Christopher Grime Email & Phone Number

England, United Kingdom

London, England, Gb

- SUSTAINABILITY: Manage the process of accepting and launching hotels in to the Considerate Collection – actively sustainable luxury hotels, with strict conditions for entry using the Global Sustainable Tourism Council’s (GSTC) Industry Criteria for Hotels framework. The Considerate Collection launched in October 2021 and has grown to a portfolio of over 50 properties. - CONNECTING: Responsible for connecting all new SLH properties to the brand, from preparing the initial contracts through to launch. - SLH WORLD OF HYATT PARTNERSHIP: Project lead for the SLH partnership with World of Hyatt from launching this venture in November 2018.- IMAGES: Relationship holder with Leonardo for image management. Small Luxury Hotels of the World™ (SLH) matches independently minded guests with independently spirited hotels. The diverse collection of over 500 hotels in more than 80 countries around the world includes everything from cutting edge design hotels and city centre sanctuaries to historic country mansions and remote private islands – all SLH hotels are consistently different, however, they are all united by the fact that they offer the best locations, highest quality, personalised service and a truly authentic way to discover a destination. www.slh.com

London, England, Gb

Responsible for connecting all new SLH properties to the brand, including assisting hotels with copy. I am also the relationship holder with Leonardo for image management through the VScape platform. In addition to these roles, the exciting new area of work is as project lead for our new partnership with World of Hyatt where my responsibility is the launch of this new venture. This work has included co-ordinating the content and imagery, then later to rates and training as we prepare for launch.

London, England, Gb

Retained by Small Luxury Hotels of the World, to manage the connecting to the brand process for new properties, which includes controlling the flow of data between the hotels and systems required for the successful operation of the business. All aspects of the process have been reviewed to improve efficiency. Connection process was cut from a four week to one to two week process.

London, England, Gb

Appointed by Small Luxury Hotels of the World to create a business plan for a brand new concept product for the company. The plan was delivered on time. The global recession and set up costs involved meant that this project was put on hold. As this is still a potentially viable project and is therefore commercially sensitive, no other details can be added at present.

Contracted to bring an ailing project back on target and on budget over a nine month period and then was successfully launched. The concept of tailor-made holidays was a new one to Virgin Holidays and this project was the startup of the Virgin HIP Hotels product, which continues to run successfully today. The process involved selling the concept to all sections of the management team from director to contractor, creating the processes to ensure all aspects ran to schedule, costing the product, copy writing, image selection, proof reading and launch.

Following a company re-structure, took on the day-to-day operation of all aspects of the company business beyond the point of sale from document production to ticketing for all products – Conference and Incentives, Groups and tailor made (individuals) – these three areas had previously been split over three departments. The role included handling everything from the after effects of the Tsunami in 2004 to the failure of VARIG Brazilian Airlines. This position also incorporated many aspects of quality control, including comprehensive hotel health and safety checks, ensuring all airline, cruise, ground agent and hotel deadlines were met and managing the department which was the main point of contact for the customers. Also regularly undertook inspection visits to design new itineraries, make contacts locally and contract space as required. This knowledge was then used to produce training programmes for the Sales and Operations teams, as well as client, trade and press functions. Undertook a lot of one-to-one trainings over this period and worked on individual staff development, having regular meetings with each person to identify strengths, weaknesses and areas they wanted additional support and training on. Team size of 12.

Role encompassed developing a brand new product for Bales away from their traditional groups market. Individual travel over this period of time grew to account for over half of Bales business and growth was increasing by around 40% year on year. Managed all aspects of this business, including producing the first Tailor Made brochure; setting targets for sales figures; quality control; and contracting this brand new product. Regularly undertook planning trips to find, design and contract new destinations. Started with 5 staff and grew to 10 over this period.

Worked with a small team of 4 developing group travel from anything from a party of 10 up to the biggest group I handled which was a conference in Russia for 800 delegates. Other clients included the Sunday Times, British Museum, Petrie Museum, English Bowling Association and several film production crews from Wish You Were Here? and the Holiday Programme, to Fortunes of War with Kenneth Branagh and Emma Thompson. Regularly escorted these groups as tour leader and also trade and press familiarisation trips.

Six months working for this environmental charity on projects from clearing derelict land and creating gardens, to repairing dry stone walls. Spent time working with people trying to get back into employment and adults with special needs to help them gain skills and confidence – very rewarding

Ba Hons, Geography

Post Grad, Business And Tourism

Education record