Metro Vancouver’s five largest law firms have increased the number of lawyers they employ by 2.3% this year compared with 2017.
Despite that modest increase, however, their overall lawyer count grew 53.3% more, on average, than the rest of the firms on Business in Vancouver’s Biggest Law Firms in Metro Vancouver list.
Both the median and average number of lawyers employed at Metro Vancouver’s largest law firms dropped in 2016 compared with 2015. The median number fell 7.2%, while the average number of lawyers dropped 3.8% during that time, indicating that firms lower on the list experienced a greater decline in the number of lawyers employed than those higher on the list
Since the 2016 decline, the median number of lawyers employed by the law firms on Business in Vancouver’s list has flatlined. Their average number of lawyers increased 2.4% in 2017 from 2016, but half of those gains were lost in 2018.
Of the top five largest law firms, Lawson Lundell LLP had the largest one-year and five-year gains in number of lawyers: up 6.9% this year compared with 2017 and up 13.5% to 109 in 2018 from 96 in 2014.
The list’s top one-year gainers in lawyers employed were No. 11-ranked Gowling WLG (Canada) LLP and No. 8-ranked Alexander Holburn Beaudin + Lang LLP. They reported one-year increases of 16.4% and 12%, respectively.
Of the top five law firms on the list, DLA Piper (Canada) LLP recorded the largest percentage decline in lawyers since 2014: to 95 in 2018 from 109 in 2014, a 12.8% drop. •
