Earlier today, Dufry and LS Travel Retail were revealed as the winners of the fashion and luxury tenders at Nice Airport (NCE), France’s third busiest airport with 11.7m passengers in 2014. The fashion contract runs from 2016-2022 and luxury from 2016-2023.

Fashion/luxury at NCE is being more than doubled (from 235sq m. to 675sq m in T1, and 318sq m to 765sq m in T2). Dufry will operate seven luxury units for brands such as Hermès in both terminals, Baccarat, Armani, Salvatore Ferragamo and Max Mara, while for another six fashion/accessories shops including multi-brand units, the operators will be both Dufry and LSTR. In total Dufry will be run nine concepts, and LSTR will operate three.

A four-category mix of fashion is coming

RE-TENDER OPPORTUNITY

A single Versace boutique will be operated directly by the brand – the first time this has happened at NCE, while one fashion unit of about 50sq m is being retendered.

Soete selects ‘proven partners’

The fashion/luxury wins come on the back of the awards of F&B (an 11-year contract, 2015-2026), the key duty free contracts (2015-2022), gastronomy (2015-2022) and chic souvenirs (2015-2022).

Soete, comments: “We chose to work with proven and recognised travel retail partners, as well as – for the first time – opening our doors to a brand that will run its own boutique directly.”

The new fashion/luxury offering, featuring nearly 40 brand names, will be deployed from the beginning of 2016 in T1, and from May 2017 in T2.

CLEAR DIRECTION

NCE has been very much in control of the revamp of its terminals from the moment the decision was taken to overhaul the retail and F&B offer at both terminals, a story broken by TRBusiness.

Dufry’s multi-brand unit will use the Nuance-developed Attitude fashion concept

The commercial department under Soete set out “to give passengers Europe’s most surprising airport commercial experience” and hired Parisian trends consultancy, Martine Leherpeur Conseil, to help define the brief.

In the case of fashion/luxury, the consultancy even picked out a list of brands that it believes will meet passengers’ expectations based on four specific segments, and according to Valerie Chuong, Head of Department – Development of Commercial Activities & Services, the winning bidders did not veer away much from these suggestions. “She tells TRBusiness: “The initial list was more extensive than the final one and retailers more or less stuck to the recommendations.”

Chuong: ‘recommendations’

Soete adds: “First we chose brands corresponding to the four pillars we wanted for our offer: the inescapable heavyweights, the trendsetters of today’s and tomorrow’s fashions, and iconic products evoking the French Riviera and also France.”

NEWCOMER BRANDS

As a result the fashion/luxury offer at NCE breaks down into four distinct categories and features a number of brands that are new to the airport market as follows:

Riviera Essentials featuring local designers and iconic brands of the French and Italian Riviera such as Eres, Vilebrequin, Sundek, Carioca, Pain De Sucre, Banana Moon, Havaianas, Cala 1789, Gas, K. Jacques, Inouitoosh, Hipanema, Melissa, Armani, Max Mara, Etro, Liu Jo, Versace, Paul & Shark, Furla, Ermenegildo Zegna and Zilli

France Essentials with more familiar names like Hermès, Baccarat, Repetto, Bensimon, Longchamp, Lacoste and Petit Bateau

Trendsetters offering rising/trendy brands like Vanessa Bruno, Hero Seven, Petite Mendigote, Jott, Marc Jacobs, Mickael Kors and Pinko

Airport Essentials, the strong international pillars of Hugo Boss, Swaroski, Tumi, Calvin Klein, Armani Jeans and Salvatore Ferragamo.

Dominique Thillaud, Chairman of the Management Board of Aéroports de la Côte d’Azur, comments: “This new step in the renovation of our commercial offer further strengthens our project, developing the ‘sense of place’ of the Cote d’Azur, inseparable from our airport, and setting up a diversified offering.”