Fitter of the Year - LVT - 2023 – The Finalists
We would like to introduce to you this year's five finalists who will be taking part in the 2023 final at The Flooring Show in Harrogate on Sunday 17th and Monday 18th September 2023. We wish all taking part good luck!
Featured also on this page are our remaining semi-finalists who took part in the trials at the FITA Training Centre in Loughborough during June 2023. Please refer to the Competition Format page for an initial overview of the process.
Our Finalists
I'm Wesley Brocklesby from Wakefield, West Yorkshire. I'm really happy to have made the finals. I have grown up in the flooring trade and I am part of the second generation running our successful family business, Brockson Carpets, in Ossett with my brother Scott. We are celebrating 50 years in business this year. For the past 6 years I've specialised in LVT installations and have attended many LVT training courses to learn the best scribing techniques, as well as the preparation knowledge to help get a good finish. I always critique my own work to help me improve. I can't wait for the finals to raise the bar again for myself. I wish the best of luck to the other finalists.
I am delighted to be in this year's final for LVT Fitter of the Year. I have been in the flooring industry since I left school. Outside of flooring, I am a husband, dad and uncle. I am lucky enough to work with my wife and nephew on a daily basis and our son is our number 1 fan. Since setting up my own business in 2020, I have focused on developing my skills and attended several training courses. This gave me the confidence to enter the competition and I am pleased that my hard work and quality has been recognised. I would like to thank The NICF for this opportunity and look forward to competing with all the other finalists. Good luck to everyone.
I'm Darrel Emery. I'm a husband and father of 4 humans, 6 dogs and a horse, I've been laying flooring for around 25 years, mainly fitting LVT but I do carpet, wood, and domestic vinyl too. I fell out of love with the trade a few years ago until I started to see other fitters' creations on social media and it made me realise that you can do anything with LVT. I started going on training courses to learn new ways and methods and it gave me the passion I needed again. Entering this competition has been the best experience of my career and to be competing against some of the best in industry has really boosted my confidence.
I'm 53 and married to my lovely wife Adele. I have 4 beautiful children. I have been in the flooring industry for 35 years. My main area of flooring is LVT and vinyl. I am currently employed by Oxford city flooring who are fantastic to work for. In 1988 I walked into a careers office after leaving a job I hated. There was a job advertised for a "Floorlayer Improver". That was it! Applied, started the next day and I'm still at it. I love the trade and I've had the pleasure of meeting lots of great people. I'm grateful that I've had the opportunity to pass on my knowledge to others through training. Although I'm starting to get older, there's life in the old dog yet!
I'm thrilled to make the finals at Harrogate this year. I would like to take the opportunity to wish all the finalists the very best. It's so nice to be amongst likeminded, top-class installers.
I'm delighted to be part of the finals for the second time. The first time round marked a huge turning point in my flooring career as I developed the confidence I needed to pursue my own work, which now makes up 99% of my workload. I didn't think I could do that and I didn't think I would ever be of a high enough standard to compete against some of the most highly skilled professionals I've ever met. It's a pleasure and a great honour to be able to put something back into a trade that's given me so much.
We would like to take the opprotunity here to thank our remaining semi-finalists who haven't made the final, but who took part and playing a valued role in the 2023 competition.
