ACT Top 100 Firms

niche services

Economy impacts T100 firm niche growth

BY LIZ GOLD

Given the current economic woes, it comes as no surprise that growth in specialty services has taken a hit — leaving fewer of the 2009 Top 100 Firms reporting increases in various niche areas than in past years. Nearly every category was down from 2008, with the exception of state and local taxes and financing arrangements.

Attest services and business valuations remain in the top two spots as the fastest growing client niches, while litigation support grabbed third, with 72 percent of the 78 responding firms reporting growth, down from 75 percent in last year’s Top 100 Firms study.

Estate, trust and gift tax planning, the third spot last year, was a source of growth for significantly fewer firms in this year’s ranking — 67 percent, compared to 82 percent last year.

Mary Lou Gervie, CPA, CFE, CFF and director of forensic accounting and dispute services at Watkins, Meegan, Drury & Co. in Bethesda, Md., attributes her firm’s forensic group’s consistent, 30-percent annual growth to an increase in client demand.

“Attorneys have a need for CPAs to assist with not only litigation issues, but potentially damage computations, tax and white-collar crime issues,” Gervie said. “If you do a really good job for an attorney, your name will get passed on within or outside their firms. I don’t do a lot of marketing; I just do a good job.”

Asheville, N.C.-based Dixon Hughes also experienced double-digit growth in its litigation support and business valuation practice due to its reputation, according to Roy Strickland, member-in-charge of the service line, who also

noted that the niche has grown because

of the firm’s commitment to alloting full-time personnel to the area.

“We’ve taken the approach that it is a dedicated service line and we have dedicated professionals who work full time in the area, so as a result, the firm also provided the necessary resources to allow us to grow,” Strickland said.

Fewer firms reported growth in business management for wealthy individuals, with only 56 percent of firms experiencing growth this year, compared to 71 percent in 2007. Fewer firms

benefited from Sarbanes-Oxley work — 46 percent, a seven-percentage point decrease from last year.

New to the list this year were two niche categories: business recovery and recession advice, and International Financial Reporting Standards consulting. Forty-one percent of responding firms reported growth in recession-related services, while 34 percent revealed growth in IFRS consulting.