A team of local advisors from Price Bailey, Leathes Prior and HSBC has worked together to help bring about a management buy-out at signs and graphics franchise Signs Express.
Established in 1989 by David Corbett and Frank Eliel, Signs Express is headquartered in Norwich and has 70 franchises across the country. The deal sees the buy-back of the remaining shares from Corbett and Eliel. Craig Brown, managing director, joined the company at its inception, and, along with operations director Peter Sayles and sales director Tony Marsh, was already a shareholder following a 2007 partial MBO. Following this latest move, Jonathan Bean becomes a fourth equity shareholder, joining the management team and being promoted to finance director.
Signs Express has a group turnover in excess of £20m and 40% of the franchises have been trading for over ten years.
Brown said: “Throughout the years I have seen the company grow and prosper to become the UK’s largest sign franchise and it’s a great pleasure to be reaching the next phase of our company’s development. David and Frank have left us with a fantastic legacy and one which myself, Peter, Tony and now Jonathan are relishing the opportunity to build on in the coming years.”
Corbett and Eliel stated: “We are delighted to pass the baton on to our well balanced and experienced team. They have the knowledge and skills needed to progress what we started, and most importantly will maintain the ethos of what we built. With a large ‘family’ of franchisees across the UK and Ireland it is fundamentally important that they feel confident that the business will continue to be developed with ethical franchising at its core.”
Stephen Reed, corporate finance director at Price Bailey advised on the deal which was funded by HSBC. Paul Warman at Leathes Prior acted as legal advisor to the company and Rob Colman of Howes Percival advised the vendors.