A Scottish law firm described as having “a hard-won reputation built over generations in East Lothian” has secured an office in Edinburgh as it pursues an “ambitious growth strategy”.
Garden Stirling Burnet is hailing its move to expand its offering of estate agency and conveyancing into the capital as “significant”.
As part of the move, the firm has recruited an estate agent and two conveyancers, and says it is “in the market to add to its property experts around Edinburgh”.
Garden Stirling Burnet, which describes itself as one of East Lothian’s oldest and largest legal firms and was acquired by Friends Legal in September 2022, will have a branch at Pure Offices in the Bonnington Bond building in Leith.
READ MORE: Ian McConnell: Airline and holiday giant's price rises eye-catching. Here's why.
Managing director Tony O’Malley views the move as the “next logical step”, after the firm won a major conveyancing contract and doubled its headcount across its four locations in East Lothian.
He said: “This is a competitive market, but it’s one that we feel can benefit from a more personable, cost-effective and results-driven service.
“After a concentrated effort of reinforcing our offering in East Lothian, we feel now is the time to expand our presence in Edinburgh. Our new office will primarily focus on property, with a distinct emphasis in the east of the city.”
The announcement of the firm’s new Edinburgh office comes after Garden Stirling Burnet secured a sponsorship deal with football club Hibernian for this season.
READ MORE: Scottish income tax burden for higher earners 'under review'
Mr O’Malley said: “This base highlights our ambition to grow and be competitive within the Edinburgh market as we build on our conveyancing strategy, all while increasing our brand awareness to those beyond our roots in East Lothian.”
Garden Stirling Burnet said, since its takeover by Friends Legal, strategic investments have focused on expanding the team and enhancing the firm's infrastructure.
The firm added: “It has resulted in Garden Stirling Burnet growing its team from 17 in 2022 to over 40 this year, with fee earners increasing in number from five to 18.”
READ MORE: Scottish Government has made Scotland unattractive - really?
Mr O’Malley said: “As we continue to grow, we want to be in a position that makes Garden Stirling Burnet an enticing place to work for legal and property professionals, and so we hope that our foothold in Edinburgh will be more attractive for job-seekers living in the city.
“We are making great headway already and see this venture in the capital as the first step to a cemented position within the Edinburgh property market.”
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