Kate Ferri Dawson
President
Ferri Dawson Insurance Group
Fdinsurancegroup.com

Working in relocation housing after college, Kate Ferri Dawson learned the power of insurance when disaster strikes before she even had her own policy.

“Concern for clients who were not properly insured pushed me to obtain my insurance license and I began working in an insurance agency,” she says.

After nearly a decade in the industry, working on the claims side as well as in both captive and independent insurance agencies, Ferri Dawson opened her own agency, the Ferri Dawson Insurance Group, in Murrysville in November 2019.

“There is so much value in the work that we do,” she says. “I wake up every morning knowing that I’m going to help people. I’m really actively working to educate, protect and prepare the public by providing peace of mind.”

The agency’s president and principal agent, Ferri Dawson says she started her business from scratch without an established clientele, building her business instead through new relationships.

Today, she handles each aspect of the agency’s operations, from insurance and marketing to networking and human resources, plus balancing the books and setting growth goals — and she did it all during a global pandemic.

“In retrospect, I feel that I had two strong hands guiding me to go into business for myself: My inherited entrepreneurial streak from my paternal grandfather and my maternal grandfather, who was an insurance agent,” she says. “My family’s entrepreneurial drive, mixed with my Pap Pap’s love for insurance, is in my blood. While I never saw it in my future, in hindsight opening my own agency seemed like a natural step.”

Growing from mentee to mentor over the years, Ferri Dawson — who is establishing the company’s first cleanup day for the Adopt-A-Highway program and organizing a drive to collect professional clothing for Dress For Success — is passionate about passing on her knowledge of the industry to the next generation of agents, as well as supporting her fellow women in insurance.

“The future of our industry is the younger generation, but I also strongly feel that it’s female,” she says. “But to make this industry more attractive for generations to come, I think it’s imperative that we work to make it more diverse, which starts with hiring and promoting women in this industry.”

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