FRIDAY night’s success for Fort Vale Engineering was the first part of a possible awards double for the ambitious firm.

As well as scooping the Lancashire Telegraph Recruitment and Development award, the Simonstone firm has been shortlisted for the national Chamber Awards 2008 run by the British Chamber of Commerce.

A leading manufacturer of valves and fittings for road tankers, Fort Vale won the regional Business of the Year Award in the Achievement in International Business category and is heading for national success on November 27 in London.

And company bosses said the Lancashire Telegraph Business Awards were a great way to get things going.

Carl Thornley, group health, safety and training manager, said: “This award is recognition of all the hard work put in by all our staff who want to develop and grow the business.

“We believe we are well placed to take the business forward in what is a difficult economic climate.”

With 340 employees, 100 of whom have been recruited in the past year as the company looked to increase in size, Fort Vale has invested in NVQ training with 50 staff undertaking a course this year.

Links to Blackburn’s Training 2000 has helped the company double its apprentice intake with 17 coming to the company in the last year and it has recruited three female school leavers on to its advanced modern apprenticeship for the first time in its history.

Mr Thornley added: “The skills we have invested in will help us meet the challenges ahead of us and leave us in a strong position to compete in the international market place and cope with the demands that brings.

“We believe passionately in developing our own skills and our own people. Those skills are massively beneficial to the company as we go forward.

“By having the right people in place the company will benefit and allow us to expand our international markets in the years to come.”

A lot of Fort Vale’s work has been to stem the fall in engineers coming into the industry so the company has placed emphasis on bringing in school leavers and developing its apprenticeship schemes.

By tackling this shortage and bringing more women into the business, the judging panel felt that Fort Vale edged out its competitors in another high quality category.