Elior 5x'd Referral Hires in only 6 months with Eqo: Driving 86% Retention & Reducing Temporary Labor

The Problem 

With a 65% turnover rate and heavy reliance on high-cost temporary labor, Elior needed a more reliable pipeline for quality talent, but only 2.3% of their external hires came from referrals 

Elior operates in rural and specialized markets where hiring is especially challenging. Despite the opportunity, Elior’s referral program was fully manual, not mobile-friendly, and difficult for frontline employees to use. As a result, only 2.3% of annual hires came from referrals. TA Ops and People Center teams spent hours each week tracking referrals in spreadsheets and responding to employee questions about status updates, creating inefficiency and low engagement.

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Solution with Eqo

Elior launched Eqo to drive greater employee referral participation, simplify the referral experience for their frontline employees, and eliminate manual admin tracking

Eqo’s text-based referral platform allowed frontline employees to refer candidates instantly – no app or login required – while automated tracking removed the administrative burden from TA and People Center teams.

To further boost visibility, Eqo supported Elior with targeted rollout communications and targeted text-campaigns (a feature Eqo supports) to ensure employees become familiar with the employee referral program. 

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The Results

In just 6 months, Elior 5x’d their employee referral hires from 275 to 1,389 hires, with a 86% retention – and delivered a 4.8/5 employee experience

Referral volume and engagement surged across frontline teams, turning referrals into one of Elior’s highest-quality hiring channels.

Automated tracking eliminated hours of manual spreadsheet work each week, while employee satisfaction with the new text-based experience reached a 4.8/5 rating.

Referred hires demonstrated significantly stronger retention – achieving 86% 6-month retention and reducing reliance on costly job boards and temporary labor.