Hotel Regina Terme
This is a wonderful vintage thermal hotel in the Swiss alps. In cooperation with Veronique Krenn and Laura Imbriani we wanted to revive the spirit of the hotel.
The tourism in Leukerbad flourished in the 70's and 80's. It was a time of growth and opportunities – not only there but all over the country.
Over the years while the growth of Leukerbad slowly stagnated, the hotel tried to keep up their high quality standards. One of the big issues was how the hotel was perceived: their customers were disappointed of the out-dated rooms and furniture.
The hotel has huge spaces and is on top of the village. It has an astonishing view from every single room which all are facing south down the valley. And most importantly: It is peaceful and has its own natural water pool, filled with their private warm water thermal spring.
So we thought to us: Who made these beautiful spaces? And the answer was clear after some digging: Senior Emil Loretan, born 1916, who is still up well and the patron of the hotel. Talking with him made very much sense and he showed us his vision. After this, everything was clear: we had to go back to the roots – hardcore!
IT DOES NOT HAVE TO BE PERFECT.
BUT IT HAS TO BE AUTHENTIC.
Of course, it's not done with a new logo. We needed to create a simple, efficient and recognizable design. Bust most importantly, it should represent what the hotel still is: vintage, cozy, big, family driven and therefore proud.
Simple, minimalistic, efficient design
With the most simple layout principles we created templates for the customer and encouraged them to use these simple guides.
let's go digital.
One thing we immediately agreed on was showing all the huge rooms and areas and having potential customers to notice that. For that reason I filled up the website with as many impressions as we could gather. Because we had one thing we did not want to happen again: having disappointed customers without any reason.
Take a look: www.reginaterme.ch
Of course, a new website and online representation had to come in place to make the whole holiday experience a good one. And this starts with research and booking online. So especially for the website we focussed on three things:
visual authenticity, transparent communication and informative content
Online experience optimization
Newsletter, Social media, Google, Booking
For the purpose of giving potential visitors and customers a neat and authentic representation of the hotel and its surroundings, we looked for solutions to keep everything up to date, made deals with influencers, engage with visitors, answer questions on all platforms and actively making offers based on current trends and needs.
Succeeding and learning
The conclusion for myself is that people these days are very understanding when companies like Hotel Regina Terme stick to the truth and don't fake anything. If something is not perfect, do not try to hide these things. Explain how it is and what challenges there are. Maybe one of your customers does not only understand, but even offers a solution.
After everything was launched it was and still is very interesting to watch how things go. Based on the traffic on the website, the feedback of many customers and last but not least the revenue the hotel makes, it definitely improved the business. The hotel now speaks for itself and does not feel broken anymore. We turned over to transparency and honesty and get the thankful reward of many visitors.