Large retailer enhances EVP to dramatically reduce recruiting spend by $170k and decrease turnover by 17% 

Welcome Break is a highly diverse business, with 5,500 employees from more than 75 countries. Governmental policy changes led to a strain on retention and increased turnover, so the company looked at its perks offerings to see how it could offer a more rounded approach to reward for its employees to aid on attracting and retaining people.

The challenge

Welcome Break is a high-growth motorway service operator with 34 different locations, representing hundreds of brands and a largely offline workforce. The business recently became a fully-franchised business, where the team members work for the parent organization Welcome Break, but represent and wear the uniforms of a variety of brands such as KFC, Subway, Starbucks, Ramada, etc, creating candidate competition between Welcome Break and High Street larger brands.

Following the governmental policy changes, many new starters were leaving Welcome Break to return to their home country, which greatly reduced the applicant pool and the possibility of new starters staying with the company for long-term careers. Welcome Break had to find a way to retain employees, while creating a range of benefits to attract the 18+ demographic, while reducing spend on recruitment agencies and a goal of reducing labor turnover by 10%.

Complicating this was also an issue of inaccessible public transport to the various locations, which were located in remote areas, and a need to stretch their employees’ disposable income without the expense of a big pay rise.

The approach

To reinvent its Attraction and Retention plan, Welcome Break conducted focus groups called “Fishbowl” meetings and surveyed 300 employees to see what attracted them to the organization, and what would make them stay, focusing on perks and the employee experience. In response, Welcome Break created pillars of engagement to achieve its objectives:

• Social - To encourage Teams to have strong relationships at work and home
• Financial - To help effectively manage their finances
• Health - To improve Teams’ health physically and mentally
• Community - Encourage them to have a sense of engagement to Welcome Break and its charity
• Career - To show how they can achieve careers in a specialist or Leadership Role
• Safety - To feel respected and safe at work

There was also a lack of understanding and awareness of current offerings that needed to be addressed.

Working with Reward Gateway, Welcome Break rebranded its engagement hub, My Welcome Break, to simplify the logo and content to show that the site was about capturing hearts and minds of their people through helping them make their pay go further and providing extra perks to make life easier.

These included:

• New perks on discounted car leasing
• An Employee Assistance program
• Moving to a proactive medical supplier to encourage wellness
• More focus on health and fitness groups, with posts on mental health and exercise 
• Bringing more attention to the existing employee discounts program where users could make their pay go further with access to in-store and online savings at hundreds of retailers

Welcome Break also developed a First Level Leadership development program, to prepare for a leadership career with the organization, bringing in more opportunity for entry-level workers to move up to a specialist or management position.

The results

Since introducing the Attraction and Retention plan, spending on the discounts platform has increased by 36%, resulting in employees saving money and making their pay go further. A focus on wellbeing is present in team meetings, with many managers using meditation and exercise videos with their teams.

And as for the turnover results? Because of the programs Welcome Break put in place, it has benefitted from an 17% reduction in turnover, and a $170k decrease in spending on recruitment agencies since 2017.