Villeroy & Boch

One Brand, all inclusive:
Villeroy & Boch's Hotel & Restaurant Division believes in originality, creativity and cosmopolitan brand appeal

Inventive talent and a great ability to innovate, a strong customer orientation and strict strategic alignment with the requirements of the domestic and international market. These are the qualities on which the market position and continuous internationalisation of the almost 260-year-old Villeroy & Boch company are based. Today, Villeroy & Boch is a European lifestyle brand of international standing and operates in 125 countries. The company, which has operated as a public limited company since 1987, went public in 1990. The Group's head office is in Mettlach/Saarland. Roughly 10,000 persons are employed by Villeroy & Boch and production is carried out at 22 factories located in 12 European countries and in Mexico. All activities revolve around the brand.

From Ceramics Manufacturer to Lifestyle Company

In 1998, the year of the company's 250th anniversary, a major strategic reorientation took place which was marked by a change in corporate direction. Villeroy & Boch moved away from its course as a production-orientated ceramics Group and became an internationally-renowned lifestyle supplier. This reorientation involved focussing all activities onto the brand. Today, Villeroy & Boch enjoys brand awareness of 70 percent.

At the heart of that paradigm shift is the sales and marketing concept "My House of Villeroy & Boch". This concept combines various Group products into collections of complementary products and presents them innovatively and integrally in realistic room settings with an emotional customer appeal.

Today the Group is subdivided into the Divisions: "Bathroom and Wellness", "Tiles" and "Tableware". The "Bad and Wellness" Division provides a broad range of ceramic sanitary-ware collections, fittings, bathroom furniture and bathroom accessories, as well as bathtubs and shower trays, shower partitions and wellness systems, such as whirlpools and steam showers. In so doing, the Division supplies all the products necessary to realise a "single-source bathroom". Rounding off the range are ceramic kitchen sinks and matching kitchen fittings. The "Tile" Division product range comprises a whole wealth of modern tile concepts for floors and walls, which make a variety of functional and aesthetic applications and solutions possible in both the private and commercial sectors - here in particular for hotels and swimming pools). International business focuses on the growing commercial business sector, in which hotels, hospitals, holiday apartment sites, homes for the aged etc. are equipped with products from all of the company's Divisions.

The "Tableware" Division specialises in everything needed to lay a table completely. It supplies crockery, glasses, cutlery, table linen and a great variety of accessories for the table and home, as well as gift items for all occasions and all tastes. Villeroy & Boch's range extends far beyond the products required for private households - it also realises high-quality advertising media and supplies extensive tableware concepts for the hotel and catering industry.

International business focuses on the growing commercial-business sector where, for example, hotels, hospitals, holiday-apartment sites, homes for the aged etc. are equipped with products from all of the company's Divisions.

The Hotel & Restaurant Division

Villeroy & Boch's Hotel & Restaurant Division was set up more than 20 years ago to provide optimal customer support for customers from the catering and hotel sector. Today it has a total of 20 employees and stands not only due to its sophisticated tableware systems, but equally due to its high degree of customer orientation when it comes to advice and service.

Under the motto "One brand. All inclusive.", the Hotel & Restaurant Division consciously focuses all its activities on the Villeroy & Boch brand with its originality, creativity and cosmopolitan appeal, then ties it all together with a unique, coherent and extensive range of products and services. Quality, functionality, design, completeness and service are its basic principles.

Villeroy & Boch always works with the greatest of care and professionalism, which begins with the choice of first-class raw materials, includes the use of innovative production techniques and extends to the manufacture of extremely resistant "fine china" bodies. As a result, it is in a position to meet extraordinary quality standards. In addition, Villeroy & Boch stands for the highest degree of functionality and utility. Stackable shapes, series of up 60 articles and, of course, resistance to dishwashers, salamanders and microwave-ovens are all taken for granted by the hotel and catering sector. Furthermore, Villeroy & Boch tableware is just as popular with guests as with caterers. This is because of its high quality design, expressed in an effective combination of shape, colour and pattern. But Villeroy & Boch tableware does not simply mean crockery, but also includes porcelain, crystal, cutlery and accessories which are perfectly coordinated with each other.

Contacts in more than 120 countries around the world ensure competent advice - constantly and universally. This is complemented by the company's own distribution system which supplies customers quickly and directly - "just in time" and in "special" situations.

Diverse Range of Products to Satisfy Every Need

Villeroy & Boch supplies hotel and restaurant tableware in a variety of materials: in special, extremely-resistant hotel porcelain, in vitro and fireproof Vilbofour porcelain and in the particularly delicate and noble bone china. There is an extremely broad and extensive spectrum of product lines which are available in numerous patterns and shapes. Matching the tableware are cutlery series made of 18/10 special steel. In addition, Villeroy & Boch supplies glass series in an exceptionally hard-wearing professional quality, especially for hotels and restaurants. Specific customer requirements are also fulfilled, as customer emblems or logos can be applied to tableware, cutlery or glasses.

Lifestyle in Hotels and Restaurants

Villeroy & Boch offers much more, however, than extensive tableware ranges with the highest product quality and a range of individually structured services. In this way the company lives up to its expectations to also be a lifestyle expert in the Hotel and Restaurant sector, by offering products in the company's unmistakable style for all the latest lifestyle trends. The aesthetic variety covers a range from the classically valuable to the rurally natural, from the bright and uncomplicated to the avant-garde with cosmopolitan openness. Villeroy & Boch has been an international trendsetter for several years, particularly in the area of stylishly simple, reduced forms and highly-expressive design. The Hotel & Restaurant Division currently focuses it attention on completely plain, white tableware series, or those which merely display very subtle patterns. They consist partly of unusual individual pieces and open up every conceivable possibility for chefs to present their culinary creations in their own totally individual style. Whether they are used for sensational table settings or unusual buffets, the latest "Food & Mood" series offer just the right service pieces for every occasion.

Why does Villeroy & Boch support the IKA/Culinary Olympics

Supporting the German Chefs Association by our company allows a perfect organisation of the Culinary Olympics.

The IKA/Culinary Olympics are a festival of joy and offer the chance of meeting Chefs from all over the world, coming together to compete and presenting high-class creations and innovations to the world.

Villeroy & Boch as global producer of fine tableware is pleased to contribute to the Culinary Olympics by providing with our innovative Form Flow the means to present the new creations of the Chefs adequately.

Which products will be presented at the IKA/Culinary Olympics?

Villeroy & Boch will show the porcelain series FLOW, the cutlery series VICTOR and the glas series LA DIVINA.