Member Spotlight | rinehimerbaker
Read Time 4 MinutesBusiness: A tech-savvy accounting firm that specializes in outsourced accounting and tax services, typically for a flat monthly fee.
Headquarters: Jupiter
Year founded: 2013
Founders: Neil Rinehimer and Chris Baker
No. of Employees: 12
Website: rinehimerbaker.com
Slogan: “Play Harder. We’ll Keep Score.”
With new tech tools and software coming onto the market every day, business owners and executives can more efficiently track what’s going on inside their companies in real time and react much more quickly, making better informed decisions and often saving the company time and money in the process.
It’s no different with accounting, and increasingly companies don’t want to wait until the end of the quarter for a full financial picture to come into focus. Decisions need to be made in real time. Yet not all accounting firms are forward-looking and adopting the best of the technologies out there to help their clients. That’s where rinehimerbaker strives to stand out from the crowd.
Zachariah Merschdorf, a senior accountant with rinehimerbaker, says, “We strive to bring accounting into the 21st Century.”
But how?
rinehimerbaker offers outsourced accounting services, also called managed or client accounting services. The firm can handle everything from bookkeeping to controller duties for clients, or a la carte services to fit their needs. It uses the latest cloud technologies to do all that, taking the stress off the client.
“We can do soup to nuts, from receiving invoices, scanning them and entering them into your system all the way up to CFO-level services,” explained Merschdorf, who also oversees business development for the Jupiter-based firm. “So we can do all of it, or if you have a CFO but missing the bookkeeper staff, or vice versa – you have an accounting staff but missing that CFO piece of it – we can do that as well.”
The firm will set up a company with the latest technologies for efficient, automated input, access and visualization of its data. Merschdorf points out a benefit of outsourced accounting is the team’s experience: “There may be 2,3 or 5 people working on your account and you are getting all our experience … but you are not paying for five employees. We are also a durable solution, we are always there, always on call, we don’t call in sick or quit on you. You don’t have to worry about a disgruntled employee running away with your data.”
rinehimerbaker typically charges a flat monthly fee for services. It employs about 12 accountants. Many of them have Big 4 experience or are experienced accounting managers from Fortune 200 companies.
The firm’s clients typically range from companies with a half million to $50 million in revenue. That includes many hospitality clients such as a franchise restaurant with three locations. rinehimerbaker handles the accounting for the three locations, business tax returns and personal taxes, for example. The firm also services software companies, nonprofits, medical practices and b2b businesses such as a small trucking line.
rinehimerbaker was founded in 2013 by Neil Rinehimer and Chris Baker, who combined their complementary areas of expertise – tax and finance operations.
“Our mantra is doing everything on the latest software, and both partners are very forward thinking. They think about where accounting will be in 10 or 20 years,” Merschdorf said.
Growing businesses look for a solution like rinehimerbaker’s because the service can evolve with the company, he said. “Companies that want to grow and see in the future say ‘I don’t want to see my financials just once a quarter, I want to see real time insights and make decisions with actionable information’.”
Merschdorf is a rare Florida native who was born in Naples and grew up in Tampa. He commends Palm Beach Tech and 1909 because, he says, they get people together who normally wouldn’t convene, promoting community engagement that is important for a growing technology community. “We all bonded with this group that supports tech in the area.”
He says he learns a lot about tech at the events, too.
“We want to stay on the edge of what’s going on in the industry because there are so many changes. We use Sage Intacct for our core accounting solution, but we work with dozens of other software [products], such as bill pay automation, payroll automation and others. And we are constantly evaluating what is new out there … to better serve our clients,” Merschdorf said.
“It’s the wild west – there is something new out there every day. You are leveraging our experience.”
Pictured at top of post: Some of rinehimerbaker team members in the Jupiter office, from left, Zachariah Merschdorf, Tonya Lilly, Laney Kneib, Kacey Robinson, and Daniel Olbrych. Other team members work remotely.