The Arden
Story

Arden Estates is an Independent Estate Agency owned by Jon Whitehead and James Cope.

Jon and Matthew Quiqley founded the company in 2010 and James joined the company later that year. Since then, Arden has grown into an established, award winning business with a fabulous track record in Sales & Lettings.

Here is a brief rundown into the history of Arden and the milestones along the way.

The name Arden came from Henley-in-Arden, where Jon was living at the time.

Jan ’10

January 2010 – Arden Estates is founded

The first branch of Arden Estates opens for business, converting the Mortgage office on the Evesham Road in Redditch. In the depths of the credit crunch, with very few houses selling, Arden Estates was born. Pictured is the very first Arden logo, created by good friend Iain Johnson!

Aug ’10

 

August 2010 – A partnership is born

James Cope agrees to join Jon as his business partner to form a partnership that would transform Arden, breaking and winning all kinds of records and awards over the next 10 years.

Jan ’12

January 2012 – Bromsgrove Branch Opens

Arden opens its second branch on the corner of The Strand in Bromsgrove. By this time, Jon had moved to Bromsgrove, so this made sense. To start with, Arden only occupied the ground floor but by the following year, the second floor was needed to expand due to the growth of the branch.

June ’13

 

June 2013 – Barnt Green Office Opens

A chance opportunity arises to acquire Judith Hitchin Estate Agents in Barnt Green, a well-known and respected name with years of experience and good will. After a few days of talks, Arden agrees to buy the branch and Arden in Barnt Green is born, positioned in centre of the Barnt Green High Street in a lovely boutique style office.

Jan ’15

 

January 2015 – Rubery Office Opens

Another chance occasion, this time with an Arden customer! Rob Davies had come to Arden to help sell his property on Rubery High Street, after receiving a much better level of service than he had from the other agents in that area, he offered Arden his New Road property in order to set up an Arden branch there. Arden’s 4th branch was born.

June ’17

 

June 2017 – House of Arden is founded

House of Arden stages its first property! The birth of one of our proudest achievements and ironically the idea was initially rejected! In May 2017, Sarah Massey (Branch Manager for Bromsgrove), put the idea of staging empty properties that weren’t selling to Jon and he rejected the idea. Sarah pressed ahead and staged one of her father’s empty properties, when Jon turned up to value it he was blown away with how good it looked and agreed on the spot to back the idea, and so House of Arden was born! Maria Stokes & Sarah Massey now head up this amazing team and have successfully staged over 100 of our clients’ houses, they have even staged houses for other estate agents out of the area!

 

June ’19

 

June 2019 – Worcester Branch Opens

Worcester was always an obvious place for Arden to set up and when Jamie Barnett acquired No.15 Foregate Street, this was too big an opportunity to miss. Arden Worcester opens its doors in the summer of 2019, with a fabulous party.

 

Aug ’20

 

August ’20 – Bromsgrove Branch moves

Arden Bromsgrove moves into their new premises at Junction 1 of the M42 (The Old Paul Matty Sports car site). This is a story of hard work and perseverance. It had been an Arden dream to move to this site for over 4 years, and after many days and hours spent overcoming every possible hurdle, the deal was finally completed in the early summer of 2020. Even a pandemic couldn’t derail it (although it tried!).

April ’21

 

April 2021 – Solihull Branch Opens

Solihull Branch! Back to the roots of Arden. As previously mentioned, the name Arden came from the Solihull / Henley-in-Arden areas and with many friends and family still living locally it seemed like the natural progression. This Branch is located at at 450 Stratford Road, a lovely office and location.

 

Mar ’23

 

March ’23 – First Carbon Neutral Estate Agent!

Arden Estates are proud to announce that we have now achieved NCZ silver certification, signifying that all of the scope 1, 2 and 3 organisational emissions of our business have been assessed, reported on and offset. This process enables us to set our carbon footprint baseline and create a targeted approach to carbon reduction, and as all currently unavoidable emissions have been officially and verifiably offset, establishes Arden Estates as a carbon neutral business. This completes the first phase of our comprehensive four phase carbon management programme.