Gymshark, the fitness apparel & accessories brand, manufacturer and online retailer has been working since late 2016 with Perkbox, Europe’s fastest growing employee experience platform to scale its employee benefits offering to staff. The partnership between both companies is today stronger than ever, with ongoing initiatives to support each other and drive engagement on the platform.
In just six years, Gymshark has become a global brand in fitness, with over 300 employees and the fastest growing international sales in the UK. However, the company has bigger ambitions than just becoming the most influential brand in its space, it also wants to achieve something greater – become one of the best places to work.
To achieve this goal, the company has invested heavily in employee wellbeing. Key to their strategy has been Perkbox which has been a big hit amongst employees. Since launching its partnership, the login rate of employees on the Perkbox platform is at 91% with its highest amount of redemptions coming from the Customer, Marketing and Operations teams, with other teams following closely behind.
The reasons for this are various. For example, to communicate and drive engagement on the Perkbox platform internally, Gymshark has a ‘Perk of the Week’ initiative, whereby a perk from the Perkbox platform that resonates well with employees is chosen and promoted to staff. A great evidence of how, when perk providers and customers work closely together, the results can be far greater.
Perkbox is also complemented by other great in-house initiatives – such as a ‘financial education series’, in partnership with HSBC, which involves workshops on topics such as ‘how to budget’ offering 1-1 appointments with Gymshark employees to discuss financial queries. While the company uses the “Unmind platform” to check-in on the mental wellbeing of employees and create tailored campaigns to improve issues such as tiredness.
With a mainly millennial workforce, Gymshark knows just how important it is to create ‘out of the box’ solutions that resonate with employees, whilst also engaging with them. That’s why for perks provided outside the Perkbox platform it also has another way of communicating them to staff. A cinema area in the company’s HQ in Birmingham is used to screen vlog-style videos to staff on topics such as the company’s bonus scheme and pension plan – all using simple ‘laymans terms’ and followed by an open Q&A.
Hayley Kenny, Enterprise Account Manager at Perkbox says:
“We’re delighted to be working with Gymshark to provide a comprehensive employee benefits package for their employees. When a company is scaling at such a rapid rate, preserving company culture at the same rate can often take a backseat. It’s great to see Gymshark taking such active steps to ensure this is not the case and acting as authentic partners with us to ensure that together, we get the best engagement for all their members of staff.”
Amanda Webb, Head of People Projects at Gymshark says:
“Employee benefits and wellbeing is fundamental to us at Gymshark, particularly as we are growing rapidly! Having the right partners and platforms helps us deliver our physical, mental and financial wellbeing agenda. However, at Gymshark, we don’t stop at delivery, we continually review our data and communications to ensure our benefits are relevant and utilised.”