When talking to managing partners at law firms based across the UK, one thing is clear – there’s no shortage of challenges for them to contend with.
Whether it’s keeping their staff happy, competing for quality work, or staying on top of client priorities, law firm leaders have their hands full.
But while they juggle all these challenges, shifting dynamics in the major legal markets across the UK mean that new opportunities are emerging for national and regional players, as a tier of firms long viewed as the national elite increasingly turn their attention to the international arena.
‘A vacuum for those like us to fill’
While firms such as DLA Piper, Eversheds Sutherland and CMS still maintain sizeable UK footprints in cities such as Manchester, Leeds and Birmingham, in recent years their attention has increasingly shifted to the international stage. As such, it is easy for City-centric observers to fall back on outdated narratives about the quality of work in the UK’s regional markets. However, for those on the ground across the country, this couldn’t be further from the truth.
‘It’s not the case that we’re all just picking up scraps’ comments Nik White (pictured), who was this year elected for a third term as managing partner at North West firm Brabners. ‘There’s tons of really, really good opportunities, and they’re opportunities that are absolutely in the sweet spot of firms like us, which means we can now, with more confidence, compete for bigger-ticket work’.
Brabners, which White has now led as managing partner since 2018, has enjoyed a period of unprecedented national media exposure in recent years, making headlines for its work on the High Court ‘Wagatha Christie’ case, and the wider firm has also been thriving, with revenues rising 40% over the last three financial years.
The firm is primarily based in Manchester and Liverpool, but expanded further afield in 2022, opening an office in Leeds, and recent reports have linked the firm with a potential move into London. However, while expansion opportunities are on the table, White is clear on the firm’s strategy of pursuing organic growth.
‘Our growth has been profitable, sustainable and stable – it’s been entirely organic, and not the result of any mergers or acquisitions. In my view, whilst organic growth may in many ways be the hardest form of growth to secure, it’s also the best.’
‘The worst thing we could do is to chase growth simply for the sake of it, or without clear alignment to our strategy and values and putting our well-established culture at any risk of dilution. We do want to grow, but in the right way and for the right reasons – and I do think there’s plenty of opportunity in the mid-market, mid-corporate space.’
Other UK nationals are alive to these opportunities, with Browne Jacobson managing partner Richard Medd noting in a recent interview with Legal Business that ‘a group of firms that might have previously competed with us for work have changed their focus.’
Shakespeare Martineau senior partner Keith Spedding, who is based in Birmingham, agrees. ‘These larger firms are looking at the international and bigger national pieces, which leaves a vacuum behind for those like us to fill’.
Roger Hutton, joint managing partner of Leeds firm Clarion, adds: ‘The truth is that the international firms are less focused on competing for businesses with less than £200m turnover, which creates spaces for regional firms like us – that mid-market space is now a big space to attack’.
Some UK firms report that clients are returning to the more domestic-focused offerings, attracted by a higher standard of service on offer at firms with stronger roots in the markets they operate. ‘We’ve had clients come back to us after initially going to an international firm because we were able to treat them as a more important client and give them more on-the-ground attention’, comments comments Roger McMillan, managing partner at leading Northern Irish firm Carson McDowell. ‘They’ve tested the water with them and decided to come back to us’.
And the LB100 numbers give weight to these claims, with last year’s average revenue growth of 11% for the regional and national firms in the LB100 outperforming the overall average of 10%.
For more, see Doubling up: LB100 firms set 10% growth benchmark as more than half pull off double-digit hikes
An even starker contrast can be seen against the former national giants who have spread their wings – DLA, Eversheds, CMS, Pinsent Masons, Gowling WLG, Addleshaw Goddard and Womble Bond Dickinson – where average revenue growth last year was 7%.
Of the 45 regional and national firms included in the LB100, 27 (60%) posted double-digit percentage revenue growth for the last financial year, 12 of which enjoyed growth of more than 15%.
Top ten national LB100 firms by revenue
| Firm | 2023-24 revenue | Change on 2022-23 |
|---|---|---|
| Irwin Mitchell | £304.3m | +10% |
| Shoosmiths | £207m | +7% |
| TLT | £174m | +11% |
| Mills & Reeve | £168m | +14% |
| Burges Salmon | £163m | +27% |
| Knights | £150m | +6% |
| Freeths | £145.4m | +13% |
| Weightmans | £140.1m | +12% |
| Keoghs | £119.6m | +11% |
| Browne Jacobson | £118m | +12% |
Roots and branch
A more partner-led service and more reasonable fees are not the only factors drawing clients to national and regional firms – the value of remaining loyal to your roots is a sentiment that is shared by many.
At Manchester’s Pannone, senior partner Paul Jonson proudly highlights that the firm’s brand ‘has been synonymous with legal services in Manchester and North West for many, many years’, while at Shakespeare Martineau – although a much larger firm, with 12 offices across the UK – Spedding strikes a similar note. ‘It’s really important for us to have that local identity, even though we are a national firm – it’s the people on the ground and their local reputations that generate the work’.
North of the border, Brodies, which in 2023 became the first domestic Scottish firm to break through the £100m revenue mark, is also resolute in its commitment to its domestic market, despite recently making its first steps into Middle East with the launch of a base in Abu Dhabi. Stephen Goldie, who took up the managing partner role at the firm last April, comments, ‘Scotland has been the anchor for us and that will continue to be the case – there’s plenty of opportunity to grow in the Scottish market while serving clients in the rest of the UK and internationally’.
Carson McDowell’s McMillan is similarly resolute about the importance of his firm’s heritage. ‘We’ve been in Belfast since 1852’, he says, ‘and have spread our wings far and wide across our jurisdiction. We’re a long-founded, well-established, respected business and our Northern Irish roots are absolutely important to us’.
Carson McDowell senior partner Neasa Quigley underlines another plus point that regional firms can draw on to differentiate themselves from their larger counterparts – ‘the real attraction to being able to meet your clients and lead a transaction, unlike in a London team.’
Regional vs national
While this cohort of firms are unquestionably loyal and committed to the markets in which they came up in, one theme does recur in conversation with firms across the UK – that the ‘regional’ label is not for everyone.
‘There’s a distinction to be made between firms which predominantly serve Yorkshire-based clients and Yorkshire-based firms’, states Walker Morris managing partner Jeanette Burgess, who last year became the Leeds firm’s first ever female leader.
The firm is one of the ‘big six’ in Leeds, going toe-to-toe with five other firms – Addleshaws, DLA, Pinsents, Squire Patton Boggs and Eversheds – which have built huge networks off offices around the world.
Walker Morris proudly refers to itself as ‘the largest single-site law firm outside London’, and argues that that does not prevent it from competing with bigger players, as Burgess explains: ‘While based in Leeds, we operate nationally and internationally, and we position ourselves as independent and flexible’.
As with many other independent firms, Walker Morris handles international via its network of relationships with other independents, an arrangement which is also paying off for TLT, one of the largest UK firms without any international offices, which has seen revenues grow by more than 50% over the past three years.
Managing partner John Wood (pictured) highlights the value of a national footprint backed up by an international network: ‘TLT’s focus is absolutely national, focusing on what the UK has got to offer us, with a really strong international network, and that’s great – we can resource any international transaction because of our network, and clients aren’t crying for us to open offices across the piece as well’.
At North West firm JMW, managing partner Marc Yaffe points to a ‘one-firm culture’ – something which most acknowledge is easier to maintain for firms which do not have bases outside of the UK.
‘Our client base comprises regional, national and international businesses and individuals, and, while we have bases in Manchester, London and Liverpool, we operate as one firm with a one-firm culture,’ he says. ‘It’s for others to define us, should they want to, but we concentrate more on how our people and clients see us, not others’.
‘Firm culture is the foundation of everything’
The issue of culture at law firms was thrown into the spotlight last year by the tragic death of Pinsents partner Vanessa Ford, prompting calls for systemic change within the legal profession. While big City firms known for punishing billable targets are reviewing their working practices to take into account the changing attitudes towards long hours culture, regional and national firms argue that the less intense working cultures at their firms are a key differentiator.
At Pannone, the firm has no individual chargeable hours or billing targets, as part of a strategy to foster a more collegiate atmosphere. ‘Firm culture is the foundation of everything’ states managing partner Nicola Marchant (pictured), who argues that targets ‘drive the wrong behaviours’: ‘Particularly bright individuals will meet targets ruthlessly, but they will do that to the exclusion of non-chargeable work that will actually help clients’.
Brabners takes a similar approach, where White explains that the firm’s intentionally low targets are ‘all about trying to maintain a healthy, happy balance. The profession is hard enough as it is, without making it harder than it needs to be’.
TLT’s Wood expands on the point. ‘The old model used to be the “red braces” shouting at everyone, but that’s really not how you achieve high performance. If you’re in a business that cares about you, your career, and the environment, and you’re doing really exciting work, that’s a great place to be’.
The six-million dollar question – growth vs culture
While smaller firms are able to credibly cite culture as a unique differentiator, in a market where growth is the key measure of success, the question is to what extent firm culture is impacted by scale.
‘That’s the six-million dollar question,’ says Wood. ‘I know you don’t have to lose culture with growth, but something seems to happen along the way with some firms – I wonder if people forget that this is a people-based business’.
‘You put your people first, and then the rest flows from there. There are businesses that have fantastic culture and significant scale – you just have to work really hard at it’.
While for many, maintaining a regional focus is a key priority, but for others, national and international expansion is an inevitable consequence of success.
On the prospects of a London launch, White is circumspect. ‘We want to continue growing, but for the right reasons and in the right way, without diluting our culture and losing that sense of independence and being different. We want to grow without being encumbered by the idea that size is everything.’
‘While I don’t feel like the lack of a London presence is inhibiting us, there is an opportunity for us to explore it and now feels the right time for us to do that on the back of seven consecutive years of sustainable, profitable growth. We would want to do it in the right way though, and only if it’s driven by client need. It can’t just be a vanity thing’.
The war for talent
Culture is of course a key factor in the war for talent, and regional and national firms are alive to this as a differentiator to set themselves apart from big City.
‘How to win the war for talent is number one on our key themes of strategy,’ says White. We know we need to be competitive on salary, but the priority will always be that we are true to our culture. Part of that is working hard for our clients but also knowing the importance of work-life balance.’
With associate salaries at City firms reaching eye-watering levels, national and regional firms argue that money alone is no longer the motivator it once was.
‘More than ever, juniors’ motivations are not purely financial,’ says TLT’s Wood. ‘They want a great experience and the opportunity to develop their careers on top of sustainability, diversity, and above all, authenticity’.
Numerous firms across the UK cite examples of ‘returners’ – lawyers heading back to the regions, often due to family connections, after satisfying their curiosity about the high-octane City life. White says Brabners attracts people ‘who have found previous roles unhealthy or unsustainable but still want to make a difference’.
‘It’s going to become the norm that people have multiple careers at multiple law firms, ‘ he says. ‘If I was 23 again, I could go to a City firm, earn well and get valuable experience and a good name on the CV, but I’d likely be considering whether it was a long-term option.’
At Pannone, the firm’s efforts to maintain its culture extend to exclusively recruiting trainees from its paralegal pool, as Marchant explains. ‘People grow up throughout the firm – they have longevity of career here. We enable people to provide good quality service unshackled.’
While success in the City will always be seen as the holy grail by many, the alternatives on offer at thriving national firms are only set to become more appealing for lawyers who want something more out of life than just work.
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