Author: Lucy Wood

First ‘Women in Security’ Award nomination for The Westgrove Group

A female security officer from a Manchester shopping park has been shortlisted out of 200 nominations for a prestigious industry award after saving a woman’s life.

Rebecca Howarth of The Westgrove Group, the Warrington based independent security company, was nominated for the Woman in Security awards, the first time the company has taken part.

The awards are specifically for women who operate on the frontline of the security industry and includes entries from door supervisors, security officers, CCTV operatives, engineers, profit protection officers, investigators and monitoring operatives in ARCs.

Rebecca was on a night shift in May at Crown Point Shopping Centre in Denton, Manchester, and was using the CCTV system to monitor the site. She spotted a distressed woman standing in the middle of the motorway bridge nearby, informed the local Police control room and immediately went to help.

Over four hours, she talked to her, calmed her down and called for assistance. The woman has since been in touch with a thank you card and present for Rebecca.

Westgrove Group Managing Director Claire McKinley Smith said: “It is amazing that the Women in Security awards take time to highlight females working in the security industry. Rebecca has shown to many people what it takes to be a very good security officer regardless of gender and to stand out within the industry.”

Rebecca was one of 12 women to be shortlisted for this year’s Woman in Security awards hosted in London by the Fire & Security Association last night. Judges were selected from the chairs and chief executives of the leading professional organisations within the security industry.

The Westgrove Group is one of the largest independent security and cleaning companies operating alongside the larger PLC’s.

Based in Warrington the company, which celebrated its 20th anniversary last month, employs over 1,000 people in over 50 shopping centres and airports across the UK working with major landlords and managing agents.

Westgrove Super Colleagues!

We are super proud to announce our 20 Super Colleagues as voted for by their team mates and managers. To celebrate our 20th Birthday in August we set about finding 20 people who represented the best in service excellence day in day out. Every day they are consistently a team player and a credit to their site in whichever part of the business – cleaning, security, customer services, administration and head office.

We were overwhelmed with the nominations and had a very hard time choosing just 20…but here they are! Well done to all Super Colleagues who receive a certificate, and gift from the company and are VIP Guests at our annual Reward & Recognition Awards in February 2019.

Andrew Cooper – Lion Yard

Bob Perry – Queens Shopping Park

Sunny Idiaghe – MediaCityUK

Paul Bratby – Peel Dome

David Brooks – Grosvenor Shopping Centre

Dave Shaw – Hardshaw Centre

Paul Bird – Runcorn Shopping City

Eric Roye – Spindles Shopping Centre

Scott Hazlehurst – Handforth Dean

Michael Beharry – Haymarket Shopping Centre

Jaspal Singh – Old Square Shopping Centre

Waqas Maroof – Mobile Support Officer

Kaasim Khan – Skydome

David Tanner – Broughton Shopping Park

Andrew Smith – Cornbow Shopping Centre

Rufai Hydara – The Lexicon

Gavin Jones – Ropewalk Shopping Centre

Roger Smith – Maylord Shopping Centre

Gemma Healey – Head Office

Emma Munroe – Head Office

Happy Birthday to Westgrove!

Yes it’s officially our 20th birthday tomorrow.

On Saturday, it will be 20 years since the start of our first contract at Wolverhampton Wanderers Football Club when we had a team of six – including both of the Chairmen!

A lot of time has passed since those early days and we now operate on over 100 sites across the UK with over 1,000 colleagues delivering cleaning, security and now PRM at Doncaster Sheffield Airport.

To celebrate we chatted to both the Chairmen, Simon Whittle and Steve Fives, at Westgrove HQ about their memories, the Westgrove Community and what the future holds for the company.

In this first interview with Steve, he starts to look back on the past 20 year and where the company is today. https://youtu.be/w99K9colyek