Insurance industry veteran sets up new office for Goldman Sachs-backed insurance company

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Nicky Godding

Aston Lark, the Chartered insurance broker backed by Goldman Sachs, has appointed Jim Stevenson as Associate Director and head of its new Cheltenham office.

Jim joins after a 19-year career at Clarke Roxburgh, Jelf and Marsh Commercial where he was Regional Director in the South Midlands and South Wales leading offices in Worcester, Cheltenham, Bath, Swindon, Cardiff and Swansea. Previously, Jim spent 12 years with Commercial Union, CGU, Norwich Union and Aviva, so brings more than 30 years of commercial insurance and risk management experience and leadership to Aston Lark.

The new Cheltenham office will cover the three counties of Gloucestershire, Herefordshire and Worcestershire and further afield across the Midlands and South West. Jim will apply his extensive commercial knowledge and broaden his network of relationships to enhance and promote Aston Lark’s facilities, services and schemes to clients, and also recruit talent into the new Cheltenham office.

Peter Blanc, Group CEO Aston Lark, said: “Aston Lark is first and foremost about looking after clients. Jim clearly shares our passion for customer service and, with his wealth of experience and depth of relationships, I’m looking forward to seeing our new Cheltenham office go from strength to strength. We plan to carry on recruiting and growing organically across the country and welcome discussions with like-minded individuals. I wish Jim all the very best as he builds a new office from scratch as part of the Aston Lark family”.

Jim added: “I had a great opportunity to reflect and consider my next role carefully. Aston Lark has had an exceptional trajectory since its merger, with integrity and customers at the core of its strategy. The recent investment by Goldman Sachs continues to drive growth and I look forward to working with Peter and the Aston Lark team to introduce their insurance and employee benefits proposition into this greenfield region for the group.”

“Increasingly in this current climate, businesses focused on sustainable growth must surround themselves with advisers who support all their operations, supply chain and people. Aston Lark will adapt and evolve with a ceaseless focus on good customer outcomes and agility to become the broker of choice for customers, insurers, employees, affiliates and other brokers that might consider Aston Lark as the ideal home for their business when the time is right.”

Nicky Godding

Nicky Godding is editor of The Business Magazine. Before her journalism career, she worked mainly in public relations moving into writing when she was invited to launch Retail Watch, a publication covering retail and real estate across Europe. After some years of constant travelling, she tucked away her passport and concentrated on business writing, co-founding a successful regional business magazine. She has interviewed some of the UK’s most successful entrepreneurs who have built multi-million-pound businesses and reported on many science and technology firsts. She reports on the region’s thriving business economy from start-ups, family businesses and multi-million-pound corporations, to the professionals that support their growth and the institutions that educate the next generation of business leaders.