LONDON, 2015-12-17 — /Travel PR News/ — Small Luxury Hotels of the World (SLH) has announced a brand new look and feel designed to demonstrate a contemporary and forward-thinking positioning for the luxury brand as it celebrates its 25th anniversary. The unveiling coincides with the appointment of new CEO, Filip Boyen, and a successful International Conference for member hotels in Marbella last month during which SLH outlined ambitious plans for the future focusing on quality, development, technology and loyalty.
The new direction, coined ‘The SLH Way’, emphasises SLH’s core philosophy to match independently-minded people with independently-spirited hotels. It celebrates the fact that all SLH hotels are consistently different, united by a shared commitment to providing the highest levels of quality and service to their guests, and reinforces SLH’s position as an anti-brand kind of brand. Complementing the existing logo a new brand ‘device’ will feature more prominently on the website and newly launched apps for iPhone and Android to reflect a 49% increase visits to SLH’s mobile site and 71% increase in reservations via mobile, as well as on SLH collateral, notably the SLH Directory which has been reintroduced for 2016.
Key initiatives for SLH in 2016 will include:
• A more stringent approach to the Development and Quality Assurance programmes that will raise the standards expected from hotels both to join the brand and to remain as members. This will guarantee that all hotels in the collection offer the very best guest experience.
• A focus on ensuring that SLH is able to offer hotels in new destinations requested by its guests. In 2015 SLH introduced hotels in Tokyo, the Seychelles, Prague and Malta based on unfulfilled customer searches on slh.com. In 2016 key destinations will include Ibiza, Dubai, Hawaii, Munich and Sydney as well as major cities in the USA.
• The introduction of language specific sites including an updated Chinese website, and brand new sites in German and Spanish over the next 18 months.
• A new loyalty scheme – Very Independent People – to be launched in late 2016 that is designed to embody the independently minded approach and reward customer behaviours in conjunction with a variety of luxury partners.
In addition SLH has just launched its first travel agents’ recognition programme – Small Luxury Heroes. Travel agents account for over two thirds of all SLH reservations and the programme will reward agents who register for the programme at www.slh.com/travel-agents with Amazon gift cards, SLH gift certificates and complimentary reward nights. Agents who register from now until 31 January 2016 will be in with a chance to win one of 25x $1,000 SLH Gift Certificates as part of a launch incentive to celebrate 25 years.
Filip Boyen, CEO for SLH says: “As a brand, SLH has grown over the last 25 years from 70 hotels in 11 countries to over 520 hotels in more than 80 countries. With our new branding SLH can now look ahead to the next 25 years and beyond, best placed to champion the small, luxury, independent hotels that are the very heart and soul of our business. We will ensure that any customer or travel agent making a reservation at an SLH hotel can rest assured that the entire collection is worthy of the SLH stamp of approval, will provide them the authentic experience that they are looking for and that they will be rewarded for their loyalty. We will also ensure that any hotel joining the brand is confident that they are in the very best hands, and company.”
SOURCE: Small Luxury Hotels of the World
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