Today, Manchester Airports Group (MAG) marked the completion of ‘Phase two’ of Stansted Airport’s £80m ($121.8m) investment – to transform the terminal building and improve services and facilities – by inviting journalists on a whistle-stop tour of its new outlets.

 

It was also revealed today that Phase three, which will see the opening of 16 new retail units – 13 stores and three pop-ups – should be ready for a grand unveiling ‘by the end of this calendar year’ [according to MAG’s Chief Executive, Charlie Cornish].

 

“We have all the well-known and high profile high street brands for F&B,” said Cornish who received journalists and retail partners earlier today. “As we move forward over the next two or three years, we are absolutely confident that Stansted (STN) will have the best retail facilities in the airport space in the UK…certainly in London.”

 

Beth Brewster, MAG’s Retail Director, followed Cornish, with a short speech about the transformation of STN since MAG took over ownership from Heathrow Airport Holdings (HAH) a couple of years ago:

 

“We got a big fat pen out and we started to draw what we thought the new departure lounge could look like and what you see here today is pretty much what we drew with that big fat pen on that PDF. And that is a huge credit to everybody who has helped us build that over the last 18 months.”

 

Whilst she remains focused on this project to it fruition, Brewster revealed that once Phase three of the transformation is complete, she will be heading off to the US to focus on MAG’s new business developments: “We are just starting to talk about setting up a US business,” she told TRBusiness today.

 

“I’ve been doing quite a lot of business development over there over the last year…the time has come to set up with a bit more intent.”

 

Brewster said that although she cannot reveal where MAG is setting up exactly, she did say that she gets ‘to do something completely different’.

 

But the three-phased commercial transformation at STN has certainly kept her busy over the last year and a half. After receiving bids from 70 F&B brands for STN, Brewster said she enjoyed ‘the biggest headache of her career’, whittling down to a list of just 12 F&B outlets. TRBusiness was treated to a guided tour of the 12 units, which include cafes, bars and restaurants varying in price proposition and cuisine.

 

As previously reported, to mark the end of Phase 1 of the £80m ($121.8m) investment programme, World Duty Free Group officially unveiled the biggest duty free and travel retail shop in the WDFG estate, in September last year.

 

Last year, MAG’s Steve Foster, Head of Retail, told TRBusiness that 80 brands, from high street and global airport retailers, had shown interest in the 16 new retail outlets, which are likely to open in October/November of this year.

 

The likes of Next, Fat Face, Dixons, JD and Rituals opened for business at STN last summer.

 

When asked by TRBusiness at STN last year for the names of the brands who would be involved in the final retail tender, Foster said: “The lion’s share of interest has come from high street retailers direct, but we have, of course, had interest from the big airport operators.”

 

Brewster spoke briefly about the new retail outlets again today: “The third and final phase is retail and what I call speciality retail, so it’s a mixture of high street brands, they’ll be…I can’t tell you the lineup today because we’ve not signed all the contracts.

 

“We are in our final conversations with everybody, we just haven’t got the contracts signed so we are down to preferred bidders. The decisions will be made official hopefully within a month to six weeks.

 

“It will be a really good lineup, again, of high street brands, airport firsts, accessible brands and slightly more high-end brands. It will be amazing. If Phase two/F&B is the cake, Phase three is the icing on the cake.”

 

Stansted Airport’s 12 new F&B outlets include the brand new Windmill Pub by JD Wetherspoon – an impressive two-storey bar and restaurant, which required a £2.7m ($4m) investment from the UK pub chain. The airport bar, which overlooks the airfield, curves pleasingly around a brickwork windmill construct [pictured left].

 

One of the airport firsts is the James Martin Kitchen – a joint concept from SSP and the celebrity British TV chef – and is described by STN as ‘a premium bakery offering fresh farm ingredients and highest quality baking’.

 

Harris+Hoole, the growing high street coffee chain backed by British supermarket giant, Tesco, also chose Stansted as the location for its first ever airport shop. Another first for the airport is Coast to Coast ‘an all-American dining experience’ which boasts a comprehensive menu of indulgent American classics.

 

SSP’s new luxury Cabin bar and restaurant – of which there are just three in existence – offers fine wines and a contemporary British menu including ‘British tapas’.

 

STN made sure there were plenty of familiar F&B brands at the airport too; Giraffe, Starbucks, Pret A Manger and Burger King round out the portfolio with some special travel-retail exclusive touches of their own [this includes an evening menu from Starbucks].

 

STN said it wanted to ensure that there were plenty of healthy options on the airport’s menu. Enter naturally fast food chain Leon and Asian-inspired Itsu – which offers low fat and low calorie options including sushi and smoothies.

 

Finally TRG’s bespoke Halo champagne bar adds the ‘sparkle’ to STN’s F&B portfolio, located at the centre of the 12 other units.

 

MAG’s Cornish said that the transformation of Stansted is one of the biggest developments, in terms of scale, that’s taken place at one of MAG’s airports under his leadership at the company.

 

“When MAG acquired Stansted we set a clear vision to transform the terminal and improve its facilities,” he said. “Having returned the airport to growth and once again made it the fastest major growing airport in the UK with nearly 21m passengers using the airport each year, and passenger numbers up 25% in March alone, the timing for this £80m investment in the terminal building couldn’t be timed better.”

 

Brewster added: “When we set about announcing details of this major transformation to the retail industry we knew we were about to work on something of major significance but not even I anticipated the buzz of excitement it would create amongst the industry.”