TRAILBLAZERS


A pretty good place to be W


elcome to the 20th anniversary of BMJ’s


Trailblazers supplement, the publication that tracks the journey of the UK’s top builders merchant companies, benchmarking


them against their previous performance and, crucially, those of their competitors.


When we launched the publication back in the heady


days of Spring 2003, jostling away at the top of the tree were Jewson and Wolseley, each with around 18% of the market, and turnovers just shy of £1.7bn, with Jewson slightly ahead, though Wolseley had twice as many branches. Coming up behind them was Travis Perkins in third place, then Grafton and BSS Group, which had just bought rival distributor Tricom. Next, a gulf of several hundred million pounds to Burdens, Jacksons, Ridgeons, Bradfords, William Wilson, EH Smith, Jayhard and Gibbs & Dandy, which had just hit £50m. Of those 13 merchant groups, only three – Bradfords, EH Smith and, obviously, Travis Perkins, are still owned by the same people as they were then. Huws Gray, incidentally, weren’t even big enough in those days to be included at all.


The churn in ownerships has continued apace throughout the last two decades; the main difference is that where in 2003 it was merchants buying other merchants, in the last few years it has been outside private money coming in, buying up merchants and making groups that grow ever larger. All the takeovers have the effect of making the compiling of accurate figures slightly problematic. This year has been more difficult than ever. There is, as we explain in the League Tables commentary, a degree of double-counting, for the simple reason that


several taken-over companies are still filing figures at Companies House under their own names. As Trailblazers is a benchmarking exercise, it makes sense, we believe, to include some of these to illustrate where they fit into the bigger picture, and how they relate to their peers.


As the acquisition of the Saint Gobain Building Distribution brands by the Danish Stark Group happened towards the end of 2022, the only figures available are those for Saint Gobain, though we have referred to them in the entry as Stark/Saint Gobain for clarity. There is, of course, the usual caveat with the information we publish here. That is that the only figures we have available are what is in the public domain. Different year-ends mean most of the results we quote are for the financial year ending December 31 2021, a few finish before that, a few afterwards. The 2022 results have been released for a number of these merchants, however, in most cases they were published too late for us to take them into consideration when compiling the financial tables.


While this year’s publication shows how complicated the industry’s finances have become, it also shows the strength of the sector. Year-on-year sales growth, stockturn, and operating margin are the key ratios we use to determine the BMJ Index, our way of assessing the overall health and competitiveness of a company. If any one of the three is negative – i.e. sales declined year-on-year, or the company recorded an operating loss – the result will be a negative Index score. Last year’s publication showed the initial effect of the Covid-19 pandemic on builders’ merchants; this year shows how that has developed. The League Tables seem to show that it’s a pretty good time to be a builder’s merchant, for now, anyway.


Fiona Russell Horne Group Managing Editor


Trailblazers is published as a supplement to Builders Merchants Journal


Builders Merchants Journal Datateam Business Media, London Road, Maidstone, Kent ME15 8LY Tel: 01622 687031 www.buildersmerchantsjournal.net


EDITORIAL Group Managing Editor: Fiona Russell Horne 01622 699101 frussell-horne@datateam.co.uk


Assistant Editor: Anjali Sooknanan 01622 699106


asooknanan@datateam.co.uk


Production Controller: Nic Mandeville


ADVERTISEMENTS Group Sales Manager: Dawn Tucker 01622 699148


mobile: 07934 731232 dtucker@datateam.co.uk


Publisher: Paul Ryder


pryder@datateam.co.uk


CONTENTS


4-11 12


15 16


18 19


20 22 22 23 24 25


26


27 28


29 30


32 33 34 36


37 38 39 40


41 42


League Tables


Alsford Timber, AW Champion, Beatsons


Beesley & Fildes, Beggs & Partners


Bradford & Sons, Boys & Boden


Browns, Builder Depot


C&W Berry, C Brewer, Crossling


Covers, EH Smith


Elliott Bros, Frank Key Grant & Stone Grafton


Huws Gray


Howarth Timber, Haldane Group


Highbourne Group, James Hargreaves


IBMG


John A Stephens, John Nicholls , JT Atkinson


James Burrell, Joseph Parr JT Dove


Kellaway Group, Kent Blaxill


Lords, LBS


Lawsons, Markovitz, MKM


MP Moran, Myers Group MGM Timber


National Timber Group, Nicholls & Clarke


Robert Pochin, Robert Price


Sydenhams, UK Plumbing Supplies


Stark Building Materials (ex Saint Gobain)


Travis Perkins Turnbull, Tipper


43 Williams, Wolseley


© Datateam Business Media Ltd 2023. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical including photo- copying, recording or any information storage or retrieval system without the express prior written consent of the publisher. The title Builders Merchants Journal is registered at Stationers’ Hall. Suppliers have contributed towards production costs of some photographs in this issue.


April 2023 A supplement to builders merchants journal


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