Sherman & Howard’s Denver office is in the Block 162 skyscraper at 675 15th St. in the Central Business District. (Sherman & Howard)
The city’s oldest law firm announced Monday that it will be swallowed up by a national company on New Year’s Day, bringing it to an end after 132 years of litigating cases here.
Sherman & Howard, which has 119 attorneys in the city, the third-most of any firm, will merge its eight offices with the similarly old Taft firm out of Cincinnati. That merger, Taft’s sixth in 16 years, will give Taft more than 1,000 attorneys and $875 million in annual revenue.
“Sherman & Howard has a long and storied history as an independent firm but, in terms of where we are in the market today, this is something that I thought should be done in order to sustain the success of the firm,” CEO Stefan Stein said in an interview.
Stein explained that Sherman & Howard has been looking for merger opportunities the past few years. A consultant it had hired for that purpose knew Taft’s managing partner and connected the two sides. After some due diligence, Sherman & Howard agreed to merge.
Stefan Stein
“It wouldn’t work for us to merge with a coastal firm that has much higher billing rates than we do,” Stein said of the firms’ financial similarities. “That wouldn’t work for our clients.”
The firm that became Sherman & Howard opened for business in 1892 in the Equitable Building at 730 17th St., then the city’s tallest tower at nine stories. It is named for Samuel Sherman Jr. and Winston Howard, two lawyers who joined the firm in the mid-1930s.
Taft, which is more fully named Taft Stettinius & Hollister, was founded in 1885 and named after the sons of former President William Howard Taft, who joined in the 1920s. It has been on a recent buying spree and grown into the 83rd-largest firm in the country as a result.
“We welcome the respected and talented group of attorneys and staff from Sherman & Howard to our team,” Managing Partner Robert Hicks said in a news release on Monday.
Sherman & Howard became the first company to sign a lease at Block 162, downtown’s newest skyscraper, in 2021. It occupies 60,000 square feet on the 23rd and 24th floors of a building full of lawyers. Snell & Wilmer is just above it and the Brownstein firm is above that.
Stein said the lease will be assigned to Taft without changes. When asked about the mood around Sherman & Howard’s offices this week, he described it as “highly enthusiastic” before acknowledging there is some bittersweetness in a 130-year-old firm going away.
“Yeah, there is. This firm has a long and storied history, absolutely, and that’s something to be cherished. There’s no question about that,” he said. “But in order to sustain success in a rapidly evolving legal market, you have to be able to pivot, you have to make adjustments.”
Sherman & Howard’s Denver office is in the Block 162 skyscraper at 675 15th St. in the Central Business District. (Sherman & Howard)
The city’s oldest law firm announced Monday that it will be swallowed up by a national company on New Year’s Day, bringing it to an end after 132 years of litigating cases here.
Sherman & Howard, which has 119 attorneys in the city, the third-most of any firm, will merge its eight offices with the similarly old Taft firm out of Cincinnati. That merger, Taft’s sixth in 16 years, will give Taft more than 1,000 attorneys and $875 million in annual revenue.
“Sherman & Howard has a long and storied history as an independent firm but, in terms of where we are in the market today, this is something that I thought should be done in order to sustain the success of the firm,” CEO Stefan Stein said in an interview.
Stein explained that Sherman & Howard has been looking for merger opportunities the past few years. A consultant it had hired for that purpose knew Taft’s managing partner and connected the two sides. After some due diligence, Sherman & Howard agreed to merge.
Stefan Stein
“It wouldn’t work for us to merge with a coastal firm that has much higher billing rates than we do,” Stein said of the firms’ financial similarities. “That wouldn’t work for our clients.”
The firm that became Sherman & Howard opened for business in 1892 in the Equitable Building at 730 17th St., then the city’s tallest tower at nine stories. It is named for Samuel Sherman Jr. and Winston Howard, two lawyers who joined the firm in the mid-1930s.
Taft, which is more fully named Taft Stettinius & Hollister, was founded in 1885 and named after the sons of former President William Howard Taft, who joined in the 1920s. It has been on a recent buying spree and grown into the 83rd-largest firm in the country as a result.
“We welcome the respected and talented group of attorneys and staff from Sherman & Howard to our team,” Managing Partner Robert Hicks said in a news release on Monday.
Sherman & Howard became the first company to sign a lease at Block 162, downtown’s newest skyscraper, in 2021. It occupies 60,000 square feet on the 23rd and 24th floors of a building full of lawyers. Snell & Wilmer is just above it and the Brownstein firm is above that.
Stein said the lease will be assigned to Taft without changes. When asked about the mood around Sherman & Howard’s offices this week, he described it as “highly enthusiastic” before acknowledging there is some bittersweetness in a 130-year-old firm going away.
“Yeah, there is. This firm has a long and storied history, absolutely, and that’s something to be cherished. There’s no question about that,” he said. “But in order to sustain success in a rapidly evolving legal market, you have to be able to pivot, you have to make adjustments.”
