38 | Tees Business
Serving the Teesside Business Community | 39
/ STOCKTON NEWS
National sportswear venture
launches in Stockton
Active Chartered Financial Planners managing director Karl Pemberton
(right) with Nik Tunley, a partner at Endeavour Partnership.
National sportswear brand BLK has launched in Stockton.
ENDEAVORING
TO SUCCEED
A
Leading legal firm advises Active on staff incentives
growing Teesside financial
services company has been
working with Endeavour
Partnership, one of the area’s
top legal firms, to understand
the benefits of a tax-efficient staff incentive
scheme which is now helping to attract and
retain key individuals.
Stockton-based Active Chartered Financial
Planners has been working with Endeavour
Partnership to implement an Enterprise
Management Incentive (EMI) which has
resulted in three directors acquiring shares in
the company.
Active, which has grown considerably since
relocating from Guisborough to Thornaby
nearly four years ago, says it has enabled the
company to recruit and retain key individuals.
Experts at Stockton-based law firm,
Endeavour Partnership, have helped Active
on a range of property, employment and
corporate issues over the last five years, and
advised on the EMI.
Managing director Karl Pemberton told
Tees Business: “After attending an EMI
seminar by Endeavour Partnership, it opened
my eyes to a really good, tax-efficient way to
recruit, reward and retain key individuals.
“As with most things they’re never as
straightforward as you think they’re going to
be, but Endeavour really helped to put us at
ease, as to how easily it could be done.
“EMI’s are complicated and quite
under-used as a legitimate vehicle to give
employees incentives.
“They’re under-used because people don’t
know about them, and I think if people knew
more about them, other businesses would
certainly use them for their staff.”
Active has grown from a five-man team to
a 26-strong firm over the last five years, and
Karl says Endeavour Partnership’s guidance
during that growth period has been critical.
He added: “Within our industry we’re well
aware of shareholders’ agreements, but as
we’ve grown as a firm we’ve taken more
people on, we’ve added new directors, which
ultimately have now become shareholders.
“It was extremely important to us, to
get the buy-in and retain key individuals,
but it’s more important to those individuals
themselves, because the structure ultimately
benefits them.”
Endeavour Partnership’s corporate and
commercial department, headed by Nik
Tunley, has worked with Active on a variety
of projects over the last five years. As one
the North East’s leading legal firms, it works
with companies advising on a wide range of
company and commercial matters as well as
complex transactional matters.
Nik said: “Active has undergone a period
of impressive growth and we’re very pleased
to have played a part in their development.
Issues such as EMI can seem daunting but
our seminars give businesses the chance
to find out a little more and meet our team
who can simplify the process. We’re really
encouraged to hear how Karl and his team
are using EMI as it is a very successful
incentive scheme.”
Karl added: “The key to the individuals
within Endeavour is that you don’t feel like
you can’t pick up the phone and chat to them,
and they don’t make you feel like you’re
asking a daft question.
“Like a lot of people, understanding
the complexities of law is not everyone’s
strength, so to gain clarification on certain
matters, to be able to just pick up the phone
and have that confidence on the end of a line
is worth its weight in gold.
“Irrespective of which department we’ve
used at Endeavour, the individual we’ve dealt
with has been exceptional, and a credit to the
industry.
“Even if you’ve only used one person in
one department before, don’t be frightened to
find out what the other departments can do
for you, because whenever we’ve done that
they’ve been phenomenal.”
As one of the North East’s leading
commercial law firms, Endeavour Partnership
is the go-to legal practice for a range of issues
in sectors including banking and finance,
hospitality and leisure, education and
technology.
Endeavour has a reputation spanning over
15 years and has supported Active for the last
five years.
Karl said: “I think we got on so well from
the beginning because we were quite
aligned with them as a company. We were
both young-ish, we both wanted to improve
as a business, we both class ourselves as
dynamic, and both wanted to be different
in our sector, so we had a lot of things in
common.
“Because we spoke on a level, that’s what
really appealed to us, and we haven’t looked
back.”
For further information, practical advice
documents and career opportunities visit
www.endeavourpartnership.com
A
world leading performance sports
apparel brand has launched in the UK,
with Teesside as its headquarters.
Based at the Durham Tees Valley Business
Centre in Stockton, the business – which will
trade as BLK United Kingdom – has already
created eight jobs for local people, with more
expected.
Chief executive Ben Houchen and chief
operating officer Mark Holt, together with
Claire Fiddler, head of purchasing, and Ben
Azadi, h