Last weekend bloggers, YouTubers, reviewers and influencers from the worlds of travel, aviation and retail assembled at Heathrow’s Hyatt Place Hotel to judge a record number of entries to the 2020 Travel Retail Awards.

Travelling from all over the world, including Cape Town, Singapore, Vancouver, France, Germany among many other destinations, the bloggers assembled on Friday 21 February for a relaxed networking evening and some stimulating conversation about the state of the duty free & travel retail industry.

In the following two days, judges were afforded a generous amount of time to comprehensively assess this year’s entries – products across all core duty free categories and those airports/retailers/F&B providers vying for the title of Best Green Initiative at an Airport – offering their invaluable consumer insight and totally unbiased opinions.

VALUABLE CONSUMER INSIGHTS

In addition to judging the entries, during their stay in London each of them offered up their valuable time to be interviewed by TRBusiness on camera.

Bloggers from all over the world assembled in London last weekend.

COVID-19 AND SUSTAINABILITY DISCUSSED

During their one-on-one video interviews they offered their important views on the industry as a whole, making suggestions on how passengers’ shopping and dining experiences could be improved, but also highlighting those shopping trips which exceeded their expectations.

Harriet Baskas writes a monthly column about airports for USATODAY.com and maintains 50 airport guides for them.

As well-travelled individuals they were also well-placed to offer their appraisal of various pertinent topics related to travel, aviation and tourism, all of which was captured on camera by TRBusiness.

One such topic which could not be ignored was the impact of the Covid-19 outbreak on the industry. (Special video to be published on TRBusiness.com and on Youtube here soon.)

Many agreed that the outbreak had not put them off from travelling, but it had encouraged them to be more vigilant in their hygiene rituals – hand sanitising more frequently for example – wherever they travel.

Another popular topic among the bloggers, reviewers and influencers was sustainability. As suspected, some said they were concerned by a lack of attention to this subject by the travel industry, namely in the areas of carbon emissions, reducing waste, recycling or upcycling and saving energy. (Stay close for a special video on this topic alone in the coming weeks).

Follow @theTRBusiness on twitter and instagram to find out more about the bloggers and the judging process.

For example, one blogger said that they would like to see more water refill stations in airports while another said that the existing water fountains were simply not signposted well enough.

One judge actually highlighted airports in Canada and the US as being more proactive in this area.

As reported, The 2020 Travel Retail Awards will place sustainability centre-stage at the ceremony. Read more here.

TRBusiness will be releasing a series of videos in the coming weeks and months on various topics explored by our esteemed panel of bloggers/influencers.

JUDGING METHODOLOGY:

Each product entered is judged by over 5,000 participants, independently sourced from m1nd-set’s unique database of international travellers. Every single one of the consumers voting will have travelled through an airport within the past six months. This stage of the judging process will make up 70% of the overall score.

A panel of bloggers and vloggers (video bloggers), who possess a range of product and travel expertise, also judge the products, making up the remaining 30% of the overall score. In addition to receiving information about each item, this panel is able to touch, feel and try out the product.