Daily Business Review – Kluger Kaplan Continues Expansion With 3rd Hire of the Year (August 30, 2021)
By Kluger, Kaplan, Silverman, Katzen & Levine, P.L. September 1, 2021
Kluger Kaplan Continues Expansion With 3rd Hire of the Year
By Dan Roe
Twelve years after its founding, the Miami-based litigation firm Kluger Kaplan recently added its 30th attorney with the hiring of former Haber Law partner Lauren Fallick.
Fallick, a commercial litigator, is the third attorney to join Kluger Kaplan in the past year. Earlier this year, the firm added associate Maia Dombey, previously a Podhurst Orseck law clerk, and associate Becky Saka, a former Florida Second District Court of Appeal staff attorney.
In an interview, founding partner Alan Kluger said the firm’s growth can be explained by generational shifts and client willingness to hire the South Florida attorneys for national work after the pandemic hit.
“One part is our younger lawyers reaching a stage in their careers where they have a following,” Kluger said. “The second piece is the same thing, partners at an enhanced stage of their careers where people older than us aren’t practicing law anymore. So we’ve become the go-to firm, and that increases the business and the need for [younger attorneys].”
Additionally, Kluger Kaplan benefited from virtual courts, as clients asked the firm to represent them in matters in Missouri, Illinois, California and elsewhere.
“There were companies that hired our firm for Florida litigation, but they would never use us for work outside of Florida,” Kluger said. “Then COVID came, and all of the sudden we started getting calls to represent [clients] in litigation in all these places because we’re appearing by Zoom.”
Kluger said he plans to continue hiring attorneys to service the influx of work, hoping to hit 35 lawyers in the next year. Hospitality and construction are expected to drive demand in the next year, Kluger said, as the state emerges from the pandemic.
Fallick spent two years at Kluger Kaplan between 2009 and 2011, joining as a third-year associate after starting her legal career at Cole, Scott & Kissane. She then moved on to West Palm Beach law firms Leopold Law and Mrachek, Fitzgerald, Rose, Konopka, Thomas & Weiss before arriving at Haber Law (then Haber Slade) in 2015. In 2018, Fallick was promoted to partner.
“Kluger Kaplan handles the types of cases I would like to work on. They’re the go-to firm for complex, high-stakes disputes,” Fallick said. “And that’s the work that brought me back.”