Practical training at Vitrulan Composites Oy

I’m going to be telling you about my internship and practical training as a sales assistant in a company called VitrulanComposites Oy. I got the job through a normal path, which equals me browsing through the main job search engines (Duunitori etc.) seeking for summer jobs that would include an opportunity to do the practical training at the same time. I wanted the job to support my studies either by the business aspect or then just literally through the practical training, so I was lucky enough to find a job that gave me both. For me the most important part was that I got to work mainly in English, due to the main part of our customer-base being from outside of Finland.  

The company and factory in Mikkeli are owned by a German concern called Vitrulan Group. This factory in Mikkeli creates tailored glass fiber- and carbon fiber rolls for further processing where the end-product might vary from yacht’s coating or windmill’s blades to different wallpapers or preventing corrosion in pipe systems. The key part is that they can be tailored to match the customer’s needs as perfectly as possible, and therefore be used in everything that might require light, durable, modern, and most importantly, sustainable materials.   

I applied for a role of sales assistant, but inside the company the title was actually a customer service specialist (for me just a trainee). The coolest part about my job was that due to the international aspect I got to communicate and talk with people from all around the world. My task required me to know and share so much information about anything that was relevant, so therefore I had to work together with basically every department to find certain things out. 

From the practical training I gained so much new information and skills about business-to-business sales and really got to see what happens behind the curtains of an international company. I also got to grow my English vocabulary with business related words, and I will definitely benefit from it in the future.  

Juuso Neuvonen

3rd year IB-student