Playing his cards right... (From The Northern Echo)

Playing his cards right...

1:16pm Tuesday 16th November 2010 in North-East Business Features

From riding high in the bus industry to building his own accountancy empire, Clive Owen’s varied career has culminated in the creation of a major North-East employer. In this month’s Success feature, in conjunction with the North East Chamber of Commerce, Andrew Mernin talks to the card-sharp executive to find out how he keeps his firm on top of the deck.

WHILE Darlington Football Club strives to win a place back in the Football League, another club in the town continues to leave big city rivals in Newcastle, Manchester and Leeds trailing in its wake.

Unlike the Quakers, however, their battleground is not the floodlit turf of The Northern Echo Arena, but the green baize tables of bridge clubs across the country.

For Darlington’s official bridge club – backed by one of the town’s most prominent businessmen – is ranked among the top five teams in the North and Midlands, and is a constant dominant force in national championships.

A key figure in building the foundations of the town’s card-playing success story is Clive Owen.

Forty years ago, after becoming hooked on the game as he filled in for his father’s absent partner, he set up the Hurworth Club which later merged with two rivals to become the Darlington club of today.

He has since landed national championships, including one last year, while his son is a regular in the England under-25 squad.

But, just as the bridge empire he helped create continues to flourish and hold its own against rivals in the larger northern conurbations, so too does the corporate club he conceived in 1983.

“My wife always reminds me that in my first year of business I worked 363 days out of 365,” says Mr Owen, founder of accountancy and business advisory firm Clive Owen and Co LLP.

The Birmingham-born executive is certainly proud of his achievements at the card table, but perhaps more so of building a major North-East employer. He said: “1983 was a difficult time to set up a business and wasn’t the greatest time for the North- East because it was the early Thatcher years and the time of the decline of our heavy industries.”

Despite its inception in some of the stormiest times for the North-East economy in living memory, his firm quickly grew from being a homebased business into a corporate juggernaut with 80 employees on board and eight fellow partners.

Today, it counts national players such as transport groups Stagecoach and Arriva alongside an army of the region’s family businesses on its list of clients.

Recent successes include its role in helping Stockton-based valve firm Process Control Equipment secure £3m in funding to fuel expansion and its work on the separate acquisitions of North-East firms Fyr Fyter and Interlet for undisclosed sums.

Meanwhile, due to the large proportion of image-conscious family businesses on its books, many larger deals, including a recent £15m takeover, remain strictly confidential.

Earlier this year, the company also appointed a managing director to the helm of its financial services division, Coniscliffe Financial Planning, to lead the next phase of its growth.

For Mr Owen much of the company’s success can be attributed to his background which he believes has given him a different perspective from many of his accountancy rivals.

Unlike the well-travelled route taken by most chartered accountants of remaining loyal to the company they cut their teeth on or making a few key moves in the services sector driven by better job prospects, the Midlander took a bus in different direction – quite literally.

After his first role at a Middlesbrough firm that later became part of finance giant KPMG, Mr Owen ventured into the bus and coach industry, with spells at The National Bus Company and West Riding Automobile Company.

“Unusually for people in professional practice, I actually worked out in the industrial scene for a few years.

“Most accountants never leave the firm they qualify with, or they join another firm and stay in the service industry the whole of their lives.

“When I worked in industry, I felt that the advice that we had received from professional firms tended to be reactive rather than proactive.

“They would come to you when you had a problem, but I was quite keen to run an organisation where the service would be proactive rather than reactive.

“That is why I think the practice has been successful.”

SINCE its launch the company has been in the enviable position of registering growth in all but one of its 27 years in business, while it has never recorded an annual loss.

A diversified portfolio has helped as, according to Mr Owen, has the unique economic make-up of the North-East.

“What is different in the North- East market compared to places like London is that in London you will have accountancy firms that only deal with one niche sector, but here you tend to become a Jack of all trades, although we do have a number of specialist areas.”

One such niche area is education – an area which Clive Owen has targeted as a key potential growth market, especially as the winds of political change sweep through the sector.

Long gone are the days when a school’s book-keeping demands were little more than balancing the tuck shop coffers or accounting for lunch money revenues.

Education is big business for financial players today, as Mr Owen is well aware.

He said: “More and more schools are being run in a commercial manner and I think this is certainly a growth area for the business.

“We help schools that don’t have the financial skills to make certain big decisions and in seeking financial backing.

“When the Coalition Government came to power one of the first things they looked at was allowing schools to convert themselves into academies, which will also have an impact.”

Another important industry which could dictate Clive Owen’s future success is manufacturing, as renewable energy and green technology promises to bring jobs, revenue and increased demand for accountants to the region.

“The North-East manufactures more than other areas of the country and there are certain fields, such as wind power, which, if they continue to expand as they have done, could be significant.”

WHEN Mr Owen first set up on his own, the North-East was a land of a few, mass employers – with the power to make or break the regional economy – and an environment sparsely populated by entrepreneurs.

He now believes this has changed considerably and a new wave of entrepreneurialism brings with it numerous opportunities for his business.

“There has been a definite shift in the past ten years, as big industries have closed down, and the area has become more entrepreneurial.”

Clearly market forces also play their part in the success of Mr Owen’s firm, but he believes he has been well protected from the continual fallout from the economic downturn by the very nature of the industry in which he operates, adding: “One of the advantages that accountants and business advisors have is that they are needed when things are going well for businesses and when they are going badly.

“Also, during difficult times, firms will review the services they pay for and so one firm’s threat becomes another’s opportunity.”

Despite the impending public sector cuts, Mr Owen sees a greater role for the private sector in the North- East which will present further opportunities for his company.

“We have a role to play in ensuring the private sector in this region remains vibrant,” he says.

Looking forward, the company has no immediate plans to extend its network of offices, which currently covers Darlington, York and Durham, although Mr Owen does remain open-minded to the suggestion.

“If a good opportunity comes up we always try to take it.

“When we opened our York office, not only did we see that it was a good market place, we also found someone who understood the area.

“If we found someone tomorrow who was really good and wanted to start an office in Middlesbrough for example, then, yes, we would look at that.

“I think we have a nice spine down the region, despite not being in the big conurbations like Newcastle or Leeds, and I expect us to expand again this financial year.”

If he continues to play his cards right, both at the bridge table and from behind his desk at his Coniscliffe Road headquarters, Clive Owen’s successful run shows no sign of coming to an end any time soon.