Roofing Today Top 40 UK Roofing Contractors 2022

Roofing Today brings you the Top 40 Roofing Contractors for 2022. In this list we see the scale of business’s activity and consequential rankings which are organised by turnover; their pre-tax profit and change on the previous year; profit margin; the size of the workforce and sales per employee.

The following data was first published in the July 2022 edition of Roofing Today Magazine. Data is provided by the largest UK-based construction intelligence researchers and intelligence analysts, Barbour ABI. 

Read commentary from Roofing Today Editor, Dr Claire Griffiths, below.

Roofing Today Top 40 UK Roofing Contractors 2022

COMMENTARY

Dr Claire Griffiths, Editor at Roofing Today Magazine

CONGRATULATIONS to all our Top 40 roofing contractors! These are the roofing companies that made it through all the trials of the pandemic and remain in the Top 40 roofing and cladding contractors in the country.

As in the past few years, the number one spot is again occupied by the Avonside group of companies, based on the latest figures available for the umbrella company, Burke Investments.

In the top five rankings, we have new at second place CA Group and, in fourth place Linder Prater with Breyer Group and Hathaway Roofing continuing in their top five placements from previous years.

There’s been some massive gains in revenue volume, most notably from Longworth, Richardson Roofing, Hathaway, NRA and Hodgson Sayers. Plaudits go to M&J Group as it continues its climb up the rankings with more gains in turnover and profitability.

Average sales have remained steady at circa £27 million across the list, suggesting that the impact of the typically full roofing and cladding order books of the past couple of years has been attenuated by the challenges of materials and labour availability. That said, total sales have risen by circa £200 million to £1.1 billion.

Sales Growth Positive for Majority

Sales growth across the list is positive for the majority, with an average figure of a 10% rise on the previous year’s account overall. Amongst the companies with an increased turnover, the average growth was of 28% on the previous figures filed.

For those that have seen static or reduced turnovers, the average decrease is -11%. The number of firms seeing a reduced turnover in the Top 40 has held largely steady, up only slightly from around a third in 2020’s list to nudging nearer a half. Some of these companies are subsidiaries of larger entities and their reductions reflect their overall internal structures.

Total pre-tax profit for our Top 40 numbers £55 million with 17 firms seeing an increase and just 3 making a loss. While the average increase in pre-tax profit comes in at a whopping 712%, the figure is skewed by some outlier mega projects coming to a conclusion during the accounting period. The extent of the polarisation in pre-tax profits is illustrated by the average of the list being 263%, despite 23 firms lodging a static or decreased figure on the previous year.

In terms of profit margin, the average across all companies is considerably reduced this year compared to previous lists, decreasing to .045%, from 6.37%. Given the turbulence of economic conditions through the pandemic this is probably in line with most expectations.

In contrast, the number of employees in our Top 40 companies has seen a slight rise on the 2020 list of 5% to 3,455. However, this needs to be seen in the context of our sector, which employs significant numbers of subcontracted roofing and cladding operatives. For this reason too, sales per employee can only be seen as an indicative relative measure, with an average of £400,000.

Unpredictable Outlook

In summary, in my 15 years as editor of Roofing Today, I don’t think I’ve seen the UK roofing sector embattled by as many issues as it is facing at present.

At the risk of relating a dispiriting litany: labour shortages, material availability, soaring wages and inflation – as well as the ongoing fall out from Brexit and Covid, not to mention the Ukrainian war – these are just some of the factors contributing to a turbulent and unpredictable outlook. Yet on the plus side, the sector remains busy with full order books for the rest of the year so there’s still plenty to cheer about.

>> Read 2023’s ‘Roofing Today Top 40 UK Roofing Contractors’ list