2018’s Young Shareholders update us on how they get on in their week at The Billington Group…
On Sunday 21st of July Adam Whiteley, Daniel Kearney and Nicholas Verkerk all took the journey to Liverpool to start our week of work experience. On that first day we introduced ourselves to one another and to our host for the week; Edward Billington.
On the first day we all packed into the car and headed into Cunard in Liverpool. On our first day we talked with several different people about the company as a whole and about Criddle and Billington Food Ingredients. One activity was the investigation into the company’s Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR), we were tasked with coming up with ideas to improve the CSR, which was both informative and fun.
On our second day we headed up to Lancaster to look at Carrs Billington. Once we arrived we were given some trendy, bright pink, high viz jackets and were given an enthusiastic and engaging tour round the factory. It was fascinating to see the process the animal food took, from the storage to shaping to packaging. We ended our day with a detour to see one of the Carrs Billingtons shops.
On Wednesday we travelled to English Provender Company (EPC) in Chester. We were shown the large mixers, the ingredients that were put into them, and how they were combined to produce some delicious mayonnaise. I found the packaging machines really interesting, especially how the ketchup was packaged into the M&S branded sachets. Later, we were recruited by the taste panel to sample different sauces and check for crucial factors (e.g. taste, aroma, appearance, etc). Finally, we were shown around a local Morrisons where it was great to see the final product.
The following day we enjoyed a 6am start and made our way to The Billington Bakery. We enjoyed an exuberant tour by the Factory Manager Paul Briggs and we even attempted some pie crimping (quite badly).
On the last day we headed over to the Billington Barn. We had a talk from the marketing team and learnt what kind of tasks they perform in the business.
Thank you to everyone at the company who were so welcoming and really helped make the week for us.