A trio of accountants went independent last month, launching a new tax and business management firm in Century City.
The firm, GCP Advisory LLP, includes more than a dozen certified public accountants among its 25 employees. It was founded by Barry Gumerove, Matthew Cohen and Ryan Perlman as a boutique firm that caters to high-net-worth individuals, entrepreneurs, entertainers and real estate professionals.
Cohen, who is managing partner, said he has experience with a wide variety of accounting firms – he got started at Big Four stalwart KPMG, and his father maintains a solo practice – and brings all of that with him at GCP.
“I really understand the different ecosystems within the accounting industry. What I like about our firm is being the best of both worlds,” he said. “It really comes down to our mantra of big firm infrastructure with local firm attention. We want to use cutting edge technology and have forward-thinking, progressive policies for our employees to be able to attract and retain the best talent for our practices.”
The trio spent the past five years at what is now Mann Gelon Smith Sroka Lee, another boutique Century City firm. GCP began life largely with their books of business.
“As we got a lot closer with each other, we realized we were philosophically aligned,” Cohen explained. “We thought there was a great opportunity to be one of the only firms launching in this space in the past few years.”
GCP’s offerings include the full range of tax preparation, advisory and planning service, advising on financial planning, succession planning, real estate transactions and entity structuring, and the full gamut of business management, such as cash flow management, income collection and reporting and transaction consulting.
Between the prominence of the Big Four – KPMG, Ernst & Young, Deloitte and PricewaterhouseCoopers – and the growth of mergers among regional mid-size networks, it’s a rarity for new firms to hit the market with growth plans. Cohen said the plan to make it work is to strongly appeal to young talent in a turnover-heavy business. Though GCP has an office, the firm hires out of state – about half of its employees aren’t in California – in order to cast the biggest net.
“We very much view how we recruit as finding the best and the brightest and those who synergize best with what we want to do, so it’s exciting to be able to remove the geographical constraints to create the best firm,” he said.
Opening a satellite office elsewhere is “something we’re open to if that’s what works best for the employees,” Cohen added. “Our whole philosophy is we hire and train really good people, we take care of them and they take care of their clients and then success will follow.”
