It’s a buyer’s market out there with respect to legal services for large corporations, according to Michael Rynowecer at BTI Consulting Group. In a recent post, he says that a typical corporation is working with 47 law firms at any given point, and even an average middle-market company is working with eight. “The battle for the primary spots are somewhere between intense and brutal,” he says.
These “top spots” are so coveted because generally only two law firms earn primary status with any client—a role not to be taken lightly, Rynowecer says. His research shows these two firms “capture between 40 percent-to-50 percent of the client’s legal budget—leaving the others to slug it out for the rest.” Becoming the primary provider of legal services at a company gives a firm access to three to five times the fees you currently bill them, he says.
