The North East’s leading Independent law firm for businesses, Muckle LLP has reported a steady rise in income and profit for year ending April 2018.
Newcastle based Muckle LLP saw income increase from £10.8m to £11.3m with profit rising from £1.2m to £1.9m.
Managing Partner, Jason Wainwright, said, “Given the economic backdrop, we are very pleased with the increase in income and improvement in profit for the 2017/18 financial year.
“Our turnover increase arose as a result of our increased deal activity in the region and some key and significant client wins. Profit improved significantly. Much of the profit improvement arose as a result of how we account for the promotion of six previously salaried partners to the equity partnership on 1 April 2017 but also came from the increased turnover combined with proactive management of our operating costs and improving efficiencies.
“Primarily a law firm for North East business, so much of our work revolves around business economic activity in the region. Encouragingly, work levels in the region have remained buoyant into the current financial year and are increasing all the time.
“We have started the current financial year (2018/19) very well, with revenues and profit also well up at half year compared to half year last year. Our business is currently handling a large number of deals and we are pleased to report we are again ahead of target for 2018/19 both in terms of turnover and profit.
“Throughout last year and into this year we have continued to invest in our people, improving our benefits package and working environment.
“We recently moved all our employees onto one floor, creating one large open plan office with all our legal teams working closely together under one roof. Since then we have actively encouraged agile working with a focus on improving everyone’s work-life balance. Agile working and technology has been introduced to enhance the overall client experience and will allow our lawyers to work more flexibly in line with growing client requirements.
“Investing significantly in IT improvements will also make working in and out of the office a seamless process and at the same time help to manage our property costs.
“We have also invested in developing a new agricultural sector team and growing our private client team which are proving to be sound investments and we continue to invest in innovation to make legal services more accessible to new and early stage business. Our real estate, commercial, corporate and employment teams continue to perform very strongly.
“The legal services market continues to evolve, with different law firm models and new entrants and continued pressure on pricing and we are mindful and acutely aware of the economic uncertainties arising from Brexit but we believe that we are as well placed as we can be to grow over the coming years.
“We will do this by focusing on the client experience, our people and our community as we aim to increase turnover, improve our profitability and continue to manage our costs.
“Muckle has a clear vision and strategy to be the North East law firm of choice for businesses and the implementation of that strategy is going well as we continue to aim to be as little like the traditional law firm as possible at the same time offering an outstanding client experience and a fantastic place to work for our people.
“Our extensive community work, encouraging staff participation and contributions will continue to be at the heart and centre of what we do.” he added.