Intercontinental Hotel Group (IHG) has issued a new range of uniforms across its Holiday Inn and Crowne Plaza brands in the EMEA region.
Following a three-year design process, the new look has now been adopted in 270 hotels spanning 17 countries. Currently, 15,000 members of staff have been issued with the new uniforms and the company expects the roll out to be complete by the end of Q1 2012.
Pan-Regional Challenges
Pan-regional uniforms present specific problems. Finding a design that can adapt to the wide-range of sizes, body shapes, skin tones, cultural differences and climates from Scotland to Abu Dhabi, and convey the brand identify of Holiday Inn and Crowne Plaza is a real challenge.
To overcome this, Jermyn Street Design, IHG’s uniform designers, travelled across Europe, the Middle East and Africa attending staff focus groups, hosting international catwalk shows and brand forums to show the new collection and ensure maximum buy-in from all franchisees. Six hundred attendees cast their votes at Jermyn Street Design’s fashion show during the international sales conference to decide on the final two new looks.
