Villere & Co

Villere & Co

Villere & Co. was established in 1911 by St. Denis J. Villere, the great-grandson of Louisiana's second governor, as an underwriter and broker of local stocks and bonds. The firm shaped New Orleans infrastructure early on, selling the bonds that built the Watson-Williams Bridge — then the world's longest concrete bridge — across Lake Pontchartrain. The transformation into a pure investment counsellor began in 1935, during the Great Depression, when a client who had sold his business asked the firm to manage his financial affairs on a fee-only basis. That shift set a course the family has maintained for nearly 90 years. The firm runs concentrated, actively managed portfolios of equities and fixed income for high-net-worth individuals, multi-generational families, and institutional clients. Its vehicles are straightforward: separately managed accounts (SMAs) available to qualified investors and two no-load mutual funds — the Villere Balanced Fund and the Villere Equity Fund — which provide access to the same stock-selection discipline at lower entry points. Villere & Co. targets under-the-radar companies with above-average growth potential, using a team-based approach where four distinct generations of the Villere family debate every investment. The geographic footprint centers on the Gulf Coast and New Orleans, though the firm sources ideas nationally and maintains relationships with exchanges in major financial centers globally. The firm manages approximately $1.4 billion (per the firm's website, 2026) and operates exclusively from its headquarters at 601 Poydras Street in downtown New Orleans. In 1994, Villere & Co. closed its broker-dealer arm to focus entirely on portfolio management, forming a long-standing custodial partnership with Charles Schwab. The firm participates deeply in local civic life — each partner is expected to serve on nonprofit boards — and has contributed to schools, universities, cultural institutions, and charitable organizations across the Gulf Coast region. In 2016, the firm sued Epiq Systems on behalf of its clients and all shareholders, successfully nominating a new board slate to improve management quality and performance (per the firm, 2016). Villere & Co. is defined by a structural feature rare among century-old financial firms: it unilaterally surrendered its broker-dealer registration in 1994 to remove any incentive structure misaligned with client outcomes. This self-imposed constraint — operating solely as a registered investment adviser with partners' personal capital invested alongside clients — distinguishes its governance from bank-owned wealth managers or hybrid broker-dealers. Succession is managed through multi-generational family participation, with partners named Villere currently spanning at least three generations active in the firm.