Two major national awards were received on one spectacularly special day for Hull’s homegrown success story Sewell Group.
The business, which dates back to 1876 and now employs 500 people across construction, estates and retail functions, enjoyed a royal breakfast with the monarch’s representative in East Yorkshire as the Lord Lieutenant presented the Queen’s Award for Enterprise for Promoting Opportunity.
A delegation from the company then travelled from Leads Road to London to make their sixth appearance in The UK’s 100 Best Companies to Work For - this year ranking 45th.
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Lord Lieutenant, Jim Dick OBE, said Sewell Group was one of only 18 businesses in the country to receive the particular Queen’s Award.
“This is one of those moments when we give an award to a company which absolutely deserves it,” he said. “I know from working with Sewell Group in other ways that promoting opportunity is in your DNA. You help people develop and it’s fantastic. This is an award from the monarch and there’s not a higher award than that.”
Particularly poignant given the Queen's recent passing, Dr Paul Sewell OBE, chair of the business which he joined in 1978, said: “These are the sort of milestones which make you realise how far you have come.
“We had never won a Queen’s Award before, although we’ve been very successful in the Sunday Times Top 100 over the last 14 years, and we are now in the large company tier. “We’ve grown the business in terms of adding new disciplines and geographically and this tells us we are going in the right direction. We had a lovely morning and a great night but then you wake up and it’s the next morning and you have to reset and go again. We don’t rest on our laurels.
“It sets the bar and we are now judged by that bar, as a Queen’s Award holder. We are united behind the principle that talent is spread equally within our community but opportunity isn’t and we have a great team here because they come from very different backgrounds.
“Just because you have had a disadvantaged start in life it doesn’t mean you can’t get to the top and if you are given the opportunity your duty is to pass that opportunity on to others. It’s not a do-good thing, it’s a business strategy and when you see the people you know it’s the right strategy.”
It came during the strongest year in almost a decade for the firm, as turnover topped £100 million once again.
Sewell Group rolled out the red carpet at its headquarters in Geneva Way to welcome the Lord Lieutenant - a two-time winner when on the senior management team at Smith & Nephew in Hull; Vice Lord Lieutenant Christopher Oughtred, who won with the city’s William Jackson Bakery; the High Sheriff of the East Riding of Yorkshire Jacky Bowes and Hull City Council leader Cllr Mike Ross. The party also included more than 50 Sewell Group employees drawn from across every business unit.
The Lord Lieutenant also urged other businesses to enter the awards and said: “The awards had a big effect on our business. In terms of credibility of the company, it certainly helped sales and it’s great for staff morale as well. It comes from the monarch. It’s very prestigious and should be seen so.
“In this region we have some fantastic people and organisations and we need to make sure that more of them get recognised. It’s a case of really promoting them and encouraging people to enter – 90 per cent of our award winners are SMEs.
“Some companies with just two or three employees have won awards and there isn’t anybody who is excluded. It can appear daunting but we hope to help people and provide the mentoring to help them go through the process.”
Mr Dick presented the group with a Queen’s Award trophy and an official citation signed by Her Majesty and Boris Johnson, the Prime Minister at the time the honour was announced in April 2021.
Mr Dick said: “It’s a very significant moment and I would like to congratulate all of you because I know the way that Sewell Group works. Everyone is important in getting this award. It’s the team that makes Sewell Group the company that it is.”
He was joined on stage for the presentations by Emily Jones, retail manager at Sewell On The Go, and Dieter Franks, construction site supervisor, as other colleagues followed the proceedings on a live stream.
Dieter said: “One of the main things that attracted me to come into the company was the award. When I came for the interview I was looking into the award and what Sewell Group does in the community and how they work.”
Emily added: “I’m really touched that I’ve been invited here as it’s such a special occasion. I know everyone back at our site is watching the live stream and celebrating. We have flags flying and it’s really nice for customers to be able to see that and for them to ask us about it. I work for a place that’s been given an award by the Queen!”
The double award comes as across the city, Hudgell Solicitors has maintained its ranking in The Times 'Best 200 Law Firms' for a third successive year. The business is headed by the chairman of Hull KR, where Sewell has naming rights for the Craven Park stadium.
Hudgell chief executive Rachel Di Clemente said it is an impressive reflection on the firm’s continuing high levels of performance. “We’re delighted to be named in this prestigious list of leading law firms once again,” she said. “When we first broke into this list three years ago we were determined not to celebrate it as a one-off success, but to use it as a marker of the quality of our work and service to clients, and challenged ourselves to make sure it was a list we were named in year after year."
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