Specialised Covers have long been supporters of initiatives aimed at providing opportunities to the youth living in the Shipley area as well as to the West Yorkshire area as a whole.  Our strong belief in the quality of British design and manufacturing has always led us to recruit both experienced and inexperienced staff, young and old, from the local area. This blend of experience and enthusiasm has been a successful mix in the past and once again Specialised Covers are looking at ways in which we can continue to play a pivotal part in the education and development of young people in the area and eventually, as we expand, across the country.

One of the ways we are looking at supporting those interested in employment in textile manufacturing is by creating and establishing a fully certified apprenticeship scheme for school leavers.

The apprenticeship scheme will initially support young people from local schools with a view to expanding the scheme nationally to all schools across the UK. Some of the core skills a person would learn throughout their apprenticeship would be manufacturing processes and procedures, stock control, waste management, as well as gaining the experience of the real world pressures of working within manufacturing, deadlines, working alongside others and occasionally, how to deal and to react when things don’t always go according to plan!