Lakes Bathrooms acquired in pre-pack deal, saving 120 jobs
What's the deal? Shower enclosure specialist Lakes Bathrooms has been bought by Birmingham-based Hiatt Hardware Group in a pre-pack administration deal. The acquisition, completed on May 18 for an undisclosed sum, secures more than 120 jobs and brings the 50-year-old showering brand under new ownership.
Hiatt Hardware Group supplies products to builders' merchants, retailers, and trade customers across the UK and Ireland. The deal marks its first major expansion into the bathroom market, adding Lakes' recognised brand and UK manufacturing capability to its portfolio.
The combined group will now employ around 200 people.
Why now? Lakes was taken over via a management buyout at the end of 2023 by a team including managing director Mike Gahir. Before that, the company had been majority-owned by the Craddock Family Trust — the late Robin Craddock and his father Alan founded Lakes Showering SpacesDealroom has a profile for this one. Try Dealroom → in 1986. The fact that it entered administration just 18 months after the buyout suggests the business faced financial pressures it couldn't overcome under its previous structure.
What could go wrong? Pre-pack deals can be contentious. Creditors from the old entity may recover little, and suppliers could be wary of extending credit to the business under new ownership. Hiatt also has no track record in the bathroom sector, so integrating a manufacturing-led brand into a hardware distribution group carries execution risk.
Ankesh Agrawal, chairman of Hiatt Hardware Group, said: "Lakes is a respected, well-established British brand with genuine manufacturing heritage and this acquisition is a bold and considered move that reflects our confidence in the long-term strength of the UK trade and home improvement market."
Adrian Jones, group finance director, added: "We have clear visibility on the synergy opportunity and a disciplined plan to create sustainable value across the combined group."
The signal: Lakes' journey from family trust to management buyout to pre-pack administration in under two years underscores the fragility facing mature UK manufacturing brands without deep balance sheets. Dealroom classifies Lakes as a mature-stage company, yet maturity alone didn't insulate it from the financial pressures that followed the 2023 buyout. For Hiatt, acquiring a recognised brand at distressed pricing is a low-cost route into an adjacent vertical — a playbook increasingly common across UK trade supply as consolidators look to bolt on established names that stumbled operationally rather than commercially.
Read more: kbbreview.com
