Best Era tops 1,000 law firms and aims for 15,000 by 2031

Best Era, a West Hartford law firm consulting firm founded in 2024, says it has worked with more than 1,000 law firms in two years and is targeting 15,000 over the next five. The company is betting that law firms need better business systems, not just more legal talent or technology.

Why it matters: - Best Era is trying to scale a consulting model for law firms at a time when many owners are struggling with operations, hiring, finances and technology. - The company’s growth target, 15,000 law firms by 2031, signals a push to become a major operator in the legal-services business side, not just a niche coach. - Best Era’s AI events and consulting programs reflect a broader shift in legal practice: firms are looking for systems that make adoption of new tools more practical.

What happened: - Best Era said it has worked with more than 1,000 law firms in its first two years. - The West Hartford, Connecticut-based firm was founded in 2024 by Ryan McKeen, Allison McKeen, Brittany Green and Marisa Rua. - Best Era set a goal of reaching 15,000 law firms over the next five years. - The first 1,000 firms include consulting clients, Best Era Community members, and lawyers and paralegals who attended the company’s AI ERA and AI PARA ERA events.

The details: - Best Era works in seven areas: business strategy, marketing, hiring and retention, operations, finance, client intake and technology. - The company offers four main ways to work with firms: Best Era Community, The Way, Two-Day Intensive and private consulting. - Best Era Community is a private Slack network for firm owners and managers that includes a content library, group coaching, AMAs and member pricing on events. - Membership in Best Era Community costs $1.39 a day. - The Way is a weekly leadership coaching program built on Best Era’s operating system and includes a function chart, employee evaluation tools and 15 ready-to-use systems. - Two-Day Intensive is offered on-site or virtually and covers values, a five-year vision, quarterly goals, marketing strategy and a financial and operations review. - Private consulting is scoped and quoted per project. - Best Era also offers online courses and paralegal training. - Ryan McKeen said, “Most law firms are not badly run. They are unrun.” - McKeen also said lawyers are not taught to be operators and that Best Era now gives firms a map instead of forcing them to create one themselves.

Between the lines: - Ryan McKeen and Allison McKeen previously built and scaled a Connecticut personal injury firm to 40 staff and eight figures in revenue. - That firm earned three consecutive Inc. 5000 rankings, including No. 13 in legal. - Allison McKeen served as COO and CFO, while Ryan McKeen tried cases and later became CEO. - Brittany Green was the firm’s marketing director and drove 10x growth. - Best Era was started after the founders kept getting the same questions from other owners about marketing budgets, hiring, paralegal pay and why firms could look profitable on paper but not in cash. - McKeen said the central problem is a gap between the rigor lawyers apply to client cases and the rigor they apply to their own balance sheets. - Best Era’s view is that AI in a law firm is an operations problem before it is a software problem. - The company argues that firms without documented systems do not become faster when they add AI; they may simply become faster at doing the wrong thing.

What’s next: - Best Era is hiring as it scales toward its five-year growth target. - The company expects to add team members as demand grows. - Best Era says the legal industry’s main constraint is not talent or technology, but the lack of working business systems for firm owners. - The company lists more information at bestera.com.