May 2014

KP Snacks joins national campaign to help young unemployed into work

This comes as new research conducted by food and grocery research and training charity, IGD (of which KP Snacks is a member) revealed that Britain’s unemployed are finding it harder than ever to find work despite the economic recovery. To tackle this, the UK’s food and grocery industry, Britain’s leading private sector employer and responsible for 1 in 7 jobs, is once again opening its doors to provide free skills training for thousands of unemployed people.

Since 2012, more than 200 companies have offered 25,000 training opportunities across the UK as part of the campaign. 97% of participants report that they felt more confident about applying for a job and 89% as more likely to consider a job in the food and grocery industry since they took part in the campaign’s workshops.
In September, young people will have the chance to attend have CV, interview and work experience sessions with HR managers at KP Snacks sites, to help them find out more about working in the food industry and to help develop their employability skills and improve their chances of getting a job.

Ryan Attwood attended the Feeding Britain’s Future session at KP Snacks’ Ashby site (home of Hula Hoops, Nik Naks, Skips and Space Raiders) last year. After the week-long session he was offered full time employment at the site.

Ryan, now 19, is now a Team Member working in Snacks Packing. He has undergone training and did really well. He says “I’m really enjoying working for KP Snacks. I enjoyed the Feeding Britain’s Future workshop and thought they were a really good way to gain experience and some qualifications. I was very pleased to be offered the chance to attend.”

Ryan had left college and gone to JobCentre Plus and this was his first full time job opportunity. Ryan was offered the position because of his excellent participation and enthusiasm during the workshop.

Gail Adams, HR Director at KP Snacks says, “Feeding Britain’s Future is a great initiative, which KP is proud to be part of. Over 70 young unemployed people got a chance to visit our sites as part of Skills for Work Month in 2013. The events we ran were highly rated by the young people who attended, with the majority rating them either ‘Good’ or ‘Excellent’ in feedback. We look forward to ramping up our activity this year and already have some exciting plans in place.”

More information about Feeding Britain’s Future can be found here.