We provide bespoke solutions to our clients’ legal issues, focussing on their commercial objectives and providing high standards of service. Our clients are predominantly owner managed businesses, SME’s and high net worth individuals. We value our client base and ensuring that they feel this through the service we provide is at the heart of our approach. Professionally, we come highly recommended with 25 recommendations from the two main independent legal directories, Legal 500 and Chambers & Partners.
We have approximately 150 people across our two main offices in Chester and Shrewsbury. Our fee earners are divided into 7 internal teams; Dispute Resolution and Insolvency; Corporate and Commercial; Employment; Real Estate; Planning, Environmental, Energy and Regulatory (known as PEER); Wills, Trusts and Tax; and Family, however in practice work often requires ‘working groups which are pulled together from multiple teams, as matters frequently require specialist knowledge from different disciplines
We are an LLP with over 30 members. All the owners of the business work within it.
We take a prudent approach to financial management which means we’re debt free and have money in the bank. It also means we can take advantage of strategic opportunities when they present themselves. Our Shrewsbury office is a good example. We recognised that the Shrewsbury market had similarities to the Chester market. We acquired a small, employment-led practice consisting of a partner, a trainee and a secretary and within 5years we’ve grown it into an office of 30 people, which continues to grow. We’ve done this through excellent recruitment of people with links to the area and an unfailing focus on embedding ourselves within the business community locally.
We have approximately 150 people across our two main offices in Chester and Shrewsbury. Our fee earners are divided into 7 internal teams; Dispute Resolution and Insolvency; Corporate and Commercial; Employment; Real Estate; Planning, Environmental, Energy and Regulatory (known as PEER); Wills, Trusts and Tax; and Family, however in practice work often requires ‘working groups which are pulled together from multiple teams, as matters frequently require specialist knowledge from different disciplines
We are an LLP with over 30 members. All the owners of the business work within it.
We take a prudent approach to financial management which means we’re debt free and have money in the bank. It also means we can take advantage of strategic opportunities when they present themselves. Our Shrewsbury office is a good example. We recognised that the Shrewsbury market had similarities to the Chester market. We acquired a small, employment-led practice consisting of a partner, a trainee and a secretary and within 5years we’ve grown it into an office of 30 people, which continues to grow. We’ve done this through excellent recruitment of people with links to the area and an unfailing focus on embedding ourselves within the business community locally.
We have two main offices in Chester and Shrewsbury. Both are excellent places to live and work offering enviable quality of life with first class housing, schools, bars, restaurants and other leisure opportunities. Both Chester and Shrewsbury also enjoy the benefit of being within easy reach of larger centres with excellent transport links. For instance, Chester offers a train to London every hour that will have you in Euston in just over 2 hours.
We also have a satellite office at Manchester Airport City to support the growth of our international work, and we work closely with bodies such as the Chambers of Commerce and the LEP in other geographical areas close by, including North Wales and the Wirral.
We also have a satellite office at Manchester Airport City to support the growth of our international work, and we work closely with bodies such as the Chambers of Commerce and the LEP in other geographical areas close by, including North Wales and the Wirral.
Chester
5-7 Grosvenor Court, Forgate Street, Chester CH1 1HGShrewsbury
Lakeside House, Oxon Business Park, Shrewsbury SY3 5HJManchester
Offices 204 and 205, Manchester Business Park Aviator Way, 3000 Aviator Way, Manchester M22 5TGOur core practice areas are fairly self explanatory and cover the work you would expect to see in those teams at any commercially focussed practice. In relation to most of our work the lawyers engaged by other parties tend to be larger firms, which indicates the quality of our work.
In our core practice areas we have a number of sector specialisms where we offer out-of-the-ordinary expertise to a national client base. Our PEER team advises on significant renewable energy projects; we have extensive expertise in the logistics sector including being the honorary legal advisers to the UK Warehousing Association; we work for clients in the food and education sectors and have UK-renowned expertise in mines, minerals and waste management.
We are a member of the Integrated Advisory Group, known as IAG International, which is an international group of lawyers and accountants. We meet three times a year and this network not only provides us with opportunities to act for overseas clients of other members who have legal requirements in England and Wales but also enables us to refer our clients who need assistance in other jurisdictions to people we know and trust.
Our people hold various board positions for clients and other organisations, including the company secretary role at Chester Zoo, the Chair of Theatr Clwyd and membership of the Board of the British Hydropower Association.
Our work is challenging but rewarding. We set high standards and by achieving them we deliver on our clients’ objectives.
In our core practice areas we have a number of sector specialisms where we offer out-of-the-ordinary expertise to a national client base. Our PEER team advises on significant renewable energy projects; we have extensive expertise in the logistics sector including being the honorary legal advisers to the UK Warehousing Association; we work for clients in the food and education sectors and have UK-renowned expertise in mines, minerals and waste management.
We are a member of the Integrated Advisory Group, known as IAG International, which is an international group of lawyers and accountants. We meet three times a year and this network not only provides us with opportunities to act for overseas clients of other members who have legal requirements in England and Wales but also enables us to refer our clients who need assistance in other jurisdictions to people we know and trust.
Our people hold various board positions for clients and other organisations, including the company secretary role at Chester Zoo, the Chair of Theatr Clwyd and membership of the Board of the British Hydropower Association.
Our work is challenging but rewarding. We set high standards and by achieving them we deliver on our clients’ objectives.
Our Culture
Our approach is simple. We want to recruit and retain the best people because by doing this we deliver excellent service to our clients and that in turn drives our financial success. To ensure we retain our people, we work hard at making Aarons an excellent place to be. This is as much about ensuring you have a good quality of life outside work as it is about enjoying your time at work.
Our standard fee earner billing target is 1,000 hours billed and paid, though our bonus scheme starts to pay out at 80% of the target, with the higher rewards being for those who exceed 100% of target. Compared to most of the firms you’ll be dealing with on the other side of matters, this isn’t a big target and by setting a realistic target that doesn’t require you to regularly work late and at weekends, you can enjoy the time when you’re not at work as well as the time that you are there.
We want our people to develop their careers with us. The case studies in the section below show how people have done this. It’s this focus on development that we think is the biggest advantage to being at Aarons. People are able to develop and progress in a way that isn’t possible at larger firms where you are at risk of being regarded as a unit of production. Because we believe in continuous personal and career development we remain committed to our people spending some time in the offices in the post covid world, achieving a balance between time spent in person with colleagues, which we believe is vital to the development of more junior fee earners in particular, and time spent working from home.
Our commitment to development is also reflected in our Personal Development Plan process which involves continuous supervision and feedback from together with two more formal reviews each year where career ambitions and development plans to achieve the are discussed.We believe that spending time together outside of work is also important. We have an extremely active social committee that organises our annual summer and Christmas parties. We have Friday drinks once a month too, paid for by the firm, and other events through the year to show our appreciation for our people. The Social Committee isn’t managed by the firm’s general management. It has its own budget and the committee, which consists of people from across the firm and is typically chaired by trainee solicitors, decides how to spend it.
Once a year we close the office for an afternoon and take everyone off site for an annual general meeting where we spend a couple of hours provide updates on performance and other key firm wide issues but mainly the day is about spending time with colleagues and enjoying ourselves.
And we’ve done some pretty unusual things together too, such as our own rowing Regatta on the River Dee where teams of colleagues took an 8 week learn to row course, then competed against each other for the chance to win the much coveted ‘Aarons Teapot Trophy’.
We’re a strong supporter of the Arts in our core areas with links to Storyhouse, Theatr Clywd and Shropshire Festivals among others. Arts organisations bring significant benefits to the communities they operate in and through sponsorship and other support we can be part of that support to our local communities. We also believe in supporting charities and causes that matter to our communities and our environment, and are active in taking part in charity fundraising activities (individually and collectively) as well as signing up to environmentally supportive activity, for example taking responsibility for our energy usage and committing to Chester Zoo’s sustainable Palm Oil project.
Our standard fee earner billing target is 1,000 hours billed and paid, though our bonus scheme starts to pay out at 80% of the target, with the higher rewards being for those who exceed 100% of target. Compared to most of the firms you’ll be dealing with on the other side of matters, this isn’t a big target and by setting a realistic target that doesn’t require you to regularly work late and at weekends, you can enjoy the time when you’re not at work as well as the time that you are there.
We want our people to develop their careers with us. The case studies in the section below show how people have done this. It’s this focus on development that we think is the biggest advantage to being at Aarons. People are able to develop and progress in a way that isn’t possible at larger firms where you are at risk of being regarded as a unit of production. Because we believe in continuous personal and career development we remain committed to our people spending some time in the offices in the post covid world, achieving a balance between time spent in person with colleagues, which we believe is vital to the development of more junior fee earners in particular, and time spent working from home.
Our commitment to development is also reflected in our Personal Development Plan process which involves continuous supervision and feedback from together with two more formal reviews each year where career ambitions and development plans to achieve the are discussed.We believe that spending time together outside of work is also important. We have an extremely active social committee that organises our annual summer and Christmas parties. We have Friday drinks once a month too, paid for by the firm, and other events through the year to show our appreciation for our people. The Social Committee isn’t managed by the firm’s general management. It has its own budget and the committee, which consists of people from across the firm and is typically chaired by trainee solicitors, decides how to spend it.
Once a year we close the office for an afternoon and take everyone off site for an annual general meeting where we spend a couple of hours provide updates on performance and other key firm wide issues but mainly the day is about spending time with colleagues and enjoying ourselves.
And we’ve done some pretty unusual things together too, such as our own rowing Regatta on the River Dee where teams of colleagues took an 8 week learn to row course, then competed against each other for the chance to win the much coveted ‘Aarons Teapot Trophy’.
We’re a strong supporter of the Arts in our core areas with links to Storyhouse, Theatr Clywd and Shropshire Festivals among others. Arts organisations bring significant benefits to the communities they operate in and through sponsorship and other support we can be part of that support to our local communities. We also believe in supporting charities and causes that matter to our communities and our environment, and are active in taking part in charity fundraising activities (individually and collectively) as well as signing up to environmentally supportive activity, for example taking responsibility for our energy usage and committing to Chester Zoo’s sustainable Palm Oil project.
Training Contract Recruitment Process
