We haven’t just
witnessed history.

We’ve measured it

S.I.R. is one of the nation's longest-tenured independent, research-based strategy firms. Founded in Richmond, Virginia in 1964 as the Southeastern Institute of Research, we have completed more than 17,000 strategic assignments for organizations, non-profits, state agencies, and communities around the nation.
.

You have seen our work without knowing it

Virginia Is For Lovers
Our research helped birth one of tourism’s most iconic slogans.

The cutting bar on foil
It was hard to tear aluminum foil. Our research found a better way to do it.

The Stay-On-Tab
Studies that helped put the pull tab on the aluminum can

The TV remote
Consumer research brought the remote to living rooms.

The First ATM
Audience testing to prove people would trust a machine.

Virginia’s Travel Map
Our insights drove the redesign of VA’s official state travel map..

Places & People

Across six decades, our research has ranged as widely as community life itself, from the products people buy to the places they visit to the systems they count on. If it shaped how people live, work, and travel, we probably studied it.

Tourism and Placemaking

Master plans and stakeholder research spanning both coasts

Higher Education

Enrollment, retention, and perception studies

Healthcare

Fostering trust and brand messaging at a systemwide scale

Workforce

Talent pipelines and employee culture

Transportation & TDM

Helping regions move smarter

Public Service

Reaching the unreached for state agencies and nonprofits nationwide

What we're known for today.

S.I.R.’s work spans the nation, with deep roots in Virginia

  • Cities and counties charting their futures

    Strategic plans, resident engagement, and local and state-level decisions. Recent planning work has attracted eight-figure manufacturing investment to cities communities that were previously overlooked.

  • Regions finding their shared identities

    Multi-jurisdictional partnerships and innovation corridors that are now moving coordinated investment across county and city lines — reshaping how regions compete

  • State agencies serving people and communities

    Recruitment campaigns and access plans that have brought thousands of citizens into public service systems and reached residents that previous outreach could not.

  • Regions building workforces that hold their people.

    We have led jobs strategies and community partnerships now guiding talent decisions for millions of workers across regional economies.

  • Anchor institutions aligning around what matters.

    Frameworks and community-facing programs that help the nation’s largest organizations think local and emphasize that they aren’t just a presence, they are neighbors too.

  • Tourism and placemaking economies growing

    Statewide tourism plans and regional identity work now guiding destinations from Virginia to Oregon, translating stories into durable visitor economies

OUR POINT OF VIEW

We work where two agendas become one

Most organizations chase economic growth and community wellbeing on separate tracks. Six decades of fieldwork taught us they rise and fall together.

Investment lands hardest when it creates opportunity for the people already there. A place holds onto its next generation when growth and belonging are built together.

We build at the point where the engine and the reason meet.

The Engine

Economic Development

Competitive advantage, target industries, workforce pipelines, infrastructure readiness, the capacity to grow.

The Reason

Community Development

Belonging, civic engagement, service, quality of life, public trust, the reason growth is worth pursuing.

How we’ve always done it

Research as
a foundation

Our research team is fully in-house. We don't outsource the primary and secondary research that gives strategy its evidence, and we build every recommendation on what we've observed ourselves.

Through all of it, a few things have never moved.

Senior-Led, End-To End.

We work at boutique scale so clients get senior strategists from the first conversation to the last measurement. The team you meet is the team that does the work.

Ready for the road ahead

We track the demographic, workforce, technology, and AI shifts reshaping our clients' work, so the strategies we build hold up over years, not quarters.

Where the work gets done, and who does it.

We operate from a restored, 100-year-old former bank building in the historic Fan District of Richmond. The building reflects the firm's character: grounded in history, structurally sound, and built to endure

The work is done by senior strategists, researchers, and advisors with decades of experience. Many came from public-sector roles, executive positions, and major agencies before joining S.I.R

Meet Our Team

Six decades in and we are still listening

If you're facing a decision that matters to your organization or your community,
we'd like to hear about it. Please fill out the form below and we will get back to you right away.

If you would prefer to start your conversation with one of our consultants individually, please refer to our people page.