WEC Academy celebrates 20th anniversary

Welding and engineering manufacturer WEC Group celebrated the 20th anniversary of its engineering academy.

The academy was created by the Darwen-based company in 2006 to address a shortage of skilled welders, fabricators and engineers.

WEC says it has now trained more than 430 apprentices since opening its in-house academy, including 200 apprentices in the past five years alone. Apprenticeships have become central to WEC’s growth strategy, helping the business expand from 136 staff to more than 1,150 employees while building a strong pipeline of skilled engineers for the future.

Steve Hartley, managing director, said: “When we launched the academy in 2006, it was because we could see the industry needed a different approach to skills. We were struggling to find enough skilled people, so we decided to invest in young people, train them properly and give them a real career.

"Twenty years later, the academy has become one of the best decisions we have ever made as a business. It has helped WEC grow, but more importantly it has changed lives and created opportunities for hundreds of people.”

The academy has grown from its original base in Lancashire into a national model for employer-led engineering training. A second training school opened at WEC Group’s Rotherham site in 2016, while the company continued investing through the COVID-19 lockdowns period with a new training facility in Blackburn to allow it to double its annual intake of apprentices. In 2025, the apprenticeship scheme was also replicated at WEC’s Coventry site, extending training opportunities across the Group’s UK manufacturing footprint.

The programme combines practical workshop training, classroom learning, mentoring and real manufacturing experience, giving apprentices the technical ability, confidence and work ethic needed to succeed in industry. Apprentices now train across various key areas including welding, fabrication, machining, technical engineering, IT, marketing and business administration.

Kris Mercer, academy manager and master welding instructor at WEC Group, said: “The most rewarding part of the academy is seeing apprentices arrive with potential and leave as confident, skilled tradespeople. Many of them come to us straight from school, and over the years we watch them develop not only their technical ability, but their confidence, discipline and pride in their work. The academy has produced supervisors, managers and highly skilled engineers who are now helping train the next generation.”