The Manchester company funds recruiting and training for ex-offenders and now has bigger plans

Taking the bus to work on her first day for the Timpson group was “surreal”, according to Sarah Barker. That is because at the end of the day she would be returning to her prison cell.

After serving more than two years for a violent assault, Barker had been turned down for nearly 70 jobs. But the family-owned Timpson group offered her a second chance, training her to work in one of its photo-processing shops on day release from prison before she eventually moved on to cutting keys, and mending shoes and watches at one of its Manchester outlets.

“If I had not got the job at Timpson I dread to think what would have happened,” says the former prisoner.

Having suffered depression since going into care when her mother died when she was 15, Barker says Timpson has helped turn her life around. From the kind gesture of a manager who gave her somewhere to live when she left prison to company-funded counselling and a loan for a deposit on a flat. “The support never stops,” she says.

Barker is one of more than 1,200 ex-offenders working for the privately owned Timpson group, which includes Johnsons and Jeeves dry cleaners, the Snappy Snaps and Max Spielmann photo stores and a locksmiths service as well as the firm’s eponymous shoe-mending and key-cutting chain.

At least seven of the group’s 2,000-plus stores are run by people still serving their sentences, who are able to work under day release schemes. They have been trained at two women’s and five men’s training academies inside prison facilities, funded by Timpson. The company spent more than £692,000 on recruiting, retraining, mentoring and other support for ex-offenders via its charitable foundation last year.

Most companies employ ex-offenders but they just don’t know it James Timpson, head of the Timpson group

After 15 years’ recruiting prisoners, Timpson is now stepping up its plans, aiming to recruit another 150 this year.

It has also just won planning permission for a Timpson university near its head office in Wythenshawe, Manchester, where it will be offering degree-level training to 500 staff a year, including ex-offenders and those on day release.

“It’s a great way of finding amazing people,” says James Timpson, the chief executive and great-great-grandson of the founder, William Timpson, who opened the family’s first shoe shop in Oldham Street, Manchester, in 1865.

“We look for staff everywhere, but a lot of people who have been in prison are desperate for an opportunity and we find they make great colleagues.

“Most companies employ ex-offenders but they just don’t know it, as they had to lie on their application form to get a job,” he says.

Timpson became interested in the social impact of the prison system after growing up alongside dozens of young people who were fostered by his parents because their own were in prison.

He says the idea to employ people on day release and ex-offenders came after he befriended a 19-year-old, who showed him round a local prison 15 years ago. “I really liked his personality so I offered him a job when he came out and he was great.,” says Timpson, who then visited numerous prisons sounding out potential recruits in gyms and canteens.

There is now a company-wide scheme under which area managers visit local category C and D prisons to sign up recruits supported by a full-time recruitment specialist who helps assess their suitability and also advises other companies interested in recruiting prisoners.

Timpson wants the government to introduce national insurance holidays to encourage employers taking on former prisoners, armed forces veterans or long-term unemployed people, as as doing so requires additional investment.

A change to the apprenticeship levy, introduced as a way to fund training schemes, is also on Timpson’s agenda. At present, the company can’t use the £1.2m it pays into the widely criticised apprenticeship levy for its offenders scheme.

“[The levy] is a really good idea but it needs to be more flexible so we can use it and target it in ways that we think are right,” Timpson says. “If I could wave a magic wand that would be really helpful for people leaving prison who want to learn new skills. There’s plenty of evidence to show that if you get a job when you leave you are way less likely to go back.”

Timpson’s prisoner recruitment scheme is part of an unusual ethos at the family company which also provides free holiday homes for members of staff and an extra paid day off to take a child to school on their first day. The group credits its success to its emphasis on caring for staff like a family and “upside down management” – training people and then trusting them to make their own decisions about running their shop.

That philosophy has helped Timpson continued to thrive. While many other high street chains are closing stores or closing down – the shoe mending to dry cleaning group expects to open 70 outlets this year.

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Timpson increased sales by nearly 7% to £278m in the year to the end of September 2018 as it added 182 new stores, taking the total to 2,075 across the country.

It is moving into barbershops and switching from high streets to supermarket carparks as it adapts to online shopping.

After opening six trial barbershop pods in supermarkets this year, Timpson says a similar number are likely to open in the year ahead. “If it works we could do hundreds,” he says. “You can’t get your hair cut online.”