UK Business Succession Index

Specialised Wholesale (Building Materials, Chemicals, Fuel, Metals): business succession in the UK

3,847 UK specialised wholesale (building materials, chemicals, fuel, metals) companies — 44.8% — have a director aged 60 or over.

12.3 points above the all-trades average of 32.5%.

Companies measured8,589
Director aged 60+3,847
Exposure rate44.8%
Companies House register·Measured base 3,475,770·Data as at 13 August 2026·Full methodology
8,589
Companies measured
3,847
With a director 60+
1,484
With a director 70+
44.8%
Exposure rate

Of the 3,847 with a director over 60, 436 score 50 or higher on business quality — an output of our own scoring model, not a Companies House figure. How we score it.

Specialised Wholesale (Building Materials, Chemicals, Fuel, Metals) by region

RegionCompanies60+Rate
Scotland36520355.6%
South West58330953%
South East96550151.9%
Wales32016250.6%
East of England70434448.9%
East Midlands45220745.8%
West Midlands96243545.2%
Yorkshire & The Humber89839744.2%
North West1,03845043.4%
Northern Ireland28011842.1%
London1,82462034%

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

See UK Wholesale & Distribution →

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, "Specialised Wholesale (Building Materials, Chemicals, Fuel, Metals): business succession in the UK", UK Business Succession Index, 13 August 2026. https://www.exitradar.co.uk/succession/wholesale-specialised/

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.