Thousands of JCB employees are gearing up for a right Royal celebration to mark the Coronation of King Charles III and Queen Camilla – with a company-wide ‘street party’.
JCB is treating more than 5,500 employees at all its UK factories to a two-course celebration lunch next week. The ‘Big Coronation Lunch’ is being staged at the company’s plants in Staffordshire, as well as Derbyshire and Wrexham, where breaks are being extended to allow the historic occasion to be marked in style.
JCB Chairman Lord Bamford said: “The Coronation really is a momentous event in our country’s history and an opportunity for all of us to come together and mark it as a team in traditional street party style.”
Factory restaurants are being decked out with red, white and blue bunting and balloons ready for classic British cuisine to be served on traditional street party trestle tables.
Employees will tuck into fish and chips, sausage and mash, a special Coronation Chicken pie or enjoy a special afternoon tea. A regal fruit crumble and trifle will be offered as dessert.
Sean Tucker, 20, of Rocester, Staffs, is a welder at JCB Cab Systems in Uttoxeter. He said: “The Big Coronation Lunches are a fantastic idea – it will be great to get together with my colleagues to celebrate the memorable occasion. It’s brilliant that the food on offer will be traditionally British – I’m going to go for the fish and chips!”
Business degree apprentice Rebecca Brooks, aged 20, from Ipstones, near Leek, Staffs, who is based at the JCB World HQ, said: “It is a very generous act by Lord Bamford and JCB to put on the lunch, and really appreciated across the workforce.”
Over the course of the four-day street party, the company’s catering team will prepare and serve almost one tonne of potatoes, 172 kgs of chicken, 293 kgs of fish, and 125 kgs of sausage.
