PwC advises responsible outdoor brand Passenger on its £15m investment from Growth Partner
The PwC Consumer & Leisure Corporate Finance team are delighted to have advised Passenger on its investment from Growth Partner and Steve Hewitt.
The consumer-specialist investment firm, Growth Partner, which is backed by HomeServe plc Founder and Chairman Richard Harpin, has completed a £15 million investment into one of the UK’s fastest growing consumer brands, taking a significant minority stake in Passenger as it continues its journey to becoming a leading global outdoor brand.
Passenger is a responsible outdoor clothing brand which was founded by Richard and Alexa Sutcliffe in 2012. Whilst travelling the remote wilderness of British Columbia, they found their purpose and defined their mission, to “Inspire Meaningful Escapism”.
Today Passenger is a responsible brand, rooted in nature, connection and wellbeing. For every order received, they plant a tree. Over 90% of Passenger’s product range is made with lower impact materials like recycled cotton, recycled polyester, hemp and organic cotton. To date, Passenger has planted over 500,000 native trees and protected 28,000,000sqm of rainforest through their charity partners, The Rainforest Trust and Trees For The Future.
Richard and Alexa were joined by founder of Surfdome, Justin Stone as Executive Chairman and Jon Lane as CEO in 2019, and Passenger has since experienced exceptional triple digit growth year on year since 2019, whilst being profitable. In 2022, Passenger was #2 on the UK’s FEBE Growth 100 list, with a 345% revenue CAGR over 2 years. In the last 12 months, Passenger has scaled to over £33m in sales, selling over 700,000 items, and is on track to achieve £50m in sales this year. 25% of the business is now outside the UK, with 40 staff based in their New Forest HQ and a further 25 staff in their Yorkshire based distribution centre.
As part of the transaction Steve Hewitt, former Gymshark CEO, is investing alongside Growth Partner and will become Chairman of Passenger. Growth Partner Investment Director, James Worrall, led the deal for Growth Partner and joins the board as a non-executive director. Passenger will also be joined by Whanau advisory, which was founded by Steve Hewitt and includes a number of former Gymshark executives including Philip Daw, previously Gymshark CFO, who will become a strategic advisor to Passenger.
With Growth Partner’s investment, Richard Harpin’s strategic insight and Steve Hewitt’s expertise in scaling fast growth international D2C brands, Passenger aims to continue its rapid domestic and international growth, whilst inspiring consumers to spend more time outdoors following their passions, recharging and connecting with nature.
Jon Lane, CEO of Passenger, said
“At Passenger we’re delighted to be partnering with Richard Harpin and Steve Hewitt, two outstanding business leaders. As we head into the next stage of our journey we’ll continue to reinforce our vision and values around being a truly responsible business.”
Justin Stone, Executive Chairman of Passenger, said
“We selected PwC based on their sector insight and data led offering which was important to us for both this transaction and our future plans. The PwC team really understood the Passenger brand and were great to deal with. The team always made themselves available, provided pragmatic advice and helped us find the right partners for the next stage of our journey.”
Tom Copeland, Partner in Consumer & Leisure Corporate Finance, said
“It has been great to work with Justin, Jon and the team to support them in finding the right partner for their exciting growth plans. Passenger has disrupted traditional markets with a direct to consumer offering based on a clear identity of meaningful escapism, coupled with embedding sustainability at the heart of the brand, which has resonated with its community in both the UK and International markets. It was important to bring on a partner who shared their values and can help take the brand to the next level. I look forward to seeing the continued progress over the next few years.”
PwC Corporate Finance acted as lead financial adviser to the shareholders. The PwC team advising on the deal was Tom Copeland, Chris Hobbs, Sophie Plater, James Fellows and Matt Williamson.
Contact us
