28 | Aycliffe Today Business
Bringing Aycliffe Business Park Together | 29
Mike Matthews has turned
Stockton firm Nifco into a
global, multi-million-pound
company.
Former Aycliffe Apprentice
Mike Matthews was recently
made president of the NECC.
AYCLIFFE-TRAINED
MATTHEWS BANGS THE
APPRENTICESHIP DRUM
Former Newton Aycliffe Apprentice Mike Matthews was recently made president
of the North East Chamber of Commerce. Aycliffe Today Business editor Martin Walker
visited him at his Nifco offices in Stockton...
Mike Matthews has a long and treasured
association with Aycliffe Business Park.
It was here in Aycliffe where the new
president of the North East Chamber of
Commerce (NECC) was grounded... shaped
into a good tool-maker before he ventured
into sales and, eventually, was made chief
executive of one of the North East’s biggest
success stories.
I visited him at his Nifco offices on Durham
Lane near Eaglescliffe, Stockton - a state-ofthe-art factory built by Aycliffe’s own Finley
Structures - and was told I had 30 minutes to
chat and get pictures.
I signed in at 9.30am, and left nearly two
hours later.
Talking of his Apprenticeship with
South West Durham Training and working
for Aycliffe firm Elite Engineering clearly
rekindled fond memories for the man who,
in his own words, comes from the “humble
beginnings” of Branksome council estate in
Darlington.
Matthews is a tool-maker by trade. He
was appointed to his current CEO position in
2008 and took on European responsibilities
in 2012.
During his time with Nifco, which employs
more than 500 people, Matthews has
transformed the business from one turning
over just £300,000 to what will be a £75m
company by 2016.
We sit down with a coffee and Matthews
needs no encouragement to begin his
recollections of yesteryear.
“I always look back at my time in Aycliffe
with great fondness, he says.
”
“I worked for a few years at Elite
Engineering. People used to call it Alight
Engineering, because there was a major fire
on the premises around 1984. All of my tools
were destroyed.
“I heard it on the morning news and I
went to work I expecting the building to still
be in place, maybe badly smoke damaged.
It looked like a bomb had hit it. The inside of
the shell had collapsed, it was just a pile of
ash.
“Our benches and tool boxes were gone. It
must have been an inferno.
”
Although no laughing matter, Matthews
maintains a thoughtful smile during his
nostalgic reminisce.
And even though he has enjoyed an
elevation to top-brass status in recent years,
he’s also not afraid to talk about the lows in
his 30-year-plus career.
“When I joined Elite it was a time when
Norman Tebbit was telling people to get on
their bikes, he says.
”
“I started my Apprenticeship in Darlington
at a place called Pheonix Tubings. Half
way through the second year of my
Apprenticeship, they announced its closure.
This was in the early 1980s and so it was a
common thing. Unemployment was rising
quickly.
“I did alright at South West Durham
eventually. I started off poorly but finished off
strongly and won Most Improved Apprentice
of the Year - note it wasn’t Apprentice of the
Year! I was crap at the beginning.
“So I literally got on my bike and started
knocking on doors. I knew someone at Elite
and went in to their reception. I was put
in front of the owner, a chap from Aycliffe
called Colin Richardson, a bit of an infamous
character in the North East engineering
fraternity, but a very likeable guy. He wasn’t
a time-served tool-maker, he was what was
known then as a dilutee, who were frowned
upon by tradesman back then.
“But he’d had the wherewithal to set
his own business up and he had some
fantastic people working for him. The guys I
worked with at Elite were some of the best
craftsman you’ll ever come across.
“It was a sub-contract tool room. You’d
work seven days a week for 16 weeks
non-stop sometimes. If you were busy, you
just got stuck in. We used to earn loads of
money, but never had the time to spend it.
All the lads had nice cars and nice homes,
and the wives were getting new sofas every
three months. That was all the talk at the bait
table, anyway.
“I had a fantastic grounding in Aycliffe and
I have some lovely memories. I learned my
trade there and I became a good tool-maker.
But I felt the only way I was going to develop
was to move on.
“I was offered a position with a company
at Teesside Airport, but the manager hadn’t
approved it with the owner. I went away on
a two-week holiday, but I didn’t tell Colin I
was leaving until the day I went away on the
Friday, because he was the type of bloke
who wouldn’t pay my holiday money if he
knew I was leaving!
“So I handed my notice in on the Friday
and I got a call on the Sunday night to say
the owner of the other company hadn’t
sanctioned my new job, so I was left without
a job. I was technically unemployed.
“But I was very lucky and got a new job
the same day. There was a big skills shortage
at the time - some things never change
I suppose - so tool-makers were in high
demand. So I joined Elta Plastics, then based
on Yarm Road in Stockton, which was later
bought out by Nifco.
”
Nifco has invested £32m in the last three
years and is targeting to have 1,500 staff by
2025 and hit £200m turnover.
Matthews says a large portion of
that success is investing in training and
development. And he’s taking that philosophy
into his new role as NECC president.
“The chamber’s raison d’être is to share
with its members, and potential members,
what opportunities there are out there and
what are the key challenges, he says.
”
“One of the things I major on is the
promotion of skills. Not only to fill the
skills gap, because for sure there’s a skills
shortage now and we’ve had them before.
It’s just to help companies and help our
membership understand that without the
right skills, we’ll never achieve our full
potential.
“We’ve got over 70,000 businesses in the
North East, the chamber represents around
25-30% of employed staff in the North East.
Our role is to assist them with information
on what will enhance their business and their
prospects.
“What we’re also trying to do, which
we’ve always tried to do, is to improve the
prospects of the North East.
“Apprenticeships