Rooted in Heritage: Why Family Business is Built to Last

[Photo: Birmingham’s Bull, New Street Station — taken on my recent visit]
I didn’t plan to get emotional at a railway station. But standing in Birmingham New Street recently, looking up at Ozzy — the magnificent mechanical Raging Bull that dominates the concourse — I felt something unexpected.

Pride.

The deep, warm kind that comes not from anything you’ve done yourself, but from where you come from.

My parents were from the Birmingham region. I grew up here. Brum is in my bones. And seeing that great steampunk beast of riveted iron and glowing purple eyes, built from materials sourced from Birmingham’s own factories, felt like a love letter to everything this city has always been — industrial, creative, unbreakable, and quietly magnificent.

It made me think about family business.

Because honestly? The two things are not so different.

When sculptor Laurence Broderick created the original Birmingham Bull, he called it a “gateway emblem for Birmingham throughout history,” designed to reflect the spirit of trade, craft, and the marketplace. That description fits a great family business perfectly.

A family firm is its own kind of emblem — a living symbol of what a family believes in, built over years and passed with pride from one generation to the next.

There’s something irreplaceable about that. When you walk into a family-run business, you feel it immediately. The values aren’t framed on a wall — they’re embodied in the people who work there. The founder’s work ethic didn’t come from a leadership course; it was learned at the kitchen table.

That kind of culture can’t be manufactured. It has to be inherited.

Heritage in business doesn’t mean being stuck in the past, though.

The best family firms do exactly what Birmingham has always done, they evolve boldly while staying true to who they are.

Birmingham has been an important centre for commerce for hundreds of years, reinventing itself time and again without ever losing its identity. That’s the family business story too. New markets, new technology, new generations at the helm — but the same values, the same name, the same commitment.

Growing up in a place like this teaches you something without you even realising it. You learn that graft matters. That community matters. That the work your parents and grandparents did has meaning and deserves to be honoured — and built upon.

So if you’re running a family business, or thinking about starting one, lean into your heritage. It isn’t baggage — it’s your foundation.

It’s the thing that makes you different from every faceless competitor out there.

Like Ozzy standing tall in New Street, you are strong, you are rooted, and you are built to endure.

Brum, I’m proud of you. And I’m proud of every family that builds something worth passing on. 🐂