How Our Hotel Used Data to Make Our Laundry

Service Glamorous (By Ana Brant)

Case Study Analysis

BUSN 480 - B

Submitted to: Maryyam Khan

By: Sharon Arif

In early 2016 complaints about Dorchester Collection’s luxury hotels laundry service
were on the rise, as was the cost of compensating guests for the damage to their clothes.

Common customer complaints can indicate areas that are deeply important to
customers. These may be areas where being “good enough” is not good enough.

The first challenge Dorchester Collection’s luxury hotels had to face was to figure out
What Their Customers Wanted.

The team dived deep into data and found what their guests wear and why they wear it.
They came to understand that the value of clothes is far more than material and cost.
The guest who wears the Brioni likely sees themself as part of the world of fashion, and
their shirt as an investment rather than a consumable. When they hand it to us to be
cleaned, the owner trusts us to understand those priorities and the suggestion of status
woven into the fabric.

Within the hotel, the team found that our employees saw the laundry service as removed
from our guests, physically and psychologically, and as a less-than-desirable career path.
This mindset was generating a high risk of us not meeting the high expectations of our
guests.

Research indicated that they needed to increase the resources we were devoting to this
aspect of customer service, so step one was increasing the laundry budget by 30%. They
also hired an expert craftsperson to run the service The team designed a PR and social
media campaign around her, raising the status and morale of the laundry staff.

The team conducted workshops for the staff to familiarize them with fabrics, labels
(which can be filled with esoteric, hard-to-understand symbols for clothing care), and
designers. Feedback they received from customers indicate that these investments in
improving our laundry employees’ skill sets. Now, when a Chanel jacket or Dior gown is
returned to a guest, it has tissue paper stuffed into the sleeves and shoulders to preserve
the proper drape…and to add a little glamour and ceremony. These service
improvements cost very little (for example, tissue paper was already part of the laundry
service, used to wrap clothing; now it is being used to add value) and have had great
success. 

Appreciating our guests’ relationship to their clothing has encouraged us to improve

existing services and create new ones. For example, when we pick up guests at the
airport, we clean their luggage, so it looks as it did when they embarked on their trip —
or better. 

If they had simply set out to reduce customer complaints about laundry service, they
would not have been able to recognize or act on the market opportunities presented by
our guests’ love of fashion.

For a luxury brand, it is not enough to do everything well; that’s table stakes. The key is
to figure out what is most important to your customers and do it better than anyone
else.