Ben’s Gutters

The first investment Stockbridge Capital Holdings ever made. From a single van in West Sussex to the largest residential operator in the country.

Ben’s Gutters was the first business Stuart Guy acquired, and the foundation of Stockbridge Capital Holdings. Backed from a single van, it was built into the largest residential operator in the United Kingdom’s building-envelope sector.

The Operation

From a single van in West Sussex in 2010, Ben’s Gutters grew to more than seventy-five operatives across England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, with over eleven thousand reviews at an average of four point eight. Its work runs from standard gutter clearance to the soft washing of soffits, fascias and conservatory roofs, four-storey vacuum work from the ground, and the cleaning of roofs and solar panels.

The Stockbridge Capital Holdings Thesis

The United Kingdom has thirty million properties. Every one of them carries a building envelope, of roofline, gutters, fascias and soffits, and water is the principal destroyer of British property. The work of preserving that envelope is non-cyclical, recession-resistant and geographically continuous, and it receives almost no institutional capital.

This was the thesis behind the investment. Stockbridge Capital Holdings saw a market fragmented across small independent operators, with no national leader, against a category of work that property will always require. It backed Ben’s Gutters and built it into the national leader.

Ben’s Gutters was the business on which Stockbridge Capital Holdings was founded, and the first proof of its approach. Identify what the market has overlooked, back it early, and build it into the leader in its field.