A DENTAL practice claimed to be the largest offering NHS treatment in the Scottish capital has been sold.
Specialist business property adviser Christie & Co, has announced the sale of two-practice dental group, Mathewson Dental Practice Ltd.
Established over 45 years ago, Mathewson Dental Ltd comprises two high-quality Edinburgh dental practices which offer both NHS and private treatments; St John’s Road Dental Practice in Corstorphine, and East Craigs Dental Practice a mile away.
The group has a total of nine fully equipped surgeries and circa 28,500 NHS registered patients and is the largest NHS general dental practice group in Edinburgh, the agent said.
The business has been owned by Hew and Lorna Mathewson since 1977, at which point it comprised one practice and circa 2,400 patients. Since then, with their daughter, the team has "worked tirelessly to grow the group’s reputation and patient base into the successful business it is today", the agent said.
They recently decided to sell in order to retire from ownership and appointed the services of Christie & Co to search for a buyer that would continue to uphold the level of care that they had nurtured over the years for both staff and patients alike, as well as "one that understood the Scottish dental system and could take the business to the next level".
Following a confidential sales process, the group has been sold to Scottish Dental Care which owns another 15 practices across Scotland.
Mr Mathewson said: “From the outset, my family and I were extremely impressed by Christie & Co to act on our behalf in the sale of our two large dental practices.
"They came up with an excellent and, as it turned out, extremely effective marketing strategy on our behalf. During the sale process itself, once a preferred buyer had been found, Joel was a highly effective negotiator, liaising with ourselves, the buyer, and our lawyers.
"We are absolutely delighted with the outcome of the sale process and are so pleased we chose Christie & Co to act as our broker as they secured us an excellent deal on terms that suited us.”
Speaking on behalf of Scottish Dental Care, managing director Christopher Friel, said: “Acquiring these practices represents a continuation of our growth plans, with the extension of our Advanced Dentistry brand into Edinburgh.
"We are proud to take forward the legacy developed by Dr Mathewson over the years, and we look forward to working with the fantastic practice teams as we progress on that journey.”
Joel Mannix, associate director – dental at Christie & Co, who handled the sale, comments, “It was a pleasure to sell this practice for Hew and his family who have worked so hard to create the outstanding business we know today.
"A completely confidential, targeted sales approach led to several high-quality offers which were all in excess of the asking price. All parties were incredibly organised which really helped create a smooth deal and led us to present Hew and his team with a list of pre-approved prospective buyers to choose from.
"Following the closing date, they chose Scottish Dental Care to carry on the practice’s legacy which has allowed the group to fill the missing link in its geography of practices.
“This was a landmark deal for the Scottish market. It represents the huge demand we’re seeing for well-established practices in Scotland, and highlights that competition is key to achieving extremely good post-sale conditions.”
Mathewson Dental Practice Ltd was sold for an undisclosed price.
Glasgow Business Awards contenders shortlist
A DIVERSE and vibrant array of the top businesses in Scotland’s largest city has been narrowed down from a wealth of talented firms vying to enter the next stage of The Glasgow Business Awards, for which The Herald is media partner.
Glasgow Chamber of Commerce has announced the shortlisted entries for The Glasgow Business Awards 2022, revealing the best of the city’s business community.
Kristy Dorsey: Businesses face a steep uphill battle this winter with little defence from the storm
WITH no equivalent of the consumer price cap to shelter from the worst of the storm, UK businesses and smaller firms in particular have been left defenceless against the energy bill crisis that financial expert Martin Lewis has described as on par with the Covid pandemic.
UK gas prices trebled throughout 2021 and have doubled again since the start of this year, meaning that businesses which last renewed their supply contracts two years ago are facing a five-fold increase as they begin to re-negotiate this autumn.
Sign up for free: You can now get the briefing sent direct to your email inbox twice-daily, and Business Week for the seven-day round-up on Sunday 👇
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules here