Some news is worth pausing to celebrate. The Orange County Business Journal has ranked Pacific Companies No. 2 on its 2026 list of Orange County employment agencies, and named us the fastest-growing firm on the entire list.
The numbers behind the ranking
According to the Journal’s reporting, Pacific Companies grew revenue 32% to $72 million in 2025, climbing four spots in the rankings from the previous year. Permanent physician placements rose 16% to 175, and temporary placements grew 21% to 151.
The growth story continued into this year. As CEO Gary Cook shared with the Journal, our locum tenens division grew 57% year over year in the first quarter of 2026 alone.
What’s driving the demand
The context makes the growth even more meaningful. The Journal reported that revenue across the 14 agencies on its list grew just 2% overall, against nearly flat job growth in Orange County. Physician staffing is the outlier, and the reasons are national in scope.
Health systems across the country are contending with physician shortages, rising burnout, and an aging workforce. The result is a fundamental shift in how hospitals and medical groups think about staffing. Hiring timelines that once stretched a month are now measured in days, and locum tenens has moved from a stopgap to a core workforce strategy.
That shift is exactly what Pacific Companies was built for. For 25 years, we have specialized in both permanent placement and locum tenens for physicians, advanced practice providers, and dentists, which means we can meet health systems wherever their needs are, and meet providers wherever they are in their careers.
Thank you
Rankings are a snapshot, but what they represent is years of trust. To every physician who let us be part of their next chapter, every health system that partnered with us on a hard search, and every member of the PC team who shows up for providers every day: this one belongs to you.
Read the full coverage in the Orange County Business Journal.
Pacific Companies is a full-service physician recruitment firm headquartered in Irvine, California. Founded in 2001, we specialize in locum tenens and permanent placement for physicians, advanced practice providers, and dentists nationwide. Explore open opportunities or connect with our team at pacificcompanies.com.
