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If your premises started life making boots and shoes, your policy should not have been written for a modern shed. Tell us what you run in Kettering and we will place it properly.
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Reviewed by Apex Insurance Brokers · Last reviewed 2026-08-08
Most business insurance pages could be about anywhere. Kettering deserves better than that, because the thing that shaped the town — the Northamptonshire shoe trade — also shaped the buildings a lot of its businesses still work from. When a policy is set up as if every unit were a modern steel-portal shed, the gap between assumption and reality is exactly where claims go wrong.
Kettering’s Victorian factories and workshops were built for boot and shoe manufacture: multi-storey brick, timber joists and floorboards, big window openings to light the benches. Plenty survive, now housing workshops, studios, offices, gyms, storage and small manufacturers. Three insurance consequences follow.
First, reinstatement cost. A period brick building costs far more to rebuild than its market value suggests — matching brickwork, modern building-regulation upgrades, professional fees, debris removal. If your sum insured is a guess based on what you paid, you are probably underinsured, and the average clause means an insurer can scale down every claim in proportion, not just a total loss. A proper rebuild valuation is the single most useful thing an owner of this stock can commission.
Second, construction disclosure. Timber floors, older roof structures and any later alterations need describing accurately to insurers. Get it wrong and you risk a dispute at the worst possible moment.
Third, fire load and services. A century-old timber-floored factory behaves very differently in a fire from a concrete-and-steel unit. Insurers may survey, and may impose requirements on electrics, heating and housekeeping. Treat those risk requirements as policy conditions, because that is what they are.
Many of Kettering’s former shoe factories have been split into multi-tenant units. That creates a specific set of questions. Usually the landlord insures the structure and recharges the premium through the service charge — but check the lease actually says so, and ask for evidence the cover exists and is index-linked to a realistic rebuild figure for a period building.
You then insure your own world: contents, stock, machinery, computers, and tenant’s improvements — the partitions, mezzanines, racking and fit-out you paid for, which the landlord’s policy will not replace. In a shared building, also think about denial of access: if a fire in a neighbouring unit closes the whole block, your own premises may be untouched and your income still stops. Business interruption cover can be extended for exactly that scenario, but only if it is asked for.
Only one of them is a legal requirement. If you employ anyone — including casual, temporary or part-time staff — the Employers’ Liability (Compulsory Insurance) Act 1969 requires you to hold employers’ liability insurance, with a statutory minimum of £5 million of cover. Trading without it risks daily fines.
Public liability is different: no statute requires it. In practice it is close to unavoidable, because other people demand it — landlords of converted units before they hand over keys, councils before granting a market pitch or street trading consent, main contractors before letting a Kettering tradesperson onto site. The right limit depends on who you work for and what their contracts specify, which is a conversation, not a checkbox.
Here is where the town’s heritage bites hardest. After serious damage, a standard modern unit can be found, fitted out and reoccupied relatively quickly. A Victorian former factory cannot. Rebuilding period brickwork takes longer to design, consent and execute; if your premises carry a listing or sit within conservation constraints, longer still; and finding equivalent alternative space in the meantime is not straightforward.
Yet the default indemnity period on many business interruption policies is 12 months. For occupiers of Kettering’s older stock, 24 or 36 months is often the honest figure — the indemnity period has to outlast not just the rebuild but the slow climb back to previous turnover. Extending it usually costs less than people expect, and it is the difference between a disruption and a closure.
Not every Kettering business is defined by its building. Trades working across Northamptonshire and beyond need tools cover that reflects where tools actually live — frequently in a van overnight, which many policies exclude or restrict. Anyone moving stock or equipment by road should look at goods in transit. And if you hold stock inside older premises, expect insurers to take an interest in physical security: minimum-standard locks on doors and accessible windows are a common policy condition in period buildings, and worth confirming before a theft rather than after.
Apex Insurance Brokers Limited is based in Bristol and arranges cover for clients across the UK, including Kettering — there is no local office, just a broker who takes the trouble to understand what a Northamptonshire factory conversion actually costs to put back. For the wider picture, see our commercial insurance page.
Apex Insurance Brokers Limited is authorised and regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority (FRN 724952). This article is general information, not advice on a specific policy.
