THE Whiteley office of national law firm Shoosmiths is celebrating a year of record growth with an increase in staff by nearly one-third.

It has added another 24 lawyers and support staff to its teams in a range of disciplines in the last 12 months alone.

The firms says its focus has been to capitalise on the trend, among both small to medium enterprises and larger corporates, of abandoning City firms of lawyers and sourcing their legal advisers from the serious players on their doorsteps.

Shoosmiths, which employs 1,150 people nationally, has also increased its fee income by 25 per cent to £55m across all areas of the business, with a 67 per cent increase in profits.

Richard Cook, the partner head of Shoosmiths' office at Whiteley, said: "Big-ticket company and corporate work is no longer the exclusive right of the London law firms."