Success Story: The Ivy Collection and Caprice Holdings
The Ivy is one of the world’s most iconic restaurants, a favourite of London’s theatreland since 1918. Today, The Ivy Collection and Caprice Holdings has more than 50 Ivy restaurants, cafés and brasseries in locations across London and the UK.
Each of these unique restaurants offers private dining experiences, with a collection of dining rooms that play host to intimate gatherings from eight people to spectacular events accommodating over 100 guests. These private rooms and event spaces can be tailored to guest needs with bespoke decorations and personalized menus to create a special experience for which there is great demand.
“It’s a luxury to be able to have the ability to host these events,” says Stephanie Mechanic, Head of Sales at The Ivy Collection & Caprice Holdings. “People make decisions very fast these days. Organizing an event might not be the first thing on their to-do list, so they want to be able to trust in whoever they’re working with to give them the right advice about the venue with the best recommendation and the easiest process possible.”
The 360 ̊ tours we can create using Matterport digital twins are an incredible sales tool, enabling us to showcase the best of our spaces.” - Stephanie Mechanic, Head of Sales The Ivy Collection & Caprice Holdings
Customer experience is at the forefront of everything the group does. When The Ivy Collection and Caprice Holdings refreshed its website in 2020, it chose to add Matterport digital twins of its 50 private dining rooms to the site. “It wasn’t hard to make the business case for this, everyone could immediately see the benefit for our clients,” says Stephanie.
The Matterport digital twin enables clients to digitally “walk through” the space and experience the room exactly as it is. Stephanie explains, “Our clients’ satisfaction and trust in our brand, our product and our recommendations are paramount in our industry. That’s what makes us stand out – our clients know they can trust what we tell them. We have to live that. Using tools that promote that trust is essential.”
“Integrity is super important to me. And I love how honest the 360 tool is,”
Stephanie continues. “The Matterport digital twins really help us set expectations for someone who can’t see venue physically – and that ensures confidence and trust.”
This is great for the client. And it’s better for The Ivy Events and Venues Team too – because they don’t need to worry about addressing any mismatched client expectations on the day.
Using the Matterport digital twins of each private dining room has also saved the team a lot of travel, time, and disruption. “A show-round can take an hour to complete,” says Stephanie. “Plus, there’s the traveling to and from the venue for the sales agent and the client. My team takes between 700 and 1,000 inquiries per week, selling rooms across the UK.”
“Before we had the Matterport twins, we could be doing several show-rounds a day with the volume of inquiries we have. Since putting the Matterport tours on the website, the team is mostly in the office now and travels only where necessary. So the team might host a couple show arounds in a week because of the confidence the Matterport tour gives.” The virtual tours are particularly favoured by international guests who can’t travel to the venue in advance. Plus, event organisers value the ability to take accurate venue measurements in the tour,
enabling them to self-serve answers to spatial queries. So clients can properly visualise the space, The Ivy Team has spent time to dress the rooms before they create a tour, using décor and lighting to create the atmosphere of the room.
Stephanie says, “I love the birds eye view, the dolls’ house view, the walk-through view. It’s very easy to use. You can dictate your starting point so you can guide your client’s point of view as they explore the restaurant and walk through the space.”
Guests love the experience and there has been a high take-up of digital twin self-serve tours. Bacchanalia, the newest opening within the Caprice Holdings Collection, which opened in November 2022, has served up over 3,000 impressions. The Ivy Chelsea Garden, which launched in May 2023, saw 800 digital twin tours within the first two months.
Stephanie concludes, “If companies can build trust and achieve a better client experience through the use of high-quality tools then that’s what will make them stand out.”
