UK Business Succession Index

Painting & Decorating: business succession in the UK

2,403 UK painting & decorating companies — 24.6% — have a director aged 60 or over.

7.9 points below the all-trades average of 32.5%.

Companies measured9,785
Director aged 60+2,403
Exposure rate24.6%
Companies House register·Measured base 3,475,770·Data as at 13 August 2026·Full methodology
9,785
Companies measured
2,403
With a director 60+
444
With a director 70+
24.6%
Exposure rate

Of the 2,403 with a director over 60, 171 score 50 or higher on business quality — an output of our own scoring model, not a Companies House figure. How we score it.

Painting & Decorating by region

RegionCompanies60+Rate
Wales2568131.6%
North West87827030.8%
West Midlands58117930.8%
South West72122130.7%
North East2547529.5%
Yorkshire & The Humber60417028.1%
Scotland67318427.3%
South East1,47138226%
East of England91423325.5%
East Midlands48812225%
London2,80243615.6%

Combinations with fewer than 250 measured companies are not listed separately. They are still counted in every total on this page.

Next step

This page counts director ages across the whole register. If you are looking to buy rather than to research, our Construction & Trades pages go further: we score each company on business quality and exit timing, and shortlist the ones worth approaching.

See UK Construction & Trades →

Part of the UK Business Succession Index.

Cite this page

These figures are free to quote and reproduce, including in commercial work, with attribution to ExitRadar and a link to this page.

ExitRadar, "Painting & Decorating: business succession in the UK", UK Business Succession Index, 13 August 2026. https://www.exitradar.co.uk/succession/const-painting/

Need a cut that is not published here — a different trade grouping, a finer geography, or the underlying distribution? Get in touch and we will usually provide it. Methodology.

Method. Figures cover the 3,475,770 active UK companies where Companies House records an age bracket for at least one serving director — 93.8% of the 3,706,712 companies on the active register. A company counts as succession-exposed when its oldest serving director is 60 or over — not the board average, which would hide a 70-year-old founder sitting alongside younger co-directors. The business-quality figure covers only the subset our model assesses — see the methodology for why that is far smaller than the number with filed accounts. Data as at 13 August 2026; updated quarterly, next update October 2026. Full methodology.