Exclusive: Behind the scenes at JJASnack’s confectionery education mission

Having laid out ambitious plans for growth over a decade ago, JJA Pack chocolate handling systems is expanding further with a valuable educational spotlight on the UK manufacturing sector, as Neill Barston discovers meeting company founder Jamie Ashpole

Giving something back to the next generation of aspiring chocolatiers, engineers and industry technicians is something that Jamie Ashpole remains especially passionate about.

After setting out on his own 12 years ago in creating JJA Pack, serving major players with specialist chocolate handling systems, the chance to expand its operations into fresh, uncharted areas began to steadily take shape as the business evolved. (Watch our exclusive video version of the feature below).

As the company’s managing director reveals with some pride, earlier this year, its latest initiative, JJA Snack took flight, aiming to spark eager young minds in offering a chance to gain invaluable hands-on learning to operate core tempering and cooling systems. Significantly, he enthuses that his latest venture, which is linked to its parent JJA Pack business, is very much a family affair.

This is ably demonstrated within the ranks of its small, yet dedicated team, which is continuing to expand through recruiting Jamie’s two twin 13-year old children, Ellie and Danny. They are playing their own unique part as company ambassadors in helping address the gap in industrial education that is increasingly noticeable within the UK.

Notably, the glaringly apparent vacuum in educational opportunities remains surprising to many sector observers, given the proud heritage of the nation that stands famed for its association with major historic players such as Cadbury, Rowntree’s and Terry’s chocolate to name a few famous brands and pioneers of our sector.

This remains a concerning situation that the company’s MD is keen to address in reaching out to schools in his native Barnsley area of Yorkshire in the North of England. As he states, the response so far is proving heartening from its initial batch of sessions held throughout 2024 so far, it seems there’s hope for the future of the industry.

“Over my entire career, I’ve worked in a lot of different industries, mainly within food, and I’ve been fortunate to travel all over the world, and 13 years ago my kids around, and they’ve been an integral part of my life ever since, and in setting up JJASnack last year, my goal has been to inspire the next generation of engineers – and inspire my kids to do something other than Youtube or TikTok,” says Jamie, who was among exhibitors at last year’s World Confectionery Conference in the UK, enthusing on his latest venture.

As he acknowledges, for many youngsters, there’s nothing quite like direct engagement to accelerate understanding of an industry. Intriguingly, he’s continuing to discover that in many instances, children often learn most quickly from their peers during their experiences at JJA Snack’s Yorkshire site in Barnsley. In describing these sessions, he feels they offer both the chance to celebrate confectionery making triumphs, as well as evaluating any mistakes made along the way in forging chocolate.

According to Jamie, who formerly worked full-time as a service engineer for the renowned German-founded global equipment group Sollich, passing on skills is of vital importance. As he notes, he will offer some initial tuition and a guiding hand to those who come on its day, yet the courses are very much designed to enable participants to get on use the equipment themselves.

“These courses are there to help get kids into engineering and STEM subjects and manufacturing by learning about where chocolate comes from, as well as how and how it’s processed into the products that everyone loves. “My kids are very much part of what we are doing here, and they take other children around with the tours we do. They have helped develop their own chocolate, as well as running their own charity events at schools,” he says, noting that his venture is about to set out on an especially exciting new chapter that will enable greater access to a far wider group of young people.

From the end of this year, he reveals that JJA Snack is set to take the next evolutionary leap in its development in moving to a new location as part of the soon-to-be unveiled immersive Skills Street initiative due to open by the end of this year near Sheffield. Its novel programme, linked to the Gulliver’s Valley Theme Park, is being hailed as a ‘game changer’ for young people of primary school age and upwards, through business-linked role-play attractions, focusing on highlighting a broad spread of career options for teenagers, set in a fun and informal environment.

‘Skills Street will have lots of different industries in there, from aerospace, automotive, to power and telecommunications, as well as live working chocolate factory. We hope that there will be around 16,000 coming through its doors every year, so it’s exciting times for us,” he adds of the initiative’s rapid ascent that he is keen to see reach as many budding future engineers as possible.

An eventful career pathway
As for his own journey into the industry, he says that as a youngster he would always enjoy basic engineering tasks such as modifying his skateboard, that would eventually sow the seeds of exploring sector work opportunities. While he acknowledges that the food and drink sector may not be something that runs in his family’s heritage, he’s clearly thrown himself into his respective roles over the years, including working with Sollich, which he describes as a brilliant experience.

He still enjoys an active relationship the company today on an independent basis as part of his own company’s operations. “It was a phenomenal time working with Sollich, and some of the products and lines that we have been involved with. It gives you a good grounding being at such a massive company, so it is an honour to continue doing installations for them.

They have a reputation for building quality machinery, and that’s what we do ourselves, and we want to maintain those standards,” he says of his earlier experiences in the sector, which he is maintaining under his own steam. Indeed, as he reveals, the chance to strike out in establishing JJA Pack (named after his own initials), was an opportunity too good to be missed, and its operations are displaying a strong sense of resilience amid wider market operating challenges.

From initially focusing on the dairy sector, it is continuing to expand its interests across the food and drink industry, including into chocolate handling
systems.  This includes filling systems, depositors, and chocolate tanks, in addition to specialist packaging machinery that has seen its presence rise across the industry during the past decade. This includes forging a major industry partnership with Siemens for equipment monitoring systems.

As he reflects, there have been plenty of memorable moments over the past decade, with his operations starting on a particularly striking note, with an
installation at Cadbury World in the Birmingham, which he observes is still there to this day.

Furthermore, its range of projects includes installing equipment for major chocolate brands within the UK, that offer up plenty of challenges, as well as working with a range of smaller and medium-sized enterprise within the industry. In addition, as Jamie explains enthusiastically as we tour its production unit, the company is expanding into areas beyond machinery, with its team now producing its own confectionery lines.

This includes classic chocolate bars, seasonal novelties and even a popcorn range created at its site, which are being made available through its website, and form a notable addition to its core work.

The future’s bright

One thing is for sure, he says that there’s a strong pipeline of activity that is engaging the business to include delivery of complete turnkey manufacturing solutions, forged originally from its purpose-built sister site in nearby Rotherham, Yorkshire. The move was carried out four years ago, evolving operations on from its founding base in Grimethorpe, famous for its former colliery and amid the region’s once-booming steel making industry.

Moreover, it’s this aspect of devising new and innovative projects and responding urgently and creatively to individual customer issues is something that is a unique selling point for the company, offering a key source of personal motivation. “I think the thing we like most about our work is doing things that haven’t been done before.

Anyone can make pipework and tanks, but combining everything together, where there’s a problem that a customer has where most people would turn away from, that’s what we enjoying doing, the difficult to do stuff,” remarks Jamie, who praises the firm’s experienced team as being an integral part of its forward momentum.

JJA Track

Another significant aspect to the business that has evolved in recent years is its JJA Track enterprise, which makes advanced used of AI algorithm data to enhance and monitor equipment performance in real time for its own, and customers’ additional machinery. As the company founder notes, this is based around analysing when equipment requires repairs, using a Siemens Edge digital platform.

Jamie Ashpole, founder of JJA Snack & JJA Pack offers a tour of its site in Yorkshire, UK. Pic: Neill Barston

This is in turn is populated with its own data, to provide a proactive service to help plan for shutdowns in the event of any equipment breakdowns, and reduce production downtime. “Every machine we manufacture as JJA Pack is fitted with our insights hub, and we are monitoring machines 24/7, and we are predicting when machines are going to fall over, We are taking the data from items such as motors and values and looking at the point at which it needs to be serviced,” says Jamie, who believes that this aspect of its work is going to experience notable growth in the coming years ahead.

As Confectionery Production has covered in the pages of our magazine, the use of AI continues apace in many sectors, so delivering on machinery efficiency goals is a prime example of how advanced data management can play a critical role within the industry. While there are always production deadline challenges to be met and wider market tests such as rising costs of energy and logistics, there appears to be plenty of optimism ahead for JJA Pack, and its connected businesses that are seeking to help shape the direction of the industry, and those who work within it for decades ahead.