Top 50 2021 - £150m-£249.99m

Gallagher

The Walbrook Building, 25 Walbrook, London EC4N 8AW

Website: www.ajg.com/uk/personal-insurance 

Contact name: Gareth Birch

Telephone: 014 5280 1710

Email: Gareth_birch@ajg.com 

Name of MD/CEO: Gareth Birch, MD of SME & personal lines, retail division 

Corporate Twitter account:
@GallagherUK

Parent company: Arthur J. Gallagher & Co.

Main location: For personal lines and private clients business — Bournemouth, Gloucester, Guildford, Irvine, London, Tunbridge Wells, Wakefield, Sale.

Additional branches: 25 additional branches in Belfast, Berkhamsted, Birmingham, Brierley Hill, Bristol, Cardiff, Chelmsford, Chester, Edinburgh, Glasgow, High Wycombe, Horsham, Leicester, Liverpool, Llantrisant, Manchester, Nottingham, Poole, Southampton, St Helier, Jersey, Stevenage, West Malling, Guernsey, Isle of Man, Brentford.

Staff numbers – total: 1,050 colleagues in SME and personal lines team.

Major specialisms: Household, motor, holiday and second homes, static caravans, non-standard properties, yacht and super yacht.

Major trading subsidiaries: Bollington, George Burrows, Intasure, Rossborough.

Details of any acquisitions in the past two years: Stackhouse Poland, April 2019; Bollington, January 2020.

How will/has Covid-19 impacted your business in 2021? Our team has continued working near to normal during the pandemic and our priorities have been supporting our clients with their insurance and risk management needs during this time and ensuring employee wellbeing. Currently we are focused on reopening a safe office environment for colleagues, and continuing to service clients through a hybrid model, as we start to get back to normal.  

Vision/background: We offer a strong track record of delivering a high level of service direct to customers and managing successful relationships with brand partners, by working in partnership with our UK-wide commercial lines broking business, with an aim of becoming the go-to insurance broker in the communities in which we operate.

The Granite Group

The Lighthouse, 98 Liverpool Road, Formby, Liverpool L37 6BS

Website: www.acorninsure.com

Contact name: Kyle Tyrrell

Telephone: 07725 332953

Email: kylet@acorninsure.com

Name of MD/CEO: Alan Peter Keating

Name of Chairman/woman: Steven Ashton

Parent company: Granite Holdings One

Main location: Liverpool

Additional branches: London, Birmingham, Manchester, Leeds.

Staff numbers – total: 1,040

Staff numbers - personal lines only: 343

Major specialisms: Specialist motor.

Major trading subsidiaries: Acorn Insurance, Motorcade Insurance, Ladies F1rst, Granite Finance, Flag Insurance Brokers.

Details of any acquisitions in the past two years: IT Developers, Flag Insurance Brokers.

How will/has Covid-19 impacted your business in 2021? The Granite Group continues to tackle the Covid-19 pandemic by focussing on three key priorities. 1) Protect our people. 2) Protect our customers. 3) Protect our business.

Vision/background: The Granite Group is the home for specialist motor insurance – understanding client’s needs, providing appropriate solutions and a quality, trusted service.

One Call Insurance

First Point, Balby Carr Bank, Doncaster, South Yorkshire DN4 5JQ

Website: www.onecallinsurance.co.uk

Contact name: Jenny Mayes

Telephone: 07960960951

Email: Jenny.mayes@onecallinsurance.co.uk

Name of MD/CEO: Nik Springthorpe

Name of Chairman/woman: John Radford

Corporate Twitter account:
@OCInsuranceUK

Main location: Doncaster

Additional branches: Doncaster, Derby

Staff numbers – total: 449

Staff numbers – personal lines only: 435

Major specialisms: Personal lines insurance broker specialising in car, van, motorbike, home insurance.

How will/has Covid-19 impacted your business in 2021? Our business adapted to support our customers via live chat. Our staff have been redeployed to home, this has allowed us to maintain opening hours and service levels, despite initially operating with reduced staff. In addition, our customers are able to self-serve 24/7 on our customer portal, which has had some major enhancements during the pandemic – making it quick and easy for our customers to manage their policies. 

Vision/background: As one of the only independent brokers in the UK, we’ve always strived to offer great quality insurance at competitive prices – backed up by market leading customer service. We have more than 200,000 five-star reviews and a satisfaction sore of 96%.

Somerset Bridge Insurance Services 

Lysander House, Catbrain Lane, Cribbs Causeway, Bristol  BS10 7TQ

Website: www.sbisl.co.uk/

Contact name: David Taylor

Telephone: 0117 952 8904 

Email: dave.taylor@sbgl.co.uk

Name of Chairman/woman: Martyn Holman

Parent company: Somerset Bridge Group

Main location: Bristol

Staff numbers – total: 432

Staff numbers - personal lines only: 337

Major specialisms: Car insurance.

How will/has Covid-19 impacted your business in 2021? Focus is on supporting our customers by providing greater flexibility and additional value, whilst protecting our staff and maintaining efficient processes. Fewer new business customers in the market has not made significant impact to date. Retention has remained strong; and overall it is not anticipated that there will be a sustained negative financial impact that will impinge our ability to meet objectives.

Vision/background: To build a sustainable and innovative business that offers transparent insurance products and an efficient and fair service to policy holders. Customers are the core of everything we do whilst drawing on our core values in all aspects of strategy and operations, Innovative, efficient, collaborative, knowledgeable, fair and transparent.

Markerstudy Broking

45 Westerham Road, Bessels Green, Sevenoaks, Kent TN13 2QB

Website: www.markerstudybroking.com

Contact name: Lizzie Smith-Foreman

Telephone: 07875652075

Email: lsmith-foreman@markerstudy.com

Name of MD/CEO: Ross Barrington (MD), Kevin Spencer (group CEO)

Name of Chairman/woman: Benny Higgins

Corporate Twitter account:
@MarkerstudyIns

Parent company: Markerstudy Group

Main location: Portsmouth

Additional branches:  Nottingham, Manchester, Peterborough, Birmingham x 2, St Ives Cambridge, Southampton, Bristol.

Staff numbers – total: Circa 1,110

Staff numbers - personal lines only: 1,000

Major specialisms: Pet, classic and prestige car, commercial, commercial vehicle, taxi, motor trader, motor sport, mobile catering, convicted driver, young driver, motorhome, home, private car, gadget.

Major trading subsidiaries: Reis, Lancaster Insurance Services, Purely Pets, Pet Wise, The Taxi Insurer, Mobilers, Equesure, Co-op, Brightside, One Insurance Solution, CVD Insurance Services, Brightside Van, Gadget Cover, Supercover, The Insurance Factory, Smartdriver Club, Motorhome Protect.

Details of any acquisitions in the past two years: Co-op Insurance Underwriting business, December 2020

How will/has Covid-19 impacted your business in 2021? Following on from 2020, our priority has continued to be delivering an efficient and empathetic response to changing customer requirements. We’ve seen considerable new opportunity in the pet insurance and SME space, with other product lines beginning to return to pre-covid levels.

Vision/background: A portfolio of personal lines and SME products, from classic car to pet insurance, markerstudy broking white-labels with some of the UK’s best known brands. It’s a top three pet administrator, and enjoys a 13-year distribution agreement with Co-op. Opportunities include widening the commercial footprint following the acquisition of Brightside.

Policy Expert

110 Bishopsgate, London EC2N 4AY

Website: www.policyexpert.co.uk

Contact name: Daniel Bunyan

Telephone: 07950412411

Email: dbunyan@policyexpert.co.uk

Name of MD/CEO: Tony Deacon

Name of Chairman/woman: Tony Deacon

Corporate Twitter account:
@PolicyExpert

Parent company: QMetric Group

Main location: London

Additional branches: Milton Keynes, Motherwell, Tunbridge Wells.

Staff numbers – total: 553

Staff numbers – personal lines only: 553

Major specialisms: Home, car.

How will/has Covid-19 impacted your business in 2021? We have seen fewer people shopping in the market for car and home insurance when compared with previous years. We think more customers will be driven into the market to shop around with the aim of reducing household expenditure. Policy Expert is well placed to help customers save money without sacrificing on cover or service.

Vision/background: Policy Expert is the largest and most successful insurtech in UK home and motor. Underpinned by proprietary technology, superior risk selection and market leading claims processes. With over 65,000 five-Star reviews, Policy Expert is rated the number one home insurance provider in the UK. Policy Expert currently services over 900,000 customers.