One business in.Five more since.
In August 2025 Meraki invested in Magnus Search, a blue collar recruiter run by the man who co-founded it. In the months that followed, five more UK businesses joined it. Their names did not survive. Their people did.
The casefor the deal.
Blue collar recruitment keeps the country moving. Warehouses, distribution centres, factories and transport networks all run on people who turn up for a shift, and the agencies that supply them carry the payroll, the compliance and the risk. It is a big, essential market. It is also one where plenty of firms were still running on paper, thin margins and goodwill.
Meraki wanted in, but not with just anyone. Magnus Search stood out. Co-founded in 2017 by Bradley Wood, it was a tech-minded challenger, one of the first in its sector to put candidate registration online, and it was still run by a founder who knew what a call-off at half five in the morning feels like.
And the thinking was bigger than one business from the start. In blue collar work, scale matters. A national client wants national cover. Weekly payroll needs a balance sheet behind it. Compliance needs specialists. The plan was for Magnus to become the platform other good regional businesses could join, with the investment, technology and back office none of them could fund alone.
Then the market made the case for us. Through 2026, wage inflation, higher National Insurance and rising employment costs squeezed firms that had always run on thin margins. Good businesses with loyal clients and experienced teams were struggling to stand on their own. Nick Gordon's view was simple: they should not just disappear, and the jobs should not go with them.
From first dealto Day One.
Meraki invested in August 2025 with £3.5 million of growth capital. Nick Gordon became Chairman. Bradley stayed to run the business, and the priorities were set out on day one: better technology and automation, stronger compliance, a better experience for workers and clients, and room to grow through acquisition.
Five businesses followed in four months, from January to April 2026. City Centre Recruitment in the South West. Smart Recruitment and Wise Recruitment, from Swindon, Yeovil, Plymouth and Exeter. TBC Recruitment in Chester, with 31 staff and more than 650 temporary workers. Rite People in the Tees Valley. Each came with a funding facility behind it, growing from £4 million to £9 million as the platform grew.
Every deal was shaped around the people involved. Some founders wanted to step back and did so after a proper handover. Others stayed to lead locally. In each case Bradley worked alongside the existing leadership team through the transition, and every business moved under the Magnus name so clients deal with one national supplier.
Meraki invests £3.5m. Nick Gordon becomes Chairman and Bradley Wood stays to lead the business.
An industrial recruitment and commercial cleaning business in the South West joins, with a £4m facility to grow it alongside Magnus.
Two Swindon-based businesses with offices in Yeovil, Plymouth and Exeter join, backed by a £1m growth facility. Their founders step back once the transition is done.
A Chester business with 31 staff and more than 650 temporary workers joins. Its founder was already planning to step back, and the team stays together.
A Tees Valley temporary recruitment business joins, taking the facility behind the Magnus platform to £9m.
Where itstands today.
A year on, Magnus is one business with sixteen offices. Across the 2026 deals, more than 80 permanent jobs were protected and more than 2,000 workers kept in their roles.
Decisions are still made by the people closest to clients. Bringing the businesses together did not mean centralising everything. Teams stay close to their local labour markets, rates and sites, which is hard to replicate from a head office hundreds of miles away.
What has changed is what sits behind them: greater financial backing, dedicated compliance expertise and a wider team to turn to when something goes wrong. Leaders who came with the deals now run regions and sales for the whole business. And the brand line, Every Shift Matters, was not written in a boardroom. It came from inside the business.
What we kept.What we added.
The first thing we ask a founder is not what we are going to change. It is what must not change. Then we put everything behind it.
Kept
- The person running it. Bradley Wood still leads Magnus, and he still sets a rate at half five in the morning when the shift needs it.
- The people who came with each deal. Nikki Merrifield joined from City Centre, Mel Chapman from Rite People and Andrew Meacham from TBC. All three are senior leaders at Magnus today.
- The client relationships. They were the reason the businesses were worth backing in the first place.
Added
- One name over the door. Five businesses joined under the Magnus name, so clients deal with one national business rather than five small ones.
- Money behind the business. The funding facility grew from £4m to £9m as businesses joined. In Bradley's words, a balance sheet that pays workers every Friday before the client has paid.
- A group back office. Finance, compliance, legal and technology run once for everyone, along with delivery support from Meraki's team in South Africa.
- Specialists a business this size could not carry alone, starting with a Head of Compliance. And a new brand built around Every Shift Matters.
We haven't lost what made our businesses work. We've strengthened what sits behind them. There are simply more of us now making sure Every Shift Matters.Magnus SearchA year on
The Meraki investment just a few months ago revolutionised my business. Nick and his team offer sound advice and follow through on promises.Bradley WoodManaging Director, Magnus Search
Partnering with Meraki Capital gives us the financial backing and strategic support to grow with confidence, while continuing to focus on our clients and candidates.Simon ThomasManaging Director, City Centre Recruitment, at the time of the deal
Nick has offered me a solution in order to continue the business under new ownership without my team being affected.Jason FoxFounder, TBC Recruitment
Becoming part of a larger organisation gives us strength and stability. It allows us to focus on what we do best.Leandra SmithOperational lead, Rite People
Magnus Searchtoday.
Every Shift Matters. Find out more at magnussearch.com.
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