The very beginning
The story of Lloyd’s began in a rather unlikely place: a small coffee house in Tower Street, in the City of London. The year was 1688 and back then, Lloyd’s had little resemblance to what it is today. Indeed, it became a home for insurance almost by chance.

Coffee became a very popular drink in the 17th Century, and as a result, coffee houses were appearing all over London. Edward Lloyd’s in particular grew to be a favourite meeting place among ships' captains, merchants and ship owners – thereby earning it a reputation as the place to go for trustworthy shipping news and, as time went on, for marine insurance.

The intervening years
Over more than three hundred years, we’ve seen entire cultures and economies grow; we’ve witnessed leaps forward in technology; and pioneered new types of insurance to match. We insured motorcars when they first became available in the UK. We’ve covered aviation from its early days. More recently, we were involved in insuring the first commercial space flight.