"We look beyond the billable hour to the future of our clients’ families and businesses with the expectation that we’ll be representing them for generations to come." —Gregory Walsh
So what gives? Well, maybe it’s the wine.
“We’ve positioned ourselves locally, nationally and internationally as a go-to firm for wine industry counsel,” explains Gregory J. Walsh, DP&F’s co-managing partner, who’s been with the firm for nine years. Walsh shares co-managing duties with Scott Gerien and gets a lot of help from the firm’s chief operating officer, Rob deOcampo.
DP&F, which has offices in Napa Square in Downtown Napa and on B Street in Downtown Santa Rosa, sees itself as a full-service law firm. It offers a full complement of transactional, litigation, intellectual property, land use, alcohol beverage, real estate and labor/employment practice groups. Walsh says the firm is a “one-stop shop” for its clients since it offers multi-disciplinary expertise. The firm just celebrated its 50th anniversary, making it “generational,” Walsh explains. This is another reason for its success.
“We’re in the fourth generation of partners and, in many cases, third or fourth generation of clients,” Walsh says. This continuity is rare for mid-size firms, he notes, and it “speaks to the strength of the relationships with our clients that each generation of lawyers has built and maintained. We look beyond the billable hour to the future of our clients’ families and businesses with the expectation that we’ll be representing them for generations to come. The current partners are incredibly fortunate to be the beneficiaries of this goodwill, and it’s our job to pass it along to the next [generation].”
Community involvement is another reason for DP&F’s high profile and continued success. As the company states on its website, its attorneys and staff “take their involvement and contribution to their communities as seriously as they do the practice of law.”
To that end, DP&F encourages all employees “to get involved in whatever interests them,” says Walsh. Whether it’s coaching soccer, supporting arts groups or providing pro-bono legal services to nonprofits, DP&F employees are very active in community work at many levels.
While not providing exact numbers, Walsh says DP&F “has a longstanding policy of supporting our employees’ philanthropic efforts by putting our money where our mouth is.” He notes that the firm and its employees donate considerable time and money to “dozens of North Bay organizations” each year.
DP&F employees dedicate their time to a wide variety of causes, serving on the boards of many nonprofits, including the diRosa Preserve, Vine Trail, Auction Napa Valley and the Napa Valley Wine Library Association. Others serve on community commissions. Associate attorney Amanda Bevins, for example, has been a long-time commissioner on the Napa Juvenile Justice Commission and the Napa County Gang & Youth Violence Commission.
Finally, Walsh is proud that DP&F has a fine reputation within the legal community as a great place to work. Carol Ritter, a DP&F attorney and a director of its business and real property practice groups, believes collaboration is a core value and “key to the success of DP&F as both a client representative and employer.” She notes that the company seeks out attorneys and staff who are “smart, curious and creative. As a result, we have amazing human resources at our disposal, are able to provide well-rounded advice to our clients and, as a bonus, enjoy our work.”
