2023 marks an important milestone in the history of the RIDGID. This year we celebrate a century of quality tools, commitment to our customers and business partners and, at the same time, responsibility for the next generations of professionals in trades.

After 39 years of excellence in the US market, in 1962 RIDGID opened the first overseas factory in Europe, Belgium. To this day the RIDGID Europe Headquarters are located in Sint-Truiden, Belgium. 

As part of the year-celebration, on Friday, November 17th we organized a School Competition Event in our European Training Centre in Sint-Truiden.

“Everything we do comes back to building the future of the trades, this event was to support the next generation of tradespeople. It’s a profession that keeps the world going, with job security and good money to be made.” says Michael Lucas, Marketing Manager Europe 

6 technical schools joined the competition, each school with a team of 5 students. 

• Sint-Martinus Scholen Herk-De-Stad
• Provinciale School Diepenbeek
• Technisch Instituut Sint-Jozef Bilzen
• HASP-O Sint-Truiden (Technicum)
• GTI Mortsel
• Don Bosco Technisch Inst. Helchteren

We believe teamwork is very important and we were excited to see great collaboration and team spirit between all the participants.

The event had two main parts which challenged the participants’ attention to detail, and their technical skills well. While the first part tested the theoretical knowledge with a multiple-question quiz, the second part focused on hands-on activities which involved RIDGID tools, of course.

The practical activities were organized into 6 modules, each module highlighting a specific activity: Manual Threading, Threading with Automatic Machines, Inspection with SeeSnake Cameras, Locating, Bending and Pressing. Each one of these activities was supervised by a RIDGID product expert who awarded points at the end of each task. The teams with the highest amount of points won the competition.

“It was great having over all these students passionate about plumbing, installations and drain maintenance. These next generations are the ones building the world of tomorrow, so we will continue to offer them support, training and quality tools to succeed and become the professionals the world needs." says Geert Van Cauter, RIDGID Product Trainer

As every competition has cool prizes, all the teams went back home with a RIDGID tool kit so much needed in their practical learning sessions. 

The GTI Mortsel School walked away with the main prize, the Provinciale School Diepenbeek just missed out on winning and finished second and the Technisch Instituut Sint-Jozef Bilzen completed the top 3. 

Congratulations to all the participants of the event, but also to the teachers who accompanied and guided them throughout this beautiful journey!

 
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