Welsh-based financial services provider Admiral is consolidating its South Wales property portfolio in response to its commitment to hybrid working.

The changes will see the company close two office locations in Cardiff and Swansea, in addition to a phased closure of its Admiral House office in Newport.

Admiral Head of Property, Huw Llewellyn said:

“We believe that giving our people choice and flexibility on how they work is critical to their enjoyment of their role, and this translates into supporting our customers and great business performance.

“The COVID-19 pandemic has changed how we work and we have learned that we can continue to operate effectively while working differently, and remotely. Our business continues to grow but our people are embracing a more flexible, hybrid approach and are telling us it’s how they want to work moving forward, as they’ve seen a positive impact on their wellbeing and work-life balance.

“And we’re excited by the opportunities it brings us, where colleagues can spend time working both at home, and together as teams in our offices working collaboratively. There’s no doubt that the flexibility of approach will help us attract and retain the top talent in the market and that’s important as we think about the future of our business.”

“We remain committed to the South Wales region, however our hybrid working approach means we’re able to accommodate our growing colleague population across a reduced property portfolio. This does mean that we will transition out of our Newport site at Admiral House and our colleagues based there will eventually use our Cardiff offices. We’re immensely proud to be part of the Newport community and although we’ll no longer have an office base in the city, we’ll continue to be represented by many of our colleagues who live locally.”

The consolidation has already seen Admiral close the Ellipse building (Swansea) earlier this year, and it will also exit Capital Quarter (Cardiff) over the course of 2022, meaning an updated property portfolio of Admiral Group House and Llansamlet in Swansea, and Ty Admiral and Capital Tower in Cardiff.

In Newport it will begin to reduce the amount of space it occupies in Admiral House by 50% from January 2022, vacating the site completely from 2023. The phased approach is to enable the company to actively support the landlord in appointing replacement tenants and to limit, as much as possible, the impact on Newport City centre. Admiral does not own any of the buildings in which it operates.

Admiral currently has around 1,000 of its 7,500 South Wales-based colleagues working across its offices on any given day and this number will increase as restrictions allow and in line with its hybrid working approach.