3Sixty Duty Free (formerly known as DFASS Group) is to release its new KrisShop omnichannel platform at the end of May.

News of the joint venture between Singapore Airlines (SIA), 3Sixty and SATS to run the retail programmes on SIA (KrisShop) and low-cost subsidiary carrier Scootalogue was first announced in March 2018.

The shareholder’s agreement confirming the establishment of the partnership was finalised in November 2018.

FURTHER PARTNERSHIPS

Other partnerships have since been announced including an agreement with Avianca for the development of an online retail platform. This covers airlines such as Aerogal (Ecuador), TACA (Peru) and LACSA (Costa Rica).

Regarding the omnichannel business as a whole, which is the company’s main focus, Roberto Graziani, Executive Vice Chairman, 3Sixty told TRBusiness: “This is not an airline business. It is a business that leverages the airline partnership and is much more than an airline business.”

He added: “I believe this is a new way of approaching retail and starting this kind of business in travel retail is very important. The most successful retailers offer integrated choices, touch-points and services to consumers.

Should all go according to plan  this business could be the ‘leader in our industry’, according to Graziani.

“Thanks to partnerships with the airlines we will have data on customers’ journeys. As soon as they book a flight, the airline will know who they are, when they are flying and from where to where they are going.

“We can leverage this data to actively contact passengers digitally and not wait for them to come to us,” he explained.

The use of the term ‘inflight’ to describe 3Sixty’s operations is no longer applicable, Graziani reiterated. “It is not inflight. For us, our business is an omnichannel one. Once we have the consumer data our main objective is to keep the customer at the centre of our strategy.”

With carriers such as KLM Royal Dutch Airlines and Tap Air Portugal recently announcing they will terminate their inflight retail offers, industry stakeholders can be forgiven for predicting a bleak outlook as far as the traditional onboard retail model is concerned.

“I believe the traditional inflight business is going to die sooner or later. Today, customers must be followed in a different way.

“You cannot wait for a customer to enter a plane and order a bottle of cognac, perfume or cream, for example. You need to engage with the customer in a completely different way.

“This is why we have started to transform the inflight business into what we call the omnichannel business.”

Graziani is in no doubt that 3Sixty’s omnichannel business will prompt an evolution that will eventually lead to the dismissal of the cart.

He explained: “We are very confident and committed to this omnichannel development and are investing a substantial amount of money into the deployment of this platform. We are also investing strongly in data analytics.

“This concept is definitely the way forward, not only from an airline point of view. Businesses outside travel retail are developing this way. You can’t just wait for the customer to enter your shop.”

GROUND-STORE BUSINESS

In addition to operating onboard concession for airlines such as Singapore Airlines, Air Canada, Virgin Atlantic and Avianca, 3Sixty runs duty free/duty paid concessions in several high-profile international airport locations. These include Chicago O’Hare, Charlotte Douglas, Ottawa and Philadelphia.

Developing this omnichannel business in partnership with airlines will be easier than doing so with its ground-store counterparts. “We do not have the data of the customers visiting the ground-stores which makes things more difficult.

“We will try to transform our brick and mortal stores from an omnichannel perspective, but at the end of the day it is the same business.”

While strongly focusing on the development of its omnichannel business since the company re-brand in 2018, 3Sixty has been busy working on evolving its ground-store business.

Since exclusively announcing to TRBusiness that its Dallas Fort Worth (Terminals A and C) shops will be the first outlets designed specifically to incorporate the entire new 3Sixty branding, the company has modified its Charlotte Airport store to reflect the re-brand. Modifications will gradually take place across its entire ground-store portfolio.

Looking back on the rebrand to 3Sixty, Graziani commented: “The re-brand to 3Sixty was not a marketing exercise and not just a name change.

“The new name was the result of a cultural re-shuffle which was necessary in the company to be consistent with the highly evolving retail environment we are having to contend with.

“We needed to have a new way of approaching things and new way of not only dealing with the end consumer but with our internal customers to.”

He added: “We need to be much more active and much more innovative. This is why we changed the name to 3Sixty. We want to tackle the business at 360-degrees.”

On the prospect of new opportunities on the ground, Graziani remarked: “We have bid for the duty free/duty paid contract at Newark, where we are currently operating and have also bid for Houston. We are waiting for the result.

“I believe we have presented reasonable proposals to both airports. If neither of these opportunities materialise there will be others in the market quite soon. We are really interested in developing the business.”

Pressed by TRBusinesson the possibility of operating ground-stores at Asian airports, he concluded: “I am not excluding Asia development, but you need to be competitive when bidding for something and I don’t think currently, alone at least, we have the ability do so.

“If there is a situation where we can partner with a company to leverage our expertise, we would be more than happy to consider it.”