UK Business Succession Index

Pharmacy: business succession in the UK

1,268 UK pharmacy companies (26.7%) have a director aged 60 or over.

5.7 points below the all-trades average of 32.4%.

Companies measured4,748
Director aged 60+1,268
Exposure rate26.7%
Companies House register·Measured base 3,631,842·Data as at 11 October 2026·Full methodology
4,748
Companies measured
1,268
With a director 60+
525
With a director 70+
26.7%
Exposure rate

Of the 1,268 with a director over 60, 232 score 50 or higher on business quality. That figure is an output of our own scoring model, not a Companies House figure. How we score it.

Pharmacy by region

RegionCompanies60+Rate
East of England32912237.1%
London1,12239234.9%
South East41611928.6%
Scotland3087725%
West Midlands56313223.4%
East Midlands2846522.9%
North West70512617.9%
Yorkshire & The Humber4355813.3%

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 Healthcare pages go further: we score each company on business quality and exit timing, and shortlist the ones worth approaching.

See UK Healthcare →

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, "Pharmacy: business succession in the UK", UK Business Succession Index, 11 October 2026. https://www.exitradar.co.uk/succession/health-pharmacy/

Need a cut that is not published here, such as 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 3,631,842 active UK companies where Companies House records an age bracket for at least one serving director (94.0% of the 3,863,328 companies on the active register). A company counts as succession-exposed when its oldest serving director is 60 or over. We do not use 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 11 October 2026; updated quarterly, next update January 2027. Full methodology.