Lords buys DH&P Plumbing and Heating

AIM-listed independent builders merchant Lords has has acquired a 90% interest in Essex plumbing and heating businesses, DH&P Trade Counters Holdings Limited and DH&P HRP Holdings Limited.

The current owners and retaining a 10% interest, and will stay in their management roles with the business.  The Acquisition has been funded from Lords’ existing resources.

 DH&P Trade Counters Holdings has five branches in Ipswich, Chelmsford, Southend, Benfleet and Colchester.  The acquisition further extends the Lords Group’s existing plumbing and heating network of nine branches, trading under the Mr Central Heating brand.

The DH&P HRP Holdings Limited business is a national distributor of plumbing and heating spares servicing 400 customers, whose operations align strongly with the Group’s APP Wholesale division that distributes plumbing and heating products nationwide to 2,400 customers.

 For the year ended 30 July 2021, DH&P generated revenues of £ 27.6 million and underlying EBITDA of £2.0 million.

Shanker Patel, Chief Executive Officer of Lords, said: “We are delighted to announce this excellent extension of Lords’ plumbing and heating business.  DH&P have built up a solid business and we are really excited to welcome the 46 DH&P employees to the Lords Group family.  Importantly, the acquisition will be highly complementary to our existing Mr Central Heating and APP Wholesale businesses within the Plumbing and Heating division and will help to increase our customer base, broaden our product offering and enhance our UK geographic coverage.”

Lords has also completed the acquisition of the Sudbury branch of Buildbase from Grafton Group, which will join Lords’ subsidiary Hevey Building Supplies. The branch disposal was a condition laid down by the Competition and Markets Authority to allow the sales of Grafton’s Traditional Merchanting Brands, of which Buildbase is one, to go through.

With the addition of this branch Hevey Building Supplies will expand to a network of 5 branches spanning the Midlands and moving into East Anglia. This expansion comes in the fifth year since Hevey joined Lords and the business has doubled its size during this period. The Acquisition will see all employees of the Sudbury Branch transferred into the employment of the Group.

Patel said: “This acquisition will see Hevey Building Supplies further enhance its growing presence in the East of England. We are delighted to welcome our 15 new colleagues to the Group and look forward to integrating them into our strong, family culture, a key cornerstone of our success.”