UK Business Group Defies Odds; Reports Significant Growth During Pandemic

Despite the major challenges experienced over the past twelve months during the UK lockdown, newly released second-year figures signal significant growth for one of the country’s newest and growing business groups. Manchester-founded Inc & Co has 15 brands across retail, property, tech, food & beverage and logistics.

Second-year results show a group turnover of just over £30m, which has been fuelled by various acquisitions including Chop’d and KNOMO London. Forecasts show a projected turnover by 2023 of £100m as the group’s retail and property arms are set to see turnovers increase as city and town footfall rises. The Group also made its first strategic sale earlier this year of consent and data management platform, MyLife Digital, to prominent data privacy and information security firm DataGuard.

Inc & Co’s unprecedented growth is also undoubtedly sparked by the company’s acquisitions, having made eight over the past year. As well as bringing in logistics firm Caribou, the collaborative has also made a number of acquisitions under the company’s retail arm, Inc Retail, including KNOMO, Chop’d, Laundrapp, Gut Instinct, and Tootsa, welcoming 600 new employees into the Inc & Co family within the last 12 months.

Jack Mason, Group CEO, Inc & Co, said “This year has definitely been tough for many businesses, ours included. There’s been widespread uncertainty that has meant that consumers haven’t been spending, and businesses have naturally been wanting to hold back budgets. However, we’ve been fortunate that in the past 12 months we have had a number of fantastic opportunities to acquire some well-known brands, such as KNOMO London, and at the same time protect as many jobs as possible. Our 2021 results show huge growth and are a testament to the hard work of every one of our teams for their dedication and tenacity in the face of uncertainty.”

With a growing number of businesses in the group, Inc & Co are keen to ensure they’re continuing to offer the best possible support for organisations and, following a major recruitment drive, have brought in an additional 50 staff members over the past year, bringing the total number of Inc & Co employees to over 750. It also has plans to recruit a further 100 team members within the next 12 months to bolster its workforce.

Chris Hatfield, Group Finance Director, Inc & Co added; “A targeted acquisition strategy, diversification into related and complementary markets, strengthening recurring revenues, programmed restructuring and tight cost control. These were the key financial drivers which resulted in net operating cash generation in 2020 despite the challenges of the Covid lockdown. We continue to invest in new products and services through our varying routes to market which will see the Group increase turnover to over £100m within the three years since launch.”

And the group is showing no signs of slowing down. Mason has confirmed rumours that Inc & Co is planning to bring retail and office working to the high street with an exciting new UK wide project due to be announced in September, and the company is currently in the process of signing seven leases across the country – with plans for a further five by the end of the year – to create new workspaces and retail expansion in the UK.