To give you more of an insight into Horrocks Hampton’s owner, Wendy Hampton, we asked
her to briefly share a bit about her background and career — you can read it below…
“I emigrated to New Zealand from England in my early 20s and after working in retail and
hospitality – where I learned the importance of customer service to a business — I decided I
had to figure out what I really wanted to do “when I grew up”.
After a process of elimination and talking to a friend who was studying for a law degree, I
applied to law school.
I initially started part time and loved every minute at university, so I decided study full-time
university and part-time work. I started with a BA and majored in Sociology but combined
this with a Law degree.
After five years at university and graduating with a BA/ LLB, I started my first job in a small
firm in Takapuna. I then went on to work for one of the large city firms before moving to a
medium-sized, city-based firm. With each job I got to learn about the different areas of law
and soon realised that property law was my passion and, in particular, Trust law — this
remains true today.
In the meantime, I married and had a daughter and decided I wanted to work closer to
home. I started work with Tony Horrocks in Takapuna. After two years I was offered a
partnership and Horrocks Hampton was formed in 2002. After 16 years in partnership, Tony
retired and I have been in sole practice — with my team of nine — for the past two years.
When I went into sole practice, I took the opportunity to rethink the firm and how we did
things. I realised pretty quickly that instead of seeing myself as running a law firm, I needed
to see the firm as a business. As a result I took several business courses which has led to the
transformation of Horrocks Hampton.
In the past two years we have updated our computers and adopted a new client
management system which has radically changed the way we operate. We are also now
largely a paperless office, have overhauled our website and have a presence on social
media. If it had not been for the changes we made at the beginning of 2020, our success
through lockdown would have been a different story. We not only survived but have grown
our client base and added more team members.
Despite the technological changes we have embraced, our goal remains the same: to
provide excellent legal service to our clients in a friendly approachable manner for value for
money.”
