Elsewhere in East Midlands…
The new Legal 500 UK edition is now out, and a quick glance at it confirms my thinking that Leicester – city of my birth and now also my home – is getting a raw deal out of it.
I should kick off by explaining that I am a former editor of this august publication (1996 and 1997). The first thing I did when I got the job was to reorganise the directory, particularly the London section, into broad sector areas – the London section was an A-Z of topics prior to this – a format which I am proud to say the directory retains to this date.
I should add that it is not my intention here to criticise The Legal 500. I know just how much work goes into it every year, how dedicated and knowledgeable its writers and editors are and how tough their job is: balancing the always-competing claims of every law firm the length and breadth of the land.
My point here is that Leicester loses out, and I think this needs addressing.
Historically, certainly within The Legal 500, Nottingham was always seen as the regional centre of the East Midlands, and has long been home to a number of large commercial law firms. Back when I was editing the directory, the population of Nottingham was greater than that of Leicester, but now Leicester is the largest city in the whole region (357,000 people at time of writing).
The city has a number of quality law firms as well as the branch offices of quality national firms such as Shakespeare Martineau and Gateleys.
However, the East Midlands section is split in two: Nottingham and Derby on the one hand, and ‘Elsewhere in East Midlands’ in the other.
I have no real issue with Nottingham and Derby being lumped together. The two cities are only fifteen miles apart, arguably form something of a commercial combine a little way short of ‘Nottingham Metro’, though if the government builds all over the green belt this might happen! A client in the north Midlands will be well-served by this distinction.
My issue is ‘Elsewhere in East Midlands’. This lumps Leicester in with two other, smaller, commercial centres – Lincoln and Northampton – and covers a vast region from Grimsby to the outskirts of Milton Keynes, a distance of nearly 160 miles.
Now, every serious commercial law firm has clients around the country, but most SMEs – the bedrock of UK corporate – buy at least some of their services locally, or regionally. This makes sense. Local lawyers know the patch, are networked in to local businesspeople and business organisations.
Each population centre will have its own area of effect, where the business gravity is stronger, and those places with a stronger commercial market will have more advisers and more specialist advisers.
A client in north Lincolnshire might go to Grimsby or Lincoln for legal advisers, but isn’t going to make the three hour trek to Northampton, or the two-and-a-half hour trek to Leicester, yet if they access The Legal 500 and want to buy locally, they are forced to yomp through lots of frankly irrelevant detail to get to their objective. (In fact, they’re more likely than not to head to Nottingham or Sheffield.)
While I applaud The Legal 500 for its commitment to quality and accuracy, I can’t help thinking that in these days of fast devices, sophisticated apps and excellent graphics, it’s time for a different treatment which speaks to client need, rather than making them do the work to find appropriate choices.
For instance, how about a client search tool which would allow you to put in your postcode and your ideal distance from law firm (could be “doesn’t matter”...) and which then creates a list of local and regional law firms suited to your specific needs, along with a note of how they are ranked in their locality?
Alternatively, consider giving Leicester and Northampton – still an hour away from one another – and Lincolnshire separate tables, in order to accord them their proper weight in rankings.
Right now, ‘Elsewhere in the East Midlands’ ain’t working.