I.
Commercial Contracts
Supply, distribution, agency, services, NDAs, shareholder agreements. Drafted to protect the position you actually negotiated — not boilerplate dressed up in your name.
Holst.
Commercial Law
Manchester · Commercial Solicitors · Est. 2012
Sharp commercial advice.
Plain English. Reasonable bills.
A Manchester commercial law firm built for small and mid-sized businesses. Five partners with City and Magic Circle backgrounds; the bills of a regional practice; the kind of plain talking you wish your last firm had managed.
SRA Regulated · 638104·Legal 500 Recommended·Lexcel Accredited·Manchester Law Society
I — How We Work
Four principles, written down.
Most commercial firms publish the same brochure copy. We’ve put down the four rules our clients actually feel — the ones we’ll be measured against if you instruct us.
I.
Plain English, always.
Contracts that you can read on the train without a dictionary. If you can’t follow what your own document says, neither will the people you’re asking to sign it.
II.
Fixed fees where we can.
On most commercial and IP work we will quote a fixed price before any chargeable work begins. Hourly billing has its place — but not as the default.
III.
The cheaper credible route, first.
A well-drafted letter resolves more matters than a writ. We will tell you when court is the right move, and when it would simply be the most expensive one.
IV.
Partner-led, not paralegal-shuffled.
Your matter is run by a partner from instruction to completion. You won’t be passed sideways to a trainee three weeks in.
II — Practice Areas
Five specialisms.
No spread bets.
We don’t do private client, conveyancing, family or criminal work. The discipline of staying narrow is what lets the bills stay reasonable.
II.
Business Sales & Acquisitions
SPAs, asset purchases, MBOs, earn-outs. We’ve completed transactions from £80k corner-shop sales to £14m trade exits. Same care, scaled fees.
III.
Employment Law
Contracts, settlement agreements, restructures, tribunal defence. Acting for the business — though we’re plain about which battles are worth fighting and which aren’t.
IV.
Intellectual Property
Trade marks, licensing, software and IP assignment, brand protection. Increasingly the most valuable asset on a small balance sheet, and the one most often left exposed.
V.
Disputes & Litigation
Commercial disputes, debt recovery, contract breaches, director conduct. We start with the cheapest credible route — court is the room we open last.
III — The Partners
Five partners. Every one of them ex-Magic Circle.
Two are featured here. The full team — Holst, Lindgren, Pemberton, Aziz and Crewe — joined from Slaughter and May, Linklaters, Freshfields and Clifford Chance between 2012 and 2019.
Alexander Holst
Senior Partner · Corporate
Eleven years at Slaughter and May before founding Holst in 2012. Specialises in mid-market M&A, private equity and complex shareholder disputes. Recommended in Legal 500 since 2018.
Sophia Lindgren
Partner · Commercial & IP
Ex-Linklaters technology and commercial team. Heads our IP and software contracts practice. Sits on the Manchester Law Society Commercial Committee.
IV — Recent Matters
A selection of recent work.
Names anonymised; outcomes verified. Further references provided on instruction, with client permission.
M&A · 2025
Sale of regional engineering business to listed acquirer
Acted for the founder-shareholders on a competitive auction process. Negotiated earn-out structure that preserved 92% of headline value post-completion.
Outcome
£14.2m
Commercial · 2024
Long-form supply agreement, food manufacturer
Renegotiated a single-customer dependency that had been on rolling 30-day terms for nine years. Three-year fixed term, minimum volume commitment, exit protections.
Outcome
Five-year revenue secured
Dispute · 2024
Shareholder unfair prejudice petition, defended
Acted for the majority shareholder in a small SaaS company. Settled at mediation on a buy-out structure favourable to the client. No proceedings issued.
Outcome
Resolved in 11 weeks
V — Fee Transparency
Plain pricing.
Guide rates for the matters we’re most often asked about. Every engagement gets a written fee estimate, in writing, before any chargeable work begins. No six-minute units. No surprise bills.
Initial consultation
Fixed £250 + VAT
60 minutes · or free of charge for retained clients
Standard commercial contract review
From £600 + VAT
Fixed quote given on first call
Bespoke shareholder agreement
£1,800 – £3,500 + VAT
Per side, depending on complexity
Business sale (under £1m)
1.5% – 2.5% of consideration
Capped fee available
Business sale (£1m – £5m)
0.9% – 1.8% of consideration
Phase-staged billing
Employment settlement agreement
From £500 + VAT
Often paid by the employer
Trade mark application (UK, one class)
£550 + VAT
Includes IPO fee
Pre-action commercial dispute letter
£450 – £900 + VAT
Settles ~60% of matters
All quoted figures exclude VAT (charged at 20%) and any third-party disbursements (court fees, IPO fees, Companies House, search fees). Contingent and capped-fee arrangements available on suitable disputes.
VI — The Firm
Founded 2012. By five partners who’d quietly had enough of the City model.
Holst opened on Spring Gardens in the spring of 2012. The founding partners had collectively spent forty-three years at Magic Circle firms in London and were tired of seeing small-business clients quoted £4,000 to look at a contract that needed forty minutes of attention.
Fourteen years on, we are a partner-led practice of five partners and eleven solicitors, advising owner-managed businesses, family companies and private equity portfolio holdings across the North-West and beyond. We take instructions from London and the Home Counties roughly a third of the time.
We are not interested in growing for the sake of it. We are interested in remaining the firm clients ring back, ten years on, when the second deal lands.
Partners
5
Solicitors
16
SRA Number
638104
Founded
2012
The Office
12 Spring Gardens
Manchester
M2 1EA
Manchester
M2 1EA
From a recent client
“We’d been quoted twenty-two thousand pounds by our London firm to handle the sale of the business. Alex looked at it for an hour, gave us a fixed fee under nine, and ran the entire transaction without a single late night for our team.”
Managing Director · Manufacturing Group Sale, 2024 · £6.8m
VII — Get in Touch
The first hour is fixed-fee.
£250 + VAT for sixty minutes with a partner. We’ll review the matter, tell you honestly whether instructing us makes commercial sense, and if it doesn’t we’ll point you at someone who’d be a better fit.
Call 0161 405 3300 →Office
12 Spring Gardens
Manchester
M2 1EA
Manchester
M2 1EA
Opening Hours
Mon – Thu · 8.30 – 18.00
Fri · 8.30 – 17.30
Out-of-hours by arrangement
Fri · 8.30 – 17.30
Out-of-hours by arrangement