The Laurel Wreath is a symbol of individuality and of belonging. We pride ourselves in being an inclusive workplace, but we recognise this is a work in progress.
We set up a Diversity & Inclusivity group in order to educate ourselves and to start doing the work to make real positive differences across the business. We feel we needed to first take the time to look internally, speak to our teams and focus our energies on listening to our employees’ experiences.
Our D&I team, which has more than 70 members from across all teams, meets on a monthly basis with the aim of giving everyone in the company a voice and an opportunity to be heard. We share ideas and discuss important matters such as LGBTQ+ rights, equality, what it’s like being a Black creative in the fashion industry and what we need to do to improve the diversity at Fred Perry.
Our D&I strategy for this year focuses on 3 key areas:
- Recruitment: How diverse are our candidates? What internal barriers to progression may exist?
- Awareness: What more can we do to promote more awareness and understanding of diversity?
- Long term strategy: Starting a mentorship scheme aimed at giving people from underprivileged backgrounds an opportunity at getting valuable experience within the brand and a start in the creative industry.
Our commitment to Diversity and Inclusivity is fostered through regular meetings with the group where we discuss how we can build an open and inclusive culture. We recognise we need to accelerate this progress and hold ourselves accountable by setting targets to usher in positive changes.
To date we have achieved:
Lessons Learnt
Ongoing healthy and open discussions about race and identity, sharing personal experiences from our team and how they are represented in the workplace. We have been speaking about what we have had to change to feel inclusive in and out of work.
Recruitment
Unconscious bias being a key area, we have changed how we recruit people. Now all candidates are anonymous meaning no names or identifying information are shown on CVs.
Uniform Policy
Shops previously had to choose gender identifying uniforms, we have now scrapped that as we acknowledge everyone’s individuality. Now all persons can choose uniform from across the current range.
Sizing
We are reviewing our size offering throughout our product range to be more inclusive.
Fred Talks
We invite influential individuals to talk about their work and experiences. Examples of some of the Fred Talk guests we have had and the topics they spoke about are:
- Nicholas Daley
- Charley Casely-Hayford
- Peter Bricknell
- Shahroo Izadi – The Kindness Method
- The Museum of Youth Culture
- Dan Bloxham – The Switch