By Ian McConnell
Business Editor
Stewart Milne has hoisted the “for sale” sign over his eponymous housebuilding group, having decided to retire nearly half a century after founding the Aberdeen-based business.
Mr Milne, who is executive chairman of the housebuilder, said: “The unprecedented events of the last two years have forced many to re-evaluate and, after considerable soul-searching, I have decided that the time is right to step back from the business I founded to prioritise my time for family, friends and other ventures I want to pursue.”
The business, founded in 1975, is wholly owned by Mr Milne, who holds 80%, and his three older sons, Gary, Mike and David.
Mr Milne, in building the business, has over the decades become a leading figure in the UK construction industry. He is a former, long-time chairman of Aberdeen Football Club.
Stewart Milne Group declared that, to realise its growth ambitions, “significant investment is required, particularly in [the] strategic land bank to create future, high-margin development opportunities”.
It said: “The group board carefully considered all options with its advisers and came to the unanimous conclusion to investigate a potential sale.”
The company added that accountancy firm Ernst & Young had been appointed “as financial adviser to the group in this process”.
READ MORE: Brexit: Ian McConnell: No straws as truth of folly set out
Stewart Milne Group sold its timber frame business recently to Fife-based Donaldson Group to focus on housebuilding in its core markets in Scotland and north-west England.
It said it had “taken major steps to improve efficiency and profitability to reposition the business for future growth”.
The company added that it had delivered one of its “best-ever” financial performances during the year ending October 31, 2021, declaring: “These accounts will show a dramatic increase in turnover and profits driven by high demand for...family homes.”
READ MORE: Ian McConnell: Why did Tory Brexiters think this was a good idea?
An electrician to trade, gaining a City & Guilds qualification in electrical engineering in 1971, Mr Milne started out specialising in renovating tenement flats in Aberdeen. Stewart Milne Group noted its chairman had at that stage been determined to reduce the normal three-month disruption to homeowners to three days, and had “achieved this through the adoption of a systematic, team approach”.
It added: “When the company moved into housebuilding in the mid-70s, it adopted a similar approach using timber systems, and timber frame has been at the heart of the business since then. Indeed, Stewart Milne Group was a leading pioneer in modern methods of construction and off-site construction using timber systems.”
Stewart Milne Group has offices in Aberdeen, Edinburgh, Glasgow and Manchester. It has a workforce of around 1,000, including sub-contractors.
Stuart MacGregor, chief executive of Stewart Milne Group, said: “We anticipate attracting a high level of interest from potential buyers who will invest in order to capitalise on the strength of our business and the buoyancy of the current homes market. We have one of the strongest sales pipelines in our history and anticipate generating significant sales over the next two years.”
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereLast Updated:
Report this comment Cancel