About Us
Built Specifically for Global Commodity Markets.
Specialist commodity recruitment, executive search, market intelligence and strategic growth support.
Imperium Commodity Search was established in 2018 with a simple belief: specialist markets deserve specialist search.
We are a global commodity recruitment and executive search business, supporting organisations across commodity trading and the international energy, metals & mining, agriculture, shipping, brokerage and derivatives markets.
Today, our work extends beyond individual appointments.
We help commodity businesses identify, understand and secure the people, teams and opportunities that support growth – from executive and retained search through to ongoing search partnerships, market mapping and intelligence, team moves and strategic acquisition opportunities.
Our consultants and research team work across commodity trading, brokerage, origination, sales and associated commercial functions, combining specialist market knowledge with targeted research, direct engagement and confidential conversation.
We don’t begin with who is available.
We begin with what you are trying to achieve.
Imperium at a Glance
ESTABLISHED 2018
Specialist commodity recruitment and search across international markets.
GLOBAL COMMODITY SPECIALISTS
Energy • Metals & Mining • Agriculture • Shipping • Brokerage • Derivatives
RESEARCH-LED SEARCH
Dedicated consultant and research capability built around the requirement rather than an existing candidate database.
INTERNATIONAL MANDATE EXPERIENCE
Executive search, market mapping, Team Moves and strategic projects across major global commodity centres.
More Than Commodity Recruitment
One specialist market. Multiple ways to support growth.
Our knowledge of the commodity markets allows us to support clients at different stages of growth — whether the requirement is one critical appointment, an ongoing hiring programme, deeper market intelligence or the acquisition of established capability.
Search
Critical, time sensitive hires & executive appointments.
Retained and executive search built around the requirement, with dedicated research, market mapping and direct engagement across global commodity talent markets.
Search Partnership
Ongoing hiring without restarting the search every time.
For commodity businesses making multiple, evolving or continuous hires across a desk, team, market or geography — including growing trading and brokerage firms.
Market Intelligence
Understand the market before making the decision.
Market mapping, intelligence, salary benchmarking and feasibility work designed to give clients visibility beyond the immediately available candidate market.
Strategic Growth
When the opportunity is bigger than an individual hire.
Confidential Team Move and M&A origination work identifying established teams, desks, capabilities and businesses that could provide another route to growth.
Different challenges. The same specialist commodity-market knowledge behind them.
We Set Ourselves Apart in the Introductions We Don’t Make.
Search should create value through relevance, not volume.
Commodity markets are specialist, relationship-driven and often highly interconnected. A successful search therefore depends on more than identifying people with the right job title.
We take time to understand the business, the commercial objective, the team, the market and the environment in which the successful individual needs to perform.
That means being selective.
We would rather introduce three people who genuinely belong in the process than send ten profiles simply because they are available.
The same principle runs through our retained search, executive search, market mapping and strategic projects: understand the requirement first, map the relevant market properly, then engage the right people directly.
The Story Behind Imperium Commodity Search
Imperium Commodity Search was established in 2018 by recruitment, headhunting and consulting professionals with direct experience of the commodity recruitment market.
The ambition was not simply to create another recruitment agency.
Having worked within different recruitment environments, the team had seen the same frustrations repeatedly: specialist searches treated like volume recruitment, too much emphasis on available CVs, and not enough time spent understanding the market, the business or the commercial objective behind the hire.
Imperium was built around a different approach — specialist market knowledge, dedicated research, direct engagement and a more selective search process.
The business has continued to evolve with the requirements of our clients.
Individual search mandates developed into retained and executive search. Repeated hiring requirements led to longer-term search partnerships. Research capability developed into market mapping and intelligence. Strategic hiring conversations expanded into Team Moves and M&A opportunity identification.
What connects those services is not a recruitment product.
It is an understanding of the global commodity markets and the ability to research, identify and open the right conversations within them.
Imperium has changed considerably since 2018. The market we specialise in has not.
From a Whiteboard and a Kettle.
Imperium began in 2018 with two people, one room and an idea for a better kind of commodity search business.
In 2018, Imperium was little more than an idea being worked through in a room above an office.
There was no large team, no established infrastructure and no grand launch.
There was Jonathan Margrave, Mark Taylor, a whiteboard and a kettle — and a belief that specialist commodity recruitment could be done differently.
Both had seen the limitations of traditional recruitment models: too much emphasis on available candidates, too little investment in research, and not enough understanding of the commercial context behind a hire.
Imperium was built to be more deliberate — specialist in its markets, selective in its introductions and prepared to do the research required to find the right people rather than simply the available ones.
The setup was basic. The ambition wasn’t.
There was no polished corporate launch story; just two people working through how they thought commodity recruitment could be done better, a whiteboard that kept filling up and a kettle doing more than its fair share of the work.
That principle has remained constant as the business has grown from individual commodity search mandates into retained and executive search, ongoing search partnerships, market intelligence, Team Moves and strategic opportunity identification.
The office changed. The team grew. The whiteboard thinking never really left.
Jonathan Margrave
Co-Founder
Jonathan brings more than 30 years of recruitment experience across major firms and specialist boutiques. He co-founded Imperium to build a more focused, research-led approach to commodity search and today leads the business, senior client relationships and strategic mandates across international commodity markets, with a particular focus on executive search and long-term client partnerships.
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Mark Taylor
Co-Founder
Mark brings a background in sales, recruitment and more than a decade specialising in commodity search. He co-founded Imperium and works across client strategy, executive search and the development of the firm’s wider search, intelligence and strategic-growth services, including Search Partnerships, market intelligence and Team Move opportunities.
Tenacity. Vigour. Humility.
Why Victor?
The horse behind the Imperium brand.
Victor has been part of Imperium’s identity from the beginning.
The horse represents qualities we wanted the business to embody: tenacity, vigour and humility — the determination to keep searching, the energy to pursue difficult mandates and the discipline to listen and understand before acting.
Those qualities still sit behind the way we approach commodity recruitment, executive search and strategic market projects today.
Persistent in the search. Considered in the approach.
tenacitas • vigor • humilitas
Built in One Market. Working Across the World.
Specialist commodity recruitment, executive search and market intelligence across the major international trading centres.
Commodity markets are global by nature. The businesses, people and opportunities we work with routinely span countries, time zones and trading hubs.
Imperium supports commodity recruitment, executive search, market mapping and strategic projects across Europe, the Americas, the Middle East and Asia-Pacific…
EUROPE
London • Geneva • Zug • Amsterdam • Paris • Hamburg
and wider European commodity centres.
AMERICAS
New York • Houston • Chicago • Stamford • Miami
and key markets across Latin America.
MIDDLE EAST
Dubai • Abu Dhabi
and the region’s growing commodity and trading hubs.
ASIA-PACIFIC
Singapore • Hong Kong • Australia
and specialist commodity markets across Asia.
Our specialism is defined by the market, not by a postcode.
Where Do We Go From Here?
Whether you are building a business or considering your own next move, our work starts with understanding what you are trying to achieve.
BUILDING A COMMODITY BUSINESS?
From critical appointments and ongoing hiring to market intelligence, Team Moves and strategic growth projects, explore how Imperium supports commodity businesses internationally.
CONSIDERING YOUR NEXT MOVE?
Explore confidential career conversations, current commodity opportunities and options for moving individually or as part of a team, with discretion maintained throughout the process.