phs - the undercover brand

Brand. At its core it’s about personal connections and human emotions. Thinking hard about how you want your customers to feel when they’re interacting with your brand and focussing your marketing efforts on achieving that feeling. But what do you do when your brand is so intrinsically ingrained in most people’s everyday lives that they aren’t aware of your brand? You focus on the buyer, rather than the consumer of your brand.

phs is a prime example of a brand that features in most of our day-to-day interactions. From hospital sanitising stations to public washrooms, entrance mats in shops to spectacular foliage in offices, phs are world leaders in delivering outstanding hygiene and specialist services across the UK, Ireland and Spain without the public being overtly aware of their offering. phs’ key consumers are the industries that require their products; hospitality services including bars, restaurants and hotels to education providers and more, their target market is the buyer of these industries, rather than the end consumer, the public who interact with their products. With buyers at the forefront of their marketing strategy, phs sought to revamp a number of their sites to further entice their customers and expand their hold on the hygiene market. 

“phs Group’s purpose is putting people at the heart of its products and services. We are a trusted partner in workplace hygiene, committed to delivering innovative, sustainable, and reliable solutions. By focusing on health, safety, and environmental responsibility, we strive to create positive impacts in businesses and communities, ensuring every space we serve is clean, efficient, and welcoming.

We believe that caring for our customers means more than just delivering excellent service—it means helping them protect the planet too. By offering sustainable solutions and supporting eco-friendly practices, we empower our customers to make a positive impact on the environment, for example we are the only national provider who make a sustained effort across the UK to divert waste from landfill into energy from waste plants; up to 95% of our waste to be exact – and that is exactly what we want our brand to represent.” – Kelly Greenaway, Head of Marketing, phs

“At phs Group, we ensure consistency across our brands and sub-brands by upholding the values of ownership, integrity, teamwork, innovation, expertise, and performance. Every brand aligns with these core principles, enabling us to deliver reliable, high-quality solutions. By fostering collaboration and embracing innovation, we maintain a unified approach that drives excellence across all sectors, ensuring that our customers receive consistent service and value, no matter which part of the phs family they interact with.” – Kelly Greenaway, Head of Marketing, phs

Following the onboarding of their wider digital estate, phs approached Spindogs to undertake a discovery process to inform the specification of a multisite solution for three of their sites; phs Group (their main group site portraying the brand and services across the entire estate as well as being the shop window for the hygiene division of the brand), phs Ireland (their Irish arm offering hygiene and pest control services) and phs Serkonten (their Spanish arm of the group). A multisite solution was intended as the beginning of the journey to aligning the brand divisions and ensuring continuity across the wider estate. 

Guided by phs’ primary mission statement for the site to become “the industry leader with inspiring practices and sustainable solutions that promotes meaningful engagement with customers”, the discovery process focussed on creating the phs.co.uk website as a foundation for group-level content and to signpost to other phs brands. The initial intention of the Group site was to be a shop window for the hygiene products of the business, it subsequently became the baseline for replication across other sites and is intended to be used as the basis for other phs brand sites moving forward. 

“The Discovery process is always enjoyable and challenging in equal measure, with no two Discoveries resulting in the same solution, and phs was no different. While we were able to interrogate the technical requirements in great detail – ultimately leading to an effective and efficient use of technology on the new website – my favourite outcome was how the brand estate was handled. 

Through a comprehensive sitemapping and wireframing process we were able to propose and develop a solution that integrated onward journeys into the wider phs Group offering without compromising the hygiene service experience. This has laid the foundations for the individual brands to become more integrated both online and offline, internally and externally.” – Daniel Lewis, Strategy Director, Spindogs 

The discovery process resulted in a report with key recommendations to bring phs’ vision to reality and the Spindogs team undertook the design, build and launch of the multisite to fruition in April 2024. The result of the Group site, Irish site and Serkonten allows users to explore the wider brand offering of phs, whilst maintaining the individuality of the divisions and not detracting from the brand. It creates a coherent user experience for the user and allows them to explore the wider estate.

Whilst focussing on the buyer is a key part of their marketing and brand strategy, phs don’t shy away from the end consumer. They hold a vested interest in the end consumer and ensuring that their products and services meet the expectations of the public. In fact, phs are the only company who has a national agreement in place to divert sanitary waste from landfill into energy from waste plants, as well as being the original champions of Period Equality. phs are fighting the environmental matters that strike the hearts of the public and expanding their waste remit to vouch for these changes. 

The key driver for phs’ ethical actions comes from their core values; 

1. Accountable by setting high standards and taking responsibility 
2. Teamwork by behaving as one team 
3. Integrity in doing the right thing to build trusting relationships 

These values form the foundation of how phs’ brand interacts not only within their internal teams but also how they present the business to the public. Rather than being regulatory-led actions, phs actively take an interest in key social and ethical actions that impact their industry and act with front-footed solutions to change and influence the public’s perception of their industry. 

“We foster open communication and collaboration across our organisation. By aligning every piece of content with our core values—ownership, integrity, teamwork, innovation, expertise, and performance—we maintain a consistent and genuine voice. This approach allows us to consistently deliver content that reflects our genuine dedication to creating positive environmental and social impacts, while staying true to who we are as a business.” – Kelly Greenaway, Head of Marketing, phs

Brand consistency is at the heart of phs’ wider marketing strategy. Ensuring that the quality of their products is paramount to the consumer’s experience resulting in buyer confidence in their suite of offerings, regardless of the sub brand delivering the service. With passion, consistency and a drive for change within the industry it’s surprising that phs are so humble with their brand, forgoing the ‘shouty’ brand campaigns that make the public aware of their services, but instead working with their loyal buyers, word of mouth and confidence in the product to drive their strategy forward.

So, next time you’re drying your hands in the next hit restaurant or admiring the plant assortment in the waiting room, take notice of phs, our favourite undercover brand.