Just over a year has passed since Charlie Mullins sold Pimlico Plumbers for a reported £140million, but according to a recent interview with The Evening Standard, the former plumbing boss is feeling seller’s regret, describing it “the biggest mistake of my life”.
In 2021 American company Neighbourly bought the business that Mullins founded in 1979 as a small concern, working out of a basement in Pimlico.
At the time of the sale, Pimlico Plumbers was seeing a turnover of £50 million a year, completing around 100,000 service calls annually in and around central London, and employing some 400 people.
However, in a recent interview with the Standard, Mullins said the new American owners aren’t living up to his expectations.
“It was my lifetime’s work,” Mullins told the Standard. “I put everything into this company, and I thought it would go on to become a bigger and stronger business under the Americans, to go national and then into Europe. But when a company buys something, they don’t have the passion a founder does — and Americans also have a different outlook. I feel bad for my staff, my customers — I feel like I’ve let them down.”
He claimed that celebrities have been getting in touch with him personally “asking what’s going on at Pimlico Plumbers”.
“Now it no longer has the Mullins name attached to it,” he said, “it doesn’t have the same draw now for customers.”
Mullins also insisted the money he earned from the sale made no difference to his life: “I’ve got the same villas and houses. I used to live and breathe Pimlico Plumbers — but now, I don’t have the same drive and passion.”
The Standard concluded its report with the thought that Neighbourly could be facing a new competitor when the non-compete clause expires after three years. Mullins said:
“My family have realised that London is now again screaming out for a successful family-run services business. If I didn’t have a restraining order on me we’d be opening up tomorrow — I’ve never retired and don’t plan to retire.”
