The Acorn Group set to invest £5m to create ‘amazing office spaces’ from listed buildings

Non-standard home and motor insurance firm The Acorn Group plans to invest £5m in 2025 to convert listed buildings into “amazing office spaces” for its 1,400 UK-based staff.

Currently, the intermediary has 13 operating sites. This includes four Liverpool offices – including a site in Formby, where the business was founded in 1982 – three London sites and additional offices in Manchester, Birmingham, Bracknell, Gravesend and Seven Oaks. The business also has a Gibraltar-based underwriter, called Haven.

Of its Liverpool locations, three are classified as listed buildings.

According to public body Historic England, listed buildings are properties with special architectural or historic interest, which therefore enjoy certain legal protections. This means that any alterations to the structure or demolition require permission, for example.

The Acorn Group purchased one of these Liverpool listed buildings, its Edward Pavilion site, in December 2024. Mike Lloyd, chief executive at The Acorn Group, told Insurance Times that the venue “is a grade one listed brick warehouse”.

Grade one is the highest level of listed building in the UK. Historic England noted that only 2.5% of the UK’s listed buildings are classified as grade one out of around 370,000 entries for listed buildings on the National Heritage List for England.

Lloyd continued: “I like old and new architectures.

“We’re going to invest around £5m across those [listed] buildings this year, hopefully creating some amazing office spaces. We are bursting out [at] the seams at the moment with all the growth that we’ve had.

“We desperately needed some new space and [the Edward Pavilion purchase] in particular gives us an iconic building to be working in.”

Lloyd described The Acorn Group’s growth in terms of both finances and people.

Back in 2002, 16 staff handled around £10m of gross written premium (GWP). When Lloyd became chief executive in 2022, the business was managing £300m GWP and around 1,200 staff.

In 2024, GWP had grown by 41% year-on-year to reach £742m, the firm’s combined operating ratio was below 90% and customer numbers had improved 30% year-on-year to hit 600,000. Its headcount is 1,400.

‘Quite particular’ architecture

For Lloyd, this investment into unique and characterful office sites is “quite particular” to The Acorn Group. He used the business’ Formby location on Liverpool Road as an example.

He explained: “About 10 years ago, we bought a pub, knocked it down and built a very modern office, which is thatched. In fact, the roof [and] also the [outside walls are] thatched. And that needs [a] special type of thatching.

“We had to get thatchers over from Holland to come and do that. It needs a special type of reed and a special type of technique. It’s a beautiful architecture.”

In terms of which of these sites is the business’ head office, even Lloyd is unsure – although the Edward Pavilion location is the newest addition to the stable and, arguably, the most iconic of the office buildings, Formby is the intermediary’s homeland, despite the fact it is one of the smallest office sites.

Lloyd playfully suggests that maybe the two venues could be “co-headquarters”.