INTERVIEW
STEVE PHILPOTT DAVID COWANS
By acquiring DC Leisure in December 2012, housing giant Places for People became a new player in the leisure arena. Julie Cramer talks to the heads of both companies
T
he health and fitness industry has seen its fair share of mergers and acquisitions over the years. The majority of
those deals have been between fitness groups, or between fitness operators and larger leisure plcs eyeing a more diverse portfolio – but one recent business deal appears to mark a new departure for the sector. Leisure management company DC
Leisure, which operates leisure facilities for almost 30 local authorities across the country, was taken over by housing giant Places for People in December 2012, for an undisclosed sum. As one of the largest property
management, development and regeneration companies in the UK, Places for People – a not-for-dividend organisation with over £3bn in assets – currently owns or manages over 80,000 homes in 230 local authorities (see briefi ng, p32). It’s believed to be the fi rst time –
in the UK at least – that a housing provider has taken over a leisure company. However, given the way the market is moving, with fi tness facilities reaching out from their sealed boxes and into the local community, perhaps it’s a sign of things to come.
Meet the CEOs S 28
teve Philpott (left of picture) is no stranger to acquisitions. In the 1990s, he was marketing
director for Whitbread, where he was charged with looking into the broader leisure market. It was Philpott who persuaded Whitbread to buy David Lloyd Leisure. He led the acquisition of DLL in 1995, running the health and fitness operation for five years before joining DC Leisure as chief executive
in 2003 as part of a management buyout from the original owners. He also created énergie Global Fitness Management with Jan
Spaticchia (Philpott is a shareholder). David Cowans has solid experience in the housing and community sector, having been housing director and also director of public affairs for Birmingham City Council before joining Places for People in 1997.
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Adding value The chief executive of DC Leisure, Steve Philpott, and his new boss David Cowans, chief executive of Places for People (PfP), certainly see it as a mutually beneficial deal. “Places for People is an owner that
understands local government and community development – and that’s essentially what we’re about too,” says Philpott. “However, it had no leisure provision and no understanding of leisure, and that’s what’s exciting both for them and us. They’ve taken us over to deliver that for them and to expand, which is a very positive situation for everyone in the organisation.” Meanwhile Cowans sees the deal
as an opportunity to enhance and add value to the PfP portfolio, which he says is both “socially and commercially” driven. He explains: “We’re a place- making business. Whether we’re involved in creating a new community or regenerating an existing neighbourhood, our focus is on making places work. We have a long-term interest in adding value to places and providing people with facilities such as new schools, shops, leisure and job opportunities. “For example, we established a chain of nurseries alongside some of our
housing developments. It wasn’t that we particularly wanted to go into the nursery business, but we’d listened to what people were telling us they wanted. More and more, it’s about the life experience of a place – a sense of community, feeling safe, family facilities and so on.” At this stage, says Philpott, it’s hard
&
to be specifi c about how joint projects might look, as this will depend not only on the objectives of the two companies but also the requirements of the local council – how the development sits within its property and asset portfolio.
“However, it does make fi nancial sense to build more than one type of facility in a location,” he says. “DC Leisure has already developed sites such as Maltby, which includes a GP surgery, chemist, meeting spaces and council offi ces, while PfP offers facilities such as adult social care at some of its sites. “Combining leisure facilities with
housing makes good sense, and on future projects we’ll be able to work together from the outset to deliver the best possible facilities.”
Bigger pond It may be natural to assume that the bigger organisation approached the
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