Unconfirmed reports from within the company have advised us that fifty percent of Holland & Holland's workers have been handed their cards and sent home.
The shop was closed a few weeks ago and the factory has been on tick-over for months but this is a radical departure and will be a blow to many long-serving employees.
New Managing Director, Nigel Stewart, whose previous job was running a yacht building company (Spirit Yachts) has clearly taken an axe to the existing structure of the long-established London gunmaker. Change was inevitable, as the company had not been profiable for a very long time but these cuts will doubtless be a shock to many employees.
One leading gun company director told me it was probably the right move, given the challenges to the firm and the imperitive to put it back on an even keel but another gunmaker worried that closing the machine shop and interrupting production lines would create a problem for the future; as these things are easier to stop than they are to re-start.
I met Nigel Stewart last month and he told me some very interesting things about his background and the challenges he saw facing the company, while discussing his track record of innovation and expansion in other businesses. Whether this decisive surgery will be the saving of Holland & Holland or turn out to be an evisceration from which it cannot recover will be seen in time.
Holland & Holland was sold to Beretta by previous owner, Chanel, in the summer of 2021. It has since closed its Bruton Street shop and announced a move to the Beretta Gallery in St James's. Gun sales are currently being conducted from the Holland & Holland Shooting Ground.
We will be seeking clarification and confirmation of the exact numbers involved and the nature of the re-structuring from official sources at Holland & Holland as soon as possible and will update this article as more information becomes available.
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