Swiss duty free and travel retailer Dufry plans to introduce the jewellery brands Folli Follie and Links of London into its existing estate following the decision to acquire 51% of Hellenic Duty Free Shops, the travel retail arm of Greece’s Folli Follie Group (FFG) for €200.5 million (US$258m).

 

Both jewellery houses, owned by FFG, have limited presences in the DF&TR channel but Dufry CEO Julian Diaz (below) says: “We believe there are significant opportunities to expand the Links of London and Folli Follie brands in travel retail, especially in emerging countries including Russia, China and India.”

 

“Our intention is to work out an agreement (with FFG), country by country or region by region, where those brands will be in travel retail with Dufry, through shop-in-shops,” he told financial analysts on Wednesday. “You will see these brands in our shops as well as standalone shops in countries worldwide… and I don’t think this will take long.”

 

To raise the funds for its 51% acquisition of HDFS, Dufry launched a share offering on Wednesday and by yesterday it had placed 2,697,620 new registered shares of the company via an accelerated book-build. The pricing was CHF109 (US$116.6) per share comfortably exceeding the amount needed for the purchase.

 

Dufry’s shares closed on Thursday at CHF114.3, similar to Tuesday’s close of CHF113.9 before the deal was officially announced the following morning.