The Hampton Roads Acquisition Record · First edition, October 2026
Who's buying Hampton Roads businesses? 57 of 65 aren't from here.
A sourced record of every sale of a Hampton Roads business since January 2023 that left a public trace.
- 65 deals
- Every row sourced
- 12 pages
- Free
Free to read, share and forward. No email needed.
What the record shows
From January 2023 to October 2026, at least 65 sales of Hampton Roads businesses left a public record. Each is counted as one deal.
In 57 of the 65, the buyer is headquartered outside Hampton Roads. In 47 of those, the buyer is based outside Virginia, spread across 22 other states, and in three deals the buyer is based outside the fifty states. In 10 more, the buyer is elsewhere in Virginia.
In 30 of the 65, the buyer is a private equity firm or a company backed by one. Of those 30, 13 trace to a firm in New York. In 23 of the 25 deals where a private equity firm backs the buyer, the backer is based in a different state from the buyer.
In eight deals, the buyer is local. In one of those, a company sold itself to its own employees.
How it was built
A deal is in the record if the business was headquartered in Hampton Roads, it had employees, control changed hands between Jan. 1, 2023, and Oct. 14, 2026, and a source anyone can open and read states the deal.
- 47rows rest on a release or web page published by the buyer, the seller or the buyer's owner
- 5rows rest on a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission
- 13rows rest on a press report and are marked as such in the record
Hampton Roads here means Norfolk, Virginia Beach, Chesapeake, Portsmouth, Suffolk, Hampton, Newport News, Williamsburg, Poquoson, Franklin, and James City, York, Gloucester and Isle of Wight counties.
Two cautions
They're printed in the record, and they travel with every number on this page.
65 is a floor. Private companies don't have to announce a sale, and many don't, so the real number is higher.
Where a buyer is headquartered tells you who owns a business now. It isn't evidence about how the change has gone for the people in it.
Spot a deal we missed, or one we got wrong? Email shelley@premierrapport.com and we'll correct it in the next edition.
You've seen who's buying. The series is about what happens next.
Every deal in this record crossed its first finish line: the day it closed, with a date and an announcement. The second finish line is the day people are actually working the new way. Nobody puts a date on it, and nobody announces it.
The Second Finish Line is seven short emails from Shelley D. Smith, one a day. They cover what people inside a company watch for after a deal, why a change can stall without anyone resisting it, and the five-minute repairs that rebuild trust. Each one gives you something you can use the same week. If you're living through one of these changes, or advising someone who is, start here.
Free. Seven short emails, one a day. Unsubscribe any time.
About Premier Rapport
Premier Rapport is a Hampton Roads firm led by Shelley D. Smith, author of Thirsty. Shelley helps organizations with culture, leadership development and succession, often while they're going through a change like the ones in this record.