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Roetzel & Andress enters Chicago market
ASHLEY C. HEENEY
Legal News Reporter
Published: October 11, 2011
The law firm of Roetzel & Andress LPA has just broken into a new market.
On Oct. 1, it acquired the law firm of Lewis, Overbeck & Furman, LLP, a long-standing Chicago firm located at 20 N. Clark St. on the 32nd floor of a 1988 built 35-story building a block from the state courts and two blocks from the federal courts.
With this acquisition, Roetzel & Andress now has offices in Illinois, Ohio, Florida, Washington, D.C. and New York, with Chicago being the firm’s third to open since 2006. LOF’s eight attorneys–six partners and two associates plus two of counsel–have stayed on board.
Timothy J. Ochsenhirt, chairman and chief executive officer of Roetzel in Akron, said the firm has been planning for entry into the Chicago market for several years and that establishing a presence there is a significant part of the firm’s growth plan. They plan to attract “new attorneys with entrepreneurial spirits,” he said.
Combining with Roetzel was a welcome change for LOF, said Attorney Tim J. Emmitt, a partner at that firm since 1971.
“We’ve been around since 1944, so the firm has gone through several evolutions and in the current market we just felt that the wave of the industry is to merge and consolidate,” said Emmit, who is now serving as partner-in-charge of Roetzel & Andress, Chicago office.
“We have areas of expertise that our clients ask for, and some that they ask for that we can’t provide that Roetzel can, so we’ll be able to have one-stop shopping,. At the same time we have areas that Roetzel doesn’t have so it’s complementary.”
Roetzel offers a full range of legal services in the areas of employment, employee benefits, ERISA, trusts and estates, real estate, business litigation and business services.
The attorneys from LOF focus more on ERISA, retirement matters and litigation in different areas from Roetzel.
“It’s really benefit to our clients because we can reach out to our other 12 offices to get help,” Emmitt said of the firm’s now “deeper bench.”
The two firms, who never worked with or against one another previously, started their talks in the spring about the possibility of combining.
“We’ve been approached by other firms that have foothold in Chicago, but frankly never found anyone with philosophy or culture like we wanted. We found that with Roetzel & Andress. They’re direct with management, don’t govern with committee as many huge firms do, which gets to be really time consuming, yet they have a great collegiality among the partners. They have a three-day retreat every year. They have something like 38 partners and the biggest part of annual retreat is to get to know your partners,” said Emmitt, who planned to give a speech introducing his partners at the retreat last week. “It’s interesting that a law firm that would take three days out of production to make everyone feel comfortable.”
Jeff Casto, President of Roetzel & Andress said since Chicago’s a major business center, they have had a number of clients approach his firm as to whether they were in Chicago or could open an office there.
“We looked at firms and some lawyers and decided on this firm, We’ll keep all their staff and we’re talking to additional laterals in Chicago and will grow the office with other lawyers from the Chicago market. We have had a variety of different requests for services. We have certain expertise they don’t’ have– environmental, IP, a deeper bankruptcy practice, employment and litigation – we look to grow and round out there,” he said, adding the new location is ideal for their business practice since Region 5 of the EPA in Chicago among other main public and private offices.
“We intend to grow intelligently and add to quality of lawyers of there,” Casto said.
Emmitt said the change will save money in terms of the high costs of technology that comes with running a modern legal practice.
“They have a lot of people on staff and communication among 220 attorneys is difficult. They have a 24-hour call center for help, anytime day or night–a huge overhead item that a lot of firms can’t maintain, so it’s going to be very helpful to us.