Leading hotel and restaurant giant Whitbread whose brands include Premier Inn and Beefeater has become the latest big name to pledge its support to collaborative movement Hospitality Rising – dubbed ‘the world’s biggest hospitality recruitment campaign.’
Created as the industry’s first official response to the hospitality recruitment crisis, Hospitality Rising is a £5m fundraising drive setting out to bolster the industry’s talent pool and create vibrant hospitality industry offers and positive career pathways.
Following backing from international sandwich shop chain Pret A Manger, multinational food and restaurant firm Whitbread, which owns the UK’s largest hotel brand Premier Inn, is now set to invest in the national campaign which has raised over £600K so far.
Whitbread joins a growing list of operators across the UK who are joining forces to help tackle the 400,000 vacancies that exist in the industry whilst changing the perception of working in hospitality for the better.
Lisa Taylor at Whitbread PLC, said: “Working with key industry leaders, we are proud to be investing in this campaign to help secure the future of talent in hospitality. Pledging our support to such a prolific campaign made absolute sense, and we are ready to stand shoulder to shoulder with investors who, like us, are committed to ensuring that we can continue to attract talented people to the dynamic and rewarding industry that is hospitality.”
The brainchild of leading marketing expert Mark McCulloch, Hospitality Rising, has already won official support from the Hospitality & Tourism Sector Skills Board (HTSB) as well as UK Hospitality, British Beer & Pub Association, British Institute of Innkeeping and Scottish Hospitality Group.
Mark McCulloch, founder of Hospitality Rising and campaign director, said: “To have Whitbread become the latest firm to join our recruitment campaign only serves to highlight just how significant this movement is. There has never been a more crucial time to show support to hospitality businesses as they begin to rebuild.
“We’re making great progress, however, there is still no pipeline of people waiting to join hospitality. The status quo is not sustainable.
“This is about hospitality joining forces to fight against other industries who will steal our future staff. We all know that a career in hospitality is up there with the best, and it’s about time that everyone else recognised that too.
“Investment is key to reaching our £5m target, therefore we are delighted to have Whitbread join our string of supporters in this exciting journey. This campaign provides the ultimate chance for us to ensure that hospitality remains an attractive career option for the thousands of talented people out there and to ensure that we all rise together, stronger than ever before, from these challenging times.”
Research has shown that staff shortages are currently costing British Hospitality businesses a whopping *£22bn per year, with every operator fighting hard to keep the talent they have. In order to tackle this, leaders behind Hospitality Rising are asking every hospitality business and supplier in the UK to consider investing £10 per employee – less than the cost of an hour’s work per person.
The funds – which will be held by UKH – will then be ploughed into an industry advertising campaign led by the country’s top marketing experts who have all donated their time for free to get the initiative off the ground.
Hospitality Rising has already seen support from investors including Pret A Manger, Hawksmoor, Hilton, The Pig / Limewood Group, Welcome Break, Buzzworks, Wahaca, Wild Flor, Fourth & Church, Athenaeum, Punch Pubs, Butlins, Manorview, Rosa's Thai, Gilpin, East London Pub Co., Calcot, Blackrock Restaurants (Brighton & London), Wells & Co., The DRG.
Former Pret A Manger and YO Sushi! Marketing chief McCulloch has already assembled an unrivalled cast of leading creative minds from top agencies. Under the auspices of the Institute of Practitioners in Advertising, they include Google's lead creative agency Forever Beta and VCCP, whose clients include O2 and Compare The Market, plus world-renowned behavioural economist Rory Sutherland and ex-Army lead recruitment brand strategist Matt Waksman, who both work at Ogilvy. PR consultancies tigerbond and The Fourth Angel are also offering their talent and team to the campaign.