Mayo Wynne Baxter amps up expansion plans

Founded 150 years ago in Lewes, Mayo Wynne Baxter is a leading law firm for life and business in the South East. 

Steeped in history, the firm was originally founded by Wynne Edwin Baxter; who was not only a successful lawyer but also the first mayor of Lewes, and the coroner who famously carried out inquests into three recognised victim cases of Jack the Ripper in 1888. He also investigated the deaths of Joseph Merrick (known as the ‘Elephant Man’), German spies, First World War bombing fatalities, accidental deaths and murder victims.

Fast forward, and more than 15 mergers and acquisitions later, the award-winning firm has seven hubs across Sussex, including Brighton, Crawley, Eastbourne, Storrington, Lewes, Seaford and East Grinstead, as well as ambitious plans to grow further into Kent and Surrey.

Despite being one of the oldest law firms in the region, the forward thinking firm has remained progressive, with a culture of collaboration, transparency, equality and inclusion. 

Ready for its next step, the 170 people-strong brand has officially merged with national legal and professional services group Ampa, a union of brands that leaders of Mayo Wynne Baxter and Ampa confirm is a ‘win-win’.

With no money exchanging as part of the merger, Mayo Wynne Baxter will remain a separate LLP, keeping its brand and independence, but adding more than 900 other experts across legal disciplines and business operations to increase the breadth and depth of what the firm can offer to its clients . 

Ampa will benefit from Mayo Wynne Baxter’s well-established presence in a new region and growing client base. The merger will take Ampa to a turnover above £100 million for 2022/23 and a group of more than 1,100 people.

Dean Orgill, chief executive partner at Mayo Wynne Baxter, said: “This is a great move for us and we have the full support of our people across the business. There is a lot of consolidation in the legal market right now, but no one else is offering what Ampa does. This is not a takeover, there are no redundancies as a result, nor a big ‘pay-day’ for equity partners; it is a merger of the purest kind, where we know that the sum is greater than its parts and that working together will make us stronger and enable bigger and faster growth.

“Our move to join Ampa is part of a wider strategy shared by the businesses for growth, collaboration and combined infrastructure, as well as shared values in terms of supporting clients and the community. When we saw what Ampa had planned, we were excited: merging was a case of ‘want to, not need to’.”

While Mayo Wynne Baxter and Ampa share clear commercial ambitions, the starting point for the union was culture and values. 

CEO of Ampa Sarah Walker-Smith said: “The most important thing for our group is culture, whether that be appointing someone to work in our post room, right through to bringing on an entire new entity. Having shared values and a desire to do business for good is absolutely critical and this is always our starting point in any discussion.

“So often in our industry large and aggressive businesses will acquire firms only to destroy the very heart of that brand and the reason they have loyal clients – we want to reverse that. At Ampa we’d rather do ‘M without the A’; we strongly believe that it is possible to have a true merger with parties of different sizes and we’ve done just that with Mayo Wynne Baxter.

“What we’re looking for is teams, individuals and brands that will either join an existing brand to bolster their offering, or – like in the case of Mayo Wynne Baxter – maintain their brand and offer something different to the group; whether that be a unique location, service offering, route to market or a fiercely loyal client following. Our approach means brands can ‘have their cake and eat it’ by benefiting from the economies of scale, bigger buying power, higher profile and access to a wider client base, while maintaining their own personality, identity and what makes them special.”

Mayo Wynne Baxter will be Ampa’s ‘regional anchor brand’ for the South East, meanwhile full service law firm Shakespeare Martineau is the group’s ‘regional anchor brand’ for the Midlands and London. 

As part of the merger, Mayo Wynne Baxter’s personal injury and clinical negligence teams will join Ampa’s existing national consumer-focussed law brand Lime Solicitors, with full continuity of service for clients, adding around £1.2 million additional turnover to Lime Solicitors.

Other brands in the group include cyber security company CSS Assure, uninsured loss recovery experts Corclaim and planning consultancy Marrons Planning. In 2021, the London team of clinical negligence and personal injury solicitors Hudgells moved into Ampa’s consumer champion law firm Lime Solicitors.

Gearing up for growth

Currently Mayo Wynne Baxter supports clients across property, corporate and commercial law, employment, litigation, international, private client and family law. The firm’s long-standing reputation has been built on providing exceptional service, achieved by employing outstanding people. 

In the next 12 months and beyond Mayo Wynne Baxter is looking to grow its expertise in its long-established services such as private client, property, specialist litigation and rural affairs, while also increasing the team’s strength and depth in commercial advice and transactions. 

With plans to grow by more than 35 people in the next two years, the firm is also open to ‘bolt-ons’ as part of its growth strategy. 

Dean said: “We are recruiting proactively across Sussex, Surrey and Kent. We are also looking for like-minded teams or smaller firms in our locality – and into Kent and Surrey – who share our culture and values to join our brand and help us drive growth and development of our business, provide better service to our clients and importantly provide new people and teams with the resources they need to flourish. Being part of Ampa enables us to increase the pace of this programme.”

Mostly servicing SMEs and high net worth individuals, Mayo Wynne Baxter’s new capabilities and access to additional professionals will enable the firm to service larger clients across the South East and beyond. Not forgetting small businesses, start-ups and families with a tighter budget, Mayo Wynne Baxter is also looking to expand LawEasier; its online platform that offers one-off consumer purchases and business subscription services for bespoke letters and legal documents that don’t require extensive expert advice. 

Group-first mentality

Ampa takes a ‘group-first’ mentality and as a result, while individuals will work for and represent their specific brands, equity members sit at a group level and no brand is ‘more important’ than the other, regardless of size. 

Sarah explained: “The benefit of a portfolio, ‘house of brands’ approach helps mitigate risk for those businesses, brands, and people that join us; having a wider sector and service offering means we’ll be in a better position to weather future economic shifts and enable individual brands to focus on what they do best without limiting the broader group’s growth trajectory. 

“When one brand succeeds, we all succeed.”

Mayo Wynne Baxter’s equity partners have merged into Ampa’s membership and Dean Orgill will now sit on the Ampa group board while also working with the firm’s partners to steer the growth of Mayo Wynne Baxter as a regional anchor brand for the group.

Changing business for good

As well as commercial success, brands in Ampa also pledge commitments to service not just clients and its people, but also the community and environment.

As B Corporation pending, brands across the group are legally required to consider the impact of business decisions on their people, customers, suppliers, communities and the environment; ensuring a balance between purpose, people and profit. 

Working together, the brands have committed to 30 responsible business pledges including increasing female representation within the membership (those with equity in the group) by five per cent (currently 33%) and racial diversity by two per cent (currently 8%), as well as supporting teams by training 100% of managers in wellbeing.

To support the environment, the group looks to be carbon negative by 2030, with all registered office hubs using 100% renewable energy as well as increasing the use of sustainably sourced or recycled office supplies and furniture.

Sarah added: “Achieving B Corp status is something that’s really important to us; it’s not a box-tick exercise, but a reflection of how we do business by enshrining our people, client and community commitments at our core.

“We believe good business can be both purposeful and profitable and we want our clients to be confident that we not only do we provide excellent service and advice, but that we do it responsibly.

“Our ambitions provide us with targets to challenge ourselves on, while being open about both what we want to achieve and how we are going to do it. We have a lot to do over the coming years, but not only is it the right thing to do for our people, our clients, our communities and our planet – it is also the commercial thing to do for our business.”

Community also plays a key role, with the group dedicating 10,000 hours of volunteering by the end of 2022.

Dean said: “We may be part of a national group, but our local community remains paramount. The relationships that we have built across the business community and with local families that we have supported with legal advice will only become stronger. We will also continue to play our part in our local communities from continuing our support with Brighton & Hove Albion to lending our expertise to all manner of charities and community projects within our areas.”

Commitment to doing business ‘for good’ goes even further, as the group has also been listed in Best Companies 2021 as ‘outstanding’ and in the top 20 law firms, top 100 Midlands and top 75 large London businesses. Voted anonymously by teams across the group, Mayo Wynne Baxter’s people will also contribute towards the group’s ranking from 2023. 

A ‘win-win’

Sarah said: “We launched our ‘house of brands’ strategy in 2020, following a full management restructure earlier in the year and despite the pandemic remained steadfast in our strategy and direction of travel. We don’t intend to have hundreds of brands in a huge confederation of businesses but maybe five or six regional anchor brands and further national specialist brands, with a joined-up strategy of how to go to market. 

“Our commitment and investments in technology and our people are starting to pay dividends. We are back to organic growth and our financial results in 21/22 reflect that. Mayo Wynne Baxter will only add to that in our results next year and so it’s an exciting future for us all.”

Dean said: “Our clients and people remain our top priorities and all our commercial decisions are made with them front of mind. This merger benefits our people because it provides greater opportunity for growth and development and Ampa’s values ensure a positive work culture that matches our own. Our clients benefit from access to a huge number of experts across new services and specialisms, including legal and non-legal.”

All Ampa brands are recruiting lateral hires and teams, and the group is proactively looking for like-minded businesses to join the group.