The South Staffordshire Waterworks Company, was formed on 4 August 1853 to provide "an abundant supply of pure water" to the inhabitants of the towns of the Black Country. South Staffordshire Waterworks Company became a public limited company on 1 November 1991 and was listed on the London Stock Exchange as South Staffordshire Water. In February 1992 a capital reorganisation took place creating South Staffordshire Water Holdings in order to create and grow non-regulated businesses.

In recognition of the success of those non-regulated businesses, South Staffordshire Water Holdings was renamed South Staffordshire Group Plc in 1999 and was reclassified to the FTSE Support Services sector in 2001.

On 11 March 2004 the Board of directors of South Staffordshire Group Plc announced its proposals to demerge South Staffordshire Plc, which included South Staffordshire Water, Echo, Rapid, Underground Pipelines Services and Aqua Direct. On 6 April 2004 South Staffordshire Plc began trading on the London Stock Exchange at a price of £6.57½ per share.

On 19 October 2004 an offer for the Group was made by AquaInvest Acquisitions Ltd, a company controlled by Arcapita Bank B.S.C. (c), a Bahrain company, at a price of £11.20 per share (£237m including debt). On 18 November the offer was declared unconditional and the Group delisted from the Stock Exchange.

On 22 March 2005 the Group acquired OnSite, a waste water services business, for £4m to broaden the range of specialist repair and maintenance services provided by the Group.

On 22 February 2006 the Group aquired Office Watercoolers, a supplier of bottled water coolers.