Freshwater’s turnover tops £5m as organic growth reaches 20% ahead of 20th anniversary
Freshwater UK plc, the leading independent communications consultancy, today announces annual results for 2015-16 showing further strong organic growth across all its sectors and specialisms, creating jobs in London and Cardiff.
Freshwater UK plc, the leading independent communications consultancy, today announces annual results for 2015-16 showing further strong organic growth across all its sectors and specialisms, creating jobs in London and Cardiff.
The Wales-headquartered business, which celebrates 20 years of trading in 2017, enjoyed a 20% increase in turnover to £5,045,000 and a 26% increase in operating profit to £842,105 in its year ending 31 August, 2016.
The growth was underpinned by the creation of 12 new full-time posts across Freshwater’s two offices, taking the group’s staff team currently to 57. The group also retains freelance consultants to enhance its specialist expertise and extend its geographical reach to all parts of the UK.
“Since 2012, we have consistently delivered healthy organic growth while substantially strengthening our financial position,” said Steve Howell, chief executive.
“This means we now have the resources and confidence to invest in a new phase of growth by expanding capacity to pursue more of the opportunities we are seeing in target markets such as transport, health, not-for-profit, energy and property.
“We have bigger teams in London and Cardiff and the flexibility to work on projects across the UK, sometimes by having team members working on site, as we did in 2015-16 with two major clients in the north of England.
“We have also seen strong growth in our training and conference business, Waterfront, which accounted for 13% of revenue last year and is continuing to flourish.”
Freshwater provided services to 141 clients during the year, with the top 10 being: Thompsons Solicitors, Cumbria Success Regime, Unite, East Kent Hospitals NHS Trust, Alstom, Welsh Government, North West London NHS Trust, Specsavers, Associated British Ports and Cavendish Square Group.
The group has six client-servicing teams: healthcare, brand and channel, London, Wales, creative media production and Waterfront (conferences and training).
“Our approach to providing services is to create the best team to meet a client’s needs, drawing from several divisions when necessary,” said Angharad Neagle, group managing director.
“This cross-team working is a significant strength, built on a long-standing integrated approach to multi-channel communication. It allows us to look at client needs holistically and map out a strategy for meeting them that brings every channel into play and puts the content we generate for them to maximum use.
“Next year will see Freshwater celebrate 20 years since Steve founded it as a sole trader consultancy in Wales. Over the last two decades, Freshwater has made its mark as one of the UK’s leading independent communications businesses. We are brimming with talent and very excited about the prospects for further growth in the current year and beyond.”
View our 2015/2016 Annual Report.