Road Freight: business succession in the UK

Name: Road Freight business succession in the UK
Creator: ExitRadar
License: https://www.exitradar.co.uk/terms

7,145 UK road freight companies — 19.8% — have a director aged 60 or over.

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

Companies measured36,115

Director aged 60+7,145

Exposure rate19.8%

Companies House register·Measured base 3,475,770·Data as at 13 August 2026·Full methodology

36,115

Companies measured

7,145

With a director 60+

2,023

With a director 70+

19.8%

Exposure rate

Of the 7,145 with a director over 60, 917 score 50 or higher on business quality — an output of our own scoring model, not a Companies House figure. How we score it.

Road Freight by region

Region	Companies	60+	Rate
Wales	940	327	34.8%
North East	617	206	33.4%
Scotland	1,187	394	33.2%
Northern Ireland	800	233	29.1%
North West	3,971	997	25.1%
South West	1,870	469	25.1%
Yorkshire & The Humber	3,529	762	21.6%
South East	3,850	761	19.8%
East of England	4,516	840	18.6%
East Midlands	3,702	597	16.1%
West Midlands	5,088	786	15.4%
London	6,026	761	12.6%

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

See UK Logistics & Fleet Services →

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, "Road Freight: business succession in the UK", UK Business Succession Index, 13 August 2026. https://www.exitradar.co.uk/succession/svc-road-freight/

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.