TRAVEL agency staff may not think twice about the uniform they put on each morning, but there is more psychology behind that skirt/blouse or shirt/trousers combo than they might think.
Multiples all favour the uniform look but apart from it presenting a smart image to customers, many say the clothes are also just as necessary to motivate staff mentally and create a team feeling.
Lunn Poly’s 5,500 shop staff wear red plaid suits or blue floral print dresses for women and navy blue suits and matching ties for men. Managers are set apart from the rest of their team with outfits of blue plaid for women and different colour suits for men that are designed to appear very business-like.
The multiple’s spokeswoman Natasha Tobin said: “It’s designed for comfort, practicality and flexibility but also to give the wearers the feeling that they are part of a big team all working for the same thing. It is supposed to be good for morale and to make staff easily distinguishable as someone who can help clients.
“Feedback from staff is excellent. They like the uniform because it gets rid of dilemmas in the morning about what to wear.” Lunn Poly says the uniforms cost the company around £150 for each member of staff.
Going Places’ uniform, relaunched in November 1997 after fabric and design trialling, is meant to give staff a similar feeling with summer and winter skirts offered to women as well as the option to wear trousers.
Fabrics are durable and are not supposed to need ironing and male travel advisers are provided with suits, says a Going Places spokesman, “because they are smarter and very professional looking”.
Going Places head of marketing Alison Flint explained: “We did a lot of research into what the staff felt about the uniform and it emerged that they thought it was very important.
“They liked the Going Places blue because it made them feel very much a part of the company and they said the uniform itself portrays them as professional.”
The company used focus groups of staff to establish the design of the uniform.
Some 1,200 Carlson Worldchoice staff are currently looking at choosing new uniforms as the company ties up with Thomas Cook.
At a cost of around £73, which agents will pay themselves, they can choose from a range of designs and colours of jackets, ties, skirts or trousers with corporate design.
But not everyone believes in the power of the uniform.
Miniple Bath Travel allows staff at its 52 branches to wear their own clothes as it does at its three Spreadbury Travel shops. The reason behind it, says joint managing director Stephen Bath, is individuality.
He said: “We see our staff as individuals. We have never had a uniform in the 75 years of Bath Travel and we are the largest travel company in the country not to have one.
“If you have a uniform policy, everyone has to wear it and I think that might upset some of the maturer staff. If they didn’t like it and left their job because of it, that would wound the company. That would create a situation that we obviously don’t want.
“With uniforms you have to be totalitarian and make everyone wear them and that’s not us. We pride ourselves on being different from the multiples.”
Bath Travel now owns Tappers Travel in South Devon where staff do wear a uniform, and this is to be retained.
West country miniple Bakers Dolphin, however, feels there is a lot to be gained from having staff in uniform. The psychology behind it is less directed at the staff – it’s more to do with the image presented to clients.
“The tartan kilts that the women wear are smart and attractive but not too business-like so people relax when they are talking to staff and often comment on how nice the uniform is,” said managing director Kevin Abbey.
The kilts were decided upon by Abbey because they would not go out of fashion and wearers were instantly recognisable not only in the shops serving customers, but also when they were out in the street.
“People approach them when they are out and about because they know straight away where they are from. It’s a brand management thing but also it sets customers at ease and makes the staff approachable.”
Bakers Dolphin has set aside £33,000 in its 1999/2000 budget for uniforms.