- What does Muckle do?
We’re a leading commercial law firm based in Newcastle upon Tyne and with a hub in Cumbria. We provide commercial legal advice, including in relation to trading contracts, data and intellectual property, corporate, property, dispute, construction and employment matters and act for clients across various sectors, including the technology, construction, property, leisure, education and charitable sectors (amongst others), as well as the manufacturing and engineering sector.
We’ve built a national reputation for offering great service, giving expert advice, and doing it all with personality and enthusiasm. Our purpose has always been to be a values-led, responsible business for our people, community and clients.
Our service is always professional, responsive and tailored to meet our clients’ needs. It is guided by four core values:
- Trust – clients can trust us to do the right thing for their business
- Teamwork – we’ll work as part of a client’s team, committed to their goals
- Responsibility – we are self-starters and challenge ourselves to deliver success
- Care – we value kindness and genuinely care about our clients, people and our local community
- What makes Muckle great?
Our people! They are the foundation of our business. We currently employ 194 people across our head office in Newcastle and our hub in Cumbria. This includes our legal experts, supported by our non-legal specialists in BD/marketing, human resources, operations, finance and digital/data.
Our strategy is to recruit, develop, engage and retain the right people for the right roles. Engaged people lead to higher retention and ultimately allow us to provide the best possible client service and push growth and innovation.
We are committed to the development of our people through a transparent strategy and to rewarding them financially through our profit share and individual bonus schemes, pension contributions, increased holiday entitlement, enhanced well-being support, and competitive parental leave policies and support. We regularly win awards for our culture and have platinum Investors in People status.
- What is your 5 year plan?
In 2022, we launched our current five-year business plan, which covers every aspect of our business model and is spread across six overarching strategies.
As part of this, we will continue to be a values-led, responsible business for our people, community and clients; care is one of our values. For the last 23 years, we’ve given 1% of our profits to our Muckle Fund for local community charities and projects. We will continue doing this.
- What are you looking for from your EMN membership?
We already act for plenty of manufacturing and engineering clients, so we understand the issues facing the sector and are well placed to provide legal support to businesses in the sector. We are always interested in making new connections and building relationships with businesses and other organisations working in the sector, and supporting wherever we can. Our EMN membership is one way we can do that.
- What information do you want to get out to members?
We’re responsive, we’re practical and – hopefully – we’ll be an extension of a client’s own team. Whatever a client wants to achieve, we’re here to help make it happen.
We have a wealth of experience and act for a wide range of clients in the engineering and manufacturing sector. We can help with:
- Supply, distribution, software, digital technology and other commercial agreements
- Data protection and intellectual property matters
- Raising finance
- Acquisitions and disposals, shareholder rights and corporate governance
- Employee disputes and trade union negotiations
- Bidding for public contracts and challenging awards
- Resolving commercial or company disputes
- Construction and property matters.
- What are you going to offer back to the community?
We’re passionate about giving back to the community; we’re fortunate enough to be able to make a real difference in people’s lives. Our ESG programme centres on the following key areas:
- Giving – for the last 23 years, we’ve donated 1% of our profits to local causes. In the last 22 years, we’ve donated almost £800,000.
- Volunteering – Everyone at Muckle has two paid leave days annually to volunteer at local charities.
- Pro bono – Our goal last year was to increase our pro bono work by 50% year on year: in 2023, we saw a 168% increase in the pro bono hours we recorded.
Our ESG credentials are underpinned by our B Corp status; we were the first law firm in the North East and Cumbria to achieve B Corp accreditation.
