements and so many electronic transactions per month could create such a cost savings that a fee might not be necessary. The cost of hard copy fulfillment will only go up.

To make a campaign like this work, credit unions must revisit their somewhat abandoned marketing budgets. Certainly there are cheap alternatives like social media and your website, but a lot of that is marketing to existing members. A billboard, bus stop posters and subway placards could bring in more new members; a campaign that links it all together would be even more effective.