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Happy birthday to us!

December 17, 2010

Twenty years ago today five more-or-less young accountants went over the wall of a national CPA firm to start their own firm. They wisely discarded their first working firm name ("Dunderhead CPAs") and settled on the name "Roth & Company." The original five shareholders went out to some finished space in West Des Moines furnished with used desks, six phones and one computer (a 386, with a mysterious program called "Windows" that didn't seem to do anything), hired a secretary, and got to work, hoping to at least get through tax season.

The original cohort of Roth & Company: Left to right: Joe Kristan, Gordon Roth, Steve Weiss, Wayne Floerchinger, Tana Buchman, Tim Breitbach, proudly showing off their first copier. Click on photo to enlarge.

We made it through the tax season, rented some permanent space downtown, and settled in. Twenty years later three of the original renegades are still at it; the other two, Gordon Roth and Steve Weiss, took the ultimate promotion to become clients. Two new shareholders arrived during the first year, Jerry Carlson and Les Heimsoth. We now have nine shareholders and 26 other full-time employees, all working at our Downtown Des Moines office.

We also have more than one computer now.

From the archives of Roth & Company, some photos from our first year below.

Jerry Carlson