A Butchery Academy has been set up by a Tipperary based butchers, dedicated to training 10 candidates in the art of butchery, according to James Whelan Butchers.
The fully accredited scholarship programme, will be run over three years and is supported by Butchery Excellence Ireland, says the Clonmel based butchers.
The deadline for applications closing on October 1, 2016, while the successful applicants will go through a process of both practical and theoretical learning.
“The Butchery Academy at James Whelan Butchers is an opportunity for us as a company to select and help shape 10 great people as butchers, to share our ethos with them, and to equip them with the essential skills to ensure there is a new generation of butchers in Ireland as committed to their craft as we are to ours.
At James Whelan Butchers we have the knowledge and the expertise and want to share these with the next generation of butchers and teach them the art and the skills of the trade, a trade we have dedicated our careers to.
“I certainly believe that we have a responsibility to communicate those to butchers, either those brand new to the trade or to those who want to invest in themselves and significantly improve their skills,” Whelan said.
The first group of successful candidates will work and train across James Whelan Butchers stores and will be paid as full-time members of staff, according to the Clonmel based butchers.
“We have the infrastructure to create a Butchery Academy at James Whelan Butchers that offers students a unique and rewarding experience, one that is exceptional,” Whelan said.
James Whelan Butchers is investing €100,000 over the course of the scholarship, which is a significant commitment, but I am very excited about getting people excited about butchery as a career.
Applicants will be trained on the job daily by the most senior experts in the company, study an in-depth syllabus divided into a series of modules and then follow rotating placements into other James Whelan Butchers shops, according to the course outline.
James Whelan Butchers is a fifth generation family business with four stores, one based in Clonmel, two in Dublin and one in Bray Co. Wicklow.