GRP has acquired Prescott Jones Ltd. Prescott Jones was founded in Swansea in 1991 and has grown to become one of the largest independent brokers in Wales and the West, with offices in Swansea, Bristol and Cardiff.
Taylor Francis is primarily a retail commercial broker with two offices, in Newport South Wales, and Aylesbury in Buckinghamshire. Mr Taylor said: “County Group will provide our business, our people and our clients with a solid base from which to continue to grow.”
GRP-owned Marshall Wooldridge has acquired Insurefirst Limited, trading as Bush & Associates (Bush). Geoff Kirk, MD of Marshall Wooldridge, said: “Wayne and his team run a high-class regional brokerage and I’m really pleased they’ve chosen to join us for the next stage of their development.
DCJ Group has acquired SM Commercial Insurance Brokers Ltd (SM Commercial). Chris Breeze, chief executive of DCJ said: “SM Commercial is a highly respected community broker with a reputation for high quality client servicing. I’m looking forward to working alongside Steve and his team to help them take the business to the next stage of its development.”
GRP Retail Division recently completed its third annual customer satisfaction survey, emailing over 80,000 commercial broking customers. The survey response at over 8% showed a good level of customer engagement, and the “Net Promoter Score” (NPS) was an "excellent" 64.9 - a 7.4% improvement on GRPs last annual NPS survey result
County Group has continued to ramp up its deal flow during 2022 following the announcement that it is acquiring the business and assets of Marsh & Co (Marsh), and Ginger Markets, an MGA set up by Marsh. Alastair Christopherson, County Group CEO, described Marsh as a ‘dynamic family-owned broker with plenty of experience and a hunger to expand.’
Global Risk Partners has acquired Castle Insurance Services (North East) Ltd (Castle). It marks the first deal for GRP in this part of the UK. GRP’s Head of M&A Stephen Ross said Castle will become GRP’s base in the North East from which to grow the UK retail business footprint further through acquisition and organic growth.
County Group, GRP's North West broking hub has acquired 100% of the share capital of Wales brokerage Archenfield Insurance Management (Archenfield). Alastair Christopherson, CEO of County, said: “This is the second of a number of deals we have in the pipeline for 2022. County Group has always been acquisitive, and our interest in acquisitions remains undiminished, as we look to grow our market presence in the North West and across Wales.”
US broker Brown & Brown, Inc. (Brown & Brown) (NYSE: BRO) has entered into an agreement to acquire Global Risk Partners (GRP) from Funds advised by Searchlight Capital Partners, L.P. (Searchlight). The acquisition, which is subject only to regulatory approval, is expected to be completed in the third quarter of 2022 and will see Brown & Brown establish itself as a major force in the UK retail insurance market.
County Group (County), the North West business of Global Risk Partners (GRP) has acquired the business and assets of PG Insurance, a Cardiff-based community broker. Alastair said: “It’s great to begin 2022 with an acquisition and PG Insurance is an excellent and well run local business that will boost our presence in South Wales, which is an important growth area for the Group.”