Local apprentices graduate with Coca-Cola European Partners
Last week, the first group of apprentices on Coca-Cola European Partners’ (CCEP) Field Sales Apprenticeship scheme graduated from the programme, with a special event held in Peterborough Cathedral to mark the occasion.
The nine apprentices, who started their placements last year, celebrated their achievement with family, members of their teams and senior leaders across the CCEP network.
The apprentices included field sales reps, Mariella Catling, Ben Kimble and Alex Henlan and six sales reps who are based at the business’ Customer Hub in Peterborough: George Brown, Ross Lee, Bailey Danahar, Josh Lynch, Tom Hutchinson and Natalie Hudson. Having all passed their apprentice qualification, seven of the apprentices will be taking up permanent roles with CCEP.
This comes six months after the business announced its largest ever apprentice recruitment drive, doubling the number of apprentices across its operations this year and investing over one million pounds into the business’ apprenticeship programme.
As part of this, 15 new field sales apprentices joined the business this week, including sales reps recruited for the Leeds, Manchester, Worcester and London regions, and those who will be working from CCEP’s Customer Hub in Peterborough. Some of the new recruits also attended the graduation event last week, where they were able to hear from apprentices about their placements and what they can expect to learn over the next year.
During the event, new and former apprentices also heard from Olympic skier, Eddie The Eagle, who shared his experiences and advice with guests during a Q&A session to help inspire and motivate the apprentices as they begin their own career paths.
An Vermeulen, VP of Field Sales at Coca-Cola European Partners, said: “Here at CCEP, supporting the education and development of new talent is hugely important to us. It was a pleasure to see our very first group of field sales apprentices graduating from the programme after all their hard work over the last year, and I look forward to seeing how they progress further in their chosen careers.
“By providing an alternative route for new talent to enter the business, our scheme supports one of our core values of encouraging a diverse workforce, while helping to educate and inspire our apprentices through valuable hands-on experience. It was a hugely proud moment for the whole team to see how far the graduates have come and what they’ve been able to achieve during their placement. We hope that this will inspire our newest recruits who will be starting with us in September, and look forward to making our next placement year even bigger and better!”
