Article

Wasabi to employees: We like you, we really like you

Some of the world's leading brands make their employees their first and most important customer. The UK-based foodservice brand,Wasabi, is making it a priority for their chain's employees too.

December 13, 2016 by S.A. Whitehead — Food Editor, Net World Media Group

Some of the world's leading brands make their employees their first and most important customer, believing that if you treat your people right, they treat your customers right, and business success follows. A fairly small UK-based foodservice brand, Wasabi, is putting the theory to practice in its two U.S. locations.

Wasabi has partnered with a cloud-based employee engagement and perks platform, Perkbox, to help foster loyalty and engagement among employees with hopes of retaining them. Wasabi HR Director Nina Göthberg said in a company press release that the Perkbox platform provides employees with a diversified package of benefits, including:

• Up to 8 percent off at 20,000 retail stores and 50 nationwide brands.
• Four percent off at Amazon. 
• Two-for-one or half-off in more than 6,500 restaurants with a free tastecard as well as cash off in numerous bars and coffee shops.
• Discounted theater tickets and attraction day passes.
• Lower rates at top gym chains.  

"Our sushi makes us special, but it's our great team that helps us to stand head and shoulders above our competition," Göthberg said in the release.

With Perkbox, Wasabi staff can access a platform of services to boost their emotional, physical and financial well-being, including perks such as online yoga, cooking and meditation classes, as well as a 24-hour helpline and financial guidance services. Wasabi employees can also access an online gamified internal rewards and recognition platform that furthers top-down rewards and drives peer-to-peer recognition.

Likewise, Wasabi administrators can add additional perks to those already available, as well as track the program's overall return on investment, as it manifests itself as better service, lower turn-over rates and improved product quality. The return on investment data is easily accessed via online dashboard which clearly shows data about elements like, how many staff are actively using the platform and how much money the  platform is helping to save and/or generate overall, Göthberg said.

"Perkbox is the perfect partnership to support us in nurturing talent from within the Wasabi family," she said. "The range of perks on offer means there is something for everyone, and it is a simple, easy-to-use way to show our team that they are really valued. We are confident that investing in employees will help us to maintain the high levels of efficiency and customer service that we pride ourselves on, especially as we grow within the UK and beyond."

In the past year of possible overtime law changes, a push for higher minimum wage rates and other changes, have made employee recruitment, engagement, retention and performancea bigger issue in the food service industry, where there have already been perpetual problems affecting the bottom line results.

About S.A. Whitehead

---

Pizza Marketplace and QSRweb editor Shelly Whitehead is a former newspaper and TV reporter with an affinity for telling stories about the people and innovative thinking behind great brands.