A wildland fire consultancy, like no other.
Strike First Fire Solutions (SFFS) is a wildland fire consultancy based in California. The Strike First mission is to bring decades of experience as professional firefighters directly to property owners. Our approach is informed by our experience and driven by a desire to continue serving California.
100+ years of collective fire experience, now working for you.
Our team of active and retired California professional firefighters has over 100 years of collective experience in municipal and wildland firefighting and incident management. As professional firefighters, we’ve spent our careers working in tandem with federal, state, and local agencies to save lives and mitigate damage to personal property and other valued assets, including revenue-generating agriculture operations.
That experience is what separates a Strike First recommendation from a generic defensible-space checklist: we know how modern fire actually moves through a property, because we’ve stood in front of it.
Shared impacts, and risks specific to HNW individuals and commercial owners.
Fire behavior has changed in the last ten years, both in predictability and severity. The evolution from fire “seasons” to a year-round fire season, with increasing volatility in wildland-urban interface (WUI) areas, has driven billions in damages and exponentially increasing firefighting costs.
Shared Impacts of Wildfires
- Loss of life
- Financial losses for property owners and businesses
- Pressure on local economies from displacement, job loss, and strain on food and transportation
- Cost and timeline to rebuild critical infrastructure
- Strain on local, state, and federal resources
- Post-fire threats such as mudslides and environmental hazards
- Insurers exiting markets due to risk and cost
Risks for HNW Individuals & Commercial Owners
Insurance
High-value assets are increasingly uninsurable, under-insured, or facing premiums high enough to push owners toward “self-insuring” by investing in preparedness.
Reconstruction Delays
Despite having the capital to rebuild, environmental review and competition for rebuilding resources prolong the process well past what owners expect.
Access to Experts
Even with resources to deploy mitigation measures, there aren’t enough experts who understand modern fire behavior well enough to offer comprehensive guidance.
Meet the founders.
Tom Arce
Principal & Founder
An 8th generation Californian, Tom grew up in Ojai, California and graduated from the University of California at Santa Barbara with a degree in Political Science.
Tom worked for 33+ years as a professional firefighter. He started his career as a member of the Ventura County Fire Department Handcrew and went on to promote up the ranks to the position of Fire Battalion Chief. VCFD is recognized nationally as a leader in the wildland firefighting arena, and has historically deployed Strike Teams (five engines of the same type with a leader) to incidents all over the state for fire suppression. Those assignments, across different fuel models, topography, weather patterns, and fire behavior, were exceptional learning opportunities that gave him knowledge otherwise unattainable.
After spending the last 8 years of his professional career as a Fire Battalion Chief, he retired from VCFD in 2021 and started Strike First Fire Solutions in 2024 to support property owners impacted by fires.
Ynez Arce
Co-Founder & Advisor
Ynez is a Family Office Executive and Co-Founder of The Cyber Foundation. She manages teams and service providers supporting prominent UHNW families with real estate management, property acquisitions and divestitures, accounting and finance, security, technology and cybersecurity, insurance, risk, legal, and compliance functions.
She understands the unique needs of UHNW families: privacy and discretion, protection of significant real estate holdings and other assets, and bespoke solutions for complex problems with myriad considerations.