How to maintain brand standards in hospitality

Maintaining brand standards is crucial for success in the hospitality industry. In this blog post, we share tips and strategies to help you maintain a consistent brand image across all your locations.
Michael Radley
 • 
Dec 2023
4 min read

Brand standards ensure a consistent customer experience. People know what to expect every time they visit, which leads to brand loyalty and trust.

So, maintaining high standards across operations is crucial for all hospitality businesses, from independent restaurants to chains with hundreds of sites.

But it is no mean feat. And with many businesses facing staff shortages, standards can slip.

Luckily, we have a simple solution for you. But first, let’s dive into why hospitality businesses need to set and maintain brand standards.

Why brand standards are important

Enhances customer experience

Brand standards ensure a consistent customer experience. People know what to expect every time they visit.

Improves team experience

Teams know how to do their job and understand what is expected from them. And if team members have the tools they need to do it well, the workday runs smoothly. Everyone’s job is less stressful, leading to an increase in job satisfaction.

Helps you get a hygiene rating of 5

Brand standards help teams understand how to do tasks correctly, ensuring team members complete necessary checks to a high standard.

Reduces costly mistakes

Putting the correct systems in place enables employees to get it right every time—helping save time, employee resources and ultimately boosting your bottom line.

Creates better team habits

If you want your teams to carry out tasks to your standard (and not how John the Manager from 2004 did it), then you need to set and communicate brand standards.

Gives you a competitive edge

Your brand is unique, and reinforcing your standards across the business helps communicate your value proposition and distinguish your business from competing brands.

How to maintain brand standards

Checklists

The volume and complexity of tasks have grown to a point where not one individual can remember everything and manage it consistently all the time.

On an average working day, hospitality workers have to carry out hundreds of tasks—from opening checks to food hygiene procedures. Even with a low rate of human error, the dynamic nature of hospitality means mistakes happen, and checks are missed. This can lead to poor customer experience at best and lawsuits at worst.

The checklist is a simple tool that guides teams through tasks and ensures they meet brand standards. Plus, they do more than simply standardise and discipline; they hold team members accountable.

Checklists also offer a simple way to improve communication between teams—team members can see which tasks are completed and flag any issues to be resolved.

Checklists not only systematically raise the standards of a business, but they can also empower team members by freeing up the cognitive load that would usually be placed on tedious tasks and allow teams to focus on delivering excellent customer experiences.

Traditionally, teams carried out checks on paper. But in today’s world, scattered paper diaries, excel sheets, and physical site visits don’t cut it.

Quicker, simpler digital solutions make it easier for your team to run through daily checks.

Training and onboarding

Businesses need to develop a set of brand standards that act as guidelines for teams. The expectations can then be communicated when onboarding new team members and reinforced in regular training sessions.

Effective training will help ensure everyone is working with the right processes, following correct procedures, and being clear on tasks and responsibilities.

How Trail can help

Trail is a simple work management app that simplifies operations.

Throughout the day, Trail’s smart checklists tell the right person what to do at the right time, helping to form good daily habits.

You can attach training videos and materials to tasks, so new starters can get up to speed quickly, and everyone knows exactly how to carry out tasks.

Teams are empowered to do their work efficiently; managers are freed up from chasing and can focus on coaching teams to provide better customer experiences.

Real-time insights and dashboards show managers where standards are slipping and which teams need help the most.


What customers are saying

"I f****** love Trail, it's taking my businesses to the next level."
Josh Paterson
Owner
"We rarely provide training to our guys, they just bought into the idea straight away. I love that I have a full visual of everyone's activity in front of me."
Katrin Toots
Compliance Manager
“It’s not a paper diary that’s covered in barbecue sauce. We have clarity over what’s done in our sites and are confident going into our audits.”
Jay Brown
Operations
“The EHO visited almost every site last year and every store was given a five star rating."
Jay Brown
Operations Chef
"We turned our Costa Checks and various compliance forms into regular tasks on Trail, which has contributed to some of the best scores we have had."
Delroy Daniels
Operations Director
"Our teams love it, it gives our managers of all levels absolute clarity on what they need to achieve every day."
James Brown
Operations Director

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