Good practice:

The Hospitality market as a new target market for craft products

Teixidors is a crafts company with a social background which seeks to achieve social integration, and economic independence of people with learning difficulties and who area at risk of social exclusion. They create unique, unrepeatable products made with highest quality materials that always follow an entirely manual process carried out through manual looms. Sustainability is for them a global concept that has to incorporate environmental and social parameters.

In 2017 Teixidors found itself in a serious economic situation and needed to quickly implement a strategy which would secure the sustainability of the project long-term. Prior to 2017 Teixidors had worked with some hospitality projects and realized the economic and occupational benefits of such collaborations which generally are quite sizeable in comparison to sales to retail stores. At the same time Teixidors detected a new trend emerging in which textile had become an equally essential part of an interior project as lighting and furnishings. Furthermore, trends in the hospitality market to search for craft brands with a capacity to produce “smaller” quantities of bespoke ranges in ecological materials favoured all of the inherent values of the Teixidors’ brands. In 2018 Teixidors took advantage of all the above-mentioned tendencies to be emphasized in its communication and coordinated with the sales team.

Teixidors has not hired any new staff but shifted time resources to establishing relationships and work on projects that may take months or even years to capitalize.

Since the strategy was implemented in 2018 Teixidors’ products can be found in additional hospitality projects in Spain and abroad such as:
Hotel Schgaguler – Italy
Hotel Casa Cacao – Spain
Hotel Mendi Argia – Spain
Hotel Edition Barcelona – Spain
Hotel Seesteg - Germany
Hotel Edition Ibiza – Spain
Memmo Alfama Hotel – Portugal
Hotel Monument – Spain
Hotel Sir Joan - Spain
Hotel Palacito Solecio – Spain

Learning to decline projects that are too large to be compatible with the production of the own collections.
The cleaning of items done with natural materials, such as wool, cannot be done in conventional hospitality wash, which means an increased cost and time commitment from the customer.

Handicraft from Spain (from Europe) with a high design value is interesting for the higher-end hospitality market where creating a unique experience for the guest becomes a crucial competitive advantage. Even a minimal change to an existing product or collection such as a change of colour or size, can provide the desired exclusivity of a personalized product and the possibility for the artist to display his/her brand to a broad market. Hotel boutique shops may provide an interesting secondary market, where the hotel guest can purchase the same or similar product that was used in the hotel interiors. Products with stories of sustainable production, locally sourced materials, or projects that support social projects add value and meaning to the hotel brand and experience.