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David McCall is a vastly experienced businessman best known for his spells as chairman of both Anglia Television, and of Suffolk brewers Greene King.
Mr McCall was made a CBE for his 40 years’ service to television, during which time he was also a founding director of both Channel 4, and British Satellite Broadcasting. Mr McCall arrived in Norfolk from Scotland more than 35 years ago, but remains a highly active figure.
In May he was appointed non-executive chairman of Clydesdale Bank’s Norwich centre, having been selected as the ideal figure to help it grow its business banking operation.
He is also a non-executive director of poultry giant Bernard Matthews, and chairman of Radio Norwich. Other roles have included chairing the charitable company which was formed to deliver the Forum in Norwich, and overseeing the development of the University of East Anglia as chairman of the university’s council. He was chairman of Norwich Playhouse from 1992 until 1998.
Chartered accountant Stephen Lambert has helped transform the fortunes of Norwich-based dental care operator Oasis Healthcare since arriving as chief executive in 2004.
Mr Lambert found Oasis facing big debts, run up while building a portfolio which today comprises 132 dental practices across the UK. Mr Lambert is credited with an overhaul which has seen the creation of clusters of dentists who can make decisions locally. He has focused on recruitment, and on the streamlining of the pay structure.
In the past year the company’s share price has quadrupled to about 65p – valuing it at £45m. A 36p-a-share takeover bid was rejected last year, and in recent weeks it has fended off far higher offers. Last November the business recorded a 9pc rise in six-monthly turnover to £44.3m, with operating profits up 42pc to £3.3m.
Mr Lambert was chief executive of pubs group Punch Taverns in 2000-02, leading the successful integration of three businesses acquired from Bass, Allied Domecq and Inn Business. Before his role at Punch, Mr Lambert was chief executive of Inn Business Group, which he joined in 1994 as finance director.
David Hill is executive chairman of one of Norfolk’s best known and longest established family businesses – Jarrold. The company, which was founded in Woodbridge in Suffolk in 1770, now has interests spanning retailing, property development and training.
It is undertaking a major redevelopment of its site at Whitefriars in Norwich, which will include new offices and houses together with new shops, restaurants and leisure facilities.
Mr Hill was born in Norwich in 1957 and grew up in Norfolk. He trained as a solicitor, qualifying in 1983, and worked in the Banking department of Norton Rose in the City of London. In 1987, with two colleagues, he set up an investment banking business, Triton Capital Limited, advising airlines, aircraft manufacturers and banks on financing opportunities in the sector. He remains a non-executive director of this business.
Mr Hill, his wife and three children, returned to Norfolk in 1995. He became executive chairman of Jarrold & Sons in 2002. He is also chairman of the Norwich Playhouse Theatre, chairman of Norwich Heart, a lay member of the UEA Council, and a governor of the 2nd Air Division Memorial Library.
Top lawyer Jonathan Barclay is chairman of Shaping Norfolk’s Future, the economic development partnership which brings together private, public and voluntary organisations with a mission to improve the county’s prosperity.
He was also senior partner at law firm Mills & Reeve before stepping down at the end of May after a distinguished 12-year spell at the helm.
A tax and estate planning specialist, Mr Barclay joined Mills & Reeve in 1974. He was a key figure as the firm expanded from its Norwich base to open further offices in Cambridge (1986), Birmingham (1998) and London (2000). Then, in 2003, the Norwich office moved to new premises in Whitefriars. Mills & Reeve had 14 partners and around 70 staff when Mr Barclay joined the firm; it is now a top 50 law firm with 78 partners and 720 staff. Mr Barclay is a director of the Forum Trust, and of Norwich Heart, a company responsible for the regeneration of Norwich’s heritage buildings.
He has played important roles on the boards of Norwich Theatre Royal and the Britten Sinfonia, and is a non-executive director of Norwich stockbroker Barratt & Cooke, and of building group RG Carter.
Car dealer Graham Dacre launched the Lind Automotive Group in Norwich in 1992.
He built one of the UK’s biggest independent motor groups, operating 22 dealerships across five counties, and with an annual turnover of £400m. Last year he sold Lind to international motor group Inchcape in a £108.6m deal – retaining just one Porsche site in Tonbridge, Kent.
Brought up in Maidstone, Mr Dacre’s first job was computer operator at a papermill. Moving to Norfolk, he worked at Boulton & Paul before joining the family car business run by his grandfather, Archie Friday, at Long Stratton. This moved to Norwich in 1976, and in 1980 Mr Dacre took over from his father. He ran it for a few years before his interest in commercial property led to projects such as redeveloping the Bell Hotel, in Norwich.
A committed Christian, Mr Dacre has been involved in several high-profile community projects, including the life-saving SOS bus project in Norwich.
David Flux, 38, is senior partner of Adrian Flux Insurance Services, and has been with the company for 22 years.
Mr Flux became a senior partner in 1999, succeeding his late father Adrian Flux, who had established the business in King Street in King’s Lynn in 1973. Initially offering disabled drivers a complete insurance service, the business grew, fuelled by specialist policies for American, Modified and Kit Car owners. By the 1980s the company had numerous divisions covering a host of niche markets, from kits to classics and modified cars to 4x4s. In the 1990s the firm launched Bikesure for motorcycles as well as household, commercial vehicles, travel and pet insurance. In 2005 it bought niche insurance provider, HIC, in Bishops Stortford, furthering their market presence.
Today the company is a multi-million pound business and one of the UK’s leading specialist insurance providers, as well as one of Kings Lynn’s major employees. Mr Flux moved the business to its current premises at East Winch Hall, outside King’s Lynn, in 2000. It has 380 staff working there, with a recruitment drive for another 30, plus 45 staff at HIC.
He is a committee member of Festival Too, and one of the founding members of The Association of Insurance Intermediaries and Brokers, now the British Insurance Brokers’ Association.
Kevin Bowes is the chairman of Watton-based family firm Bowes of Norfolk, now one of the country’s largest farming and pig processing enterprises. The business farms 4,000 acres, employs more than 700 people, and processes approximately 10,500 pigs a week. It supplies pork products to major supermarkets such as Tesco, and exports to Europe, Russia, South Africa, and the Far East.
Kevin Bowes became chairman in 2006 following the retirement of his brother, Ashley. The two had previously worked together as joint managing directors of the business, which was formed as GD Bowes & Sons by their father, Dudley Bowes, in 1957. With Kevin concentrating on the farming and pig rearing side of the business, the two brothers transformed a small multi-species abattoir into one of the largest employers in Breckland, with a turnover of more than £62m. The plant was rebuilt after a near-disastrous fire in the 1980s, and a dedicated retail packing plant was added in the 1990s.
Veteran boatbuilder Martin Broom is chairman of Brundall-based luxury motor cruiser firm Broom Boats.
He has been involved for nearly 50 years. Broom Boats is the longest-established power boat builder in the British Isles, and has been operating from the banks of the Yare since it was established as CJ Broom & Sons by Charles John Broom – grandfather of Martin – in 1898.Today it has a turnover of about £12m, and along with Rackheath-based sister company Aquafibre it employs 180 people.
Charles Broom passed the company to his three sons, Charles, Basil and Bernard. Martin Broom, Basil’s son, entered the business with his wife, Jennifer, in 1958, initially with Mr Broom’s cousin, Barney, who later went into the Church. Mr Broom arrived just as fibreglass was superseding timber, and unlike others he was quick to embrace the revolutionary new technology. Broom Boats runs a thriving boat servicing business, but withdrew from the hire fleet industry a few years ago.
The forward-looking nature of the business was demonstrated with the appointment of former Lotus executive Andrew Walmsley as managing director about 18 months ago.
Terry Reilly is chief executive of Norwich-based book distribution business the Bertram Group.
He arrived in 2003, and presided over a £2m move into new headquarters on Broadland Business Park in 2004. In January this year the business was acquired by Entertainment UK, a subsidiary of Woolworths, in a £29m deal. Bertram Group comprises three main divisions – Bertram Books, Bertram Publisher Services, and Leeds-based Bertram Library Services.
It employs 430 people in Norwich, another 260 in Leeds, and has enjoyed three successive years of rising profits – up last time by 21pc to £5m on turnover of £108m for the year to July, 2006. The business was founded 40 years ago in a chicken shed by Elsie Bertram and her son, Kip. The family sold the business in 1999. The business is evolving, and now sends out orders placed via the Waterstone’s website.
London-born Mr Reilly left school at 16 and joined Tesco as a management trainee. In 1971 he joined WH Smith News, and held numerous management positions over the next three decades. As operations director he was responsible for 55 depots, 4,500 staff, and 26,000 customers.
Jeremy Bradley is managing director of Norfolk-based snack manufacturer Kettle Foods, which employs 350 people at Bowthorpe, near Norwich.
Mr Bradley was previously with British Sugar before joining Kettle Foods as a director 10 years ago, becoming managing director three years ago. Last August the company was taken over by fast-growing snack conglomerate Lion Capital, in a deal thought to have been worth between £150m and £170m.
Lion also owns brands such as Weetabix and Orangina, and Jimmy Choo shoes. Kettle specialises in ‘gourmet-style’ crisps, nuts and tortilla chips, and produces around 1.4m bags of crisps a year. The business was founded in Oregon by Cameron Healy in 1978. Its UK operation began at Vulcan Road, Norwich, in 1989, and moved to Bowthorpe in 1994.