FRANCE. The Nuance Group has captured the travel retail concession at Toulouse Airport. The seven-year concession covers a total area of 1,200sq m, and shops are scheduled to open from October 2009.
Toulouse-Blagnac Airport is the fourth largest regional airport in France and is currently constructing a new Terminal D, which is scheduled to open in 2009. The Nuance Group will operate most of the commercial area there, with 12 shops ranging from 20sq m to 300sq m. Categories covered include perfume, cosmetics, liquor, tobacco, fashion, luggage, electronics, fine food and souvenirs.
Nuance said it had developed tailored concepts with a regional south-west of France flavour, which would enhance the Sense of Place in the airport offer.
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Toulouse Airport’s new Terminal D is designed to reflect the culture of Toulouse and the Pyrenees region |
The Nuance Group will be opening these outlets in two phases: Phase 1, to be completed by October 2009, will cover a 300sq m Perfume & Cosmetics store, a 200sq m Liquor, Tobacco and Food store, a ‘CULT style’ accessories concept covering 84sq m, a 50sq m temporary Spirit of Toulouse destination concept and a SWIFT-branded gate shop covering 50sq m.
The remaining outlets will follow in late 2010, once the airport has concluded its refurbishment programme, which will lead to the introduction of a completely new commercial area.
At that point a Fashion concept, a Travel Star luggage outlet, a Swatch corner featuring fashion watches and jewellery, a Sound & Vision electronics concept, a design store and an event location will be added to the Nuance portfolio. At the same time, the definite Spirit of Toulouse store featuring a shop-in-shop for the Airbus brand will be introduced.
Toulouse-Blagnac Airport CEO Jean-Michel Vernhes said: “We were impressed by the quality and range of the offer proposed by The Nuance Group. This offer clearly matches the expectations of customers at Toulouse Blagnac Airport. Nuance has a very impressive track record and is the partner of choice of 60 airports across 20 countries, which, together with their proposal, has convinced us to entrust them with this operation.”
The Nuance Group CEO Europe Jean-Paul Bonnel added: “It has been a pleasure to work with the team of Toulouse-Blagnac Airport, developing tailor-made concepts in close collaboration. The scope of the operation will allow us to create a truly outstanding offer and to implement all of the new ideas and concept improvements our European team has been working on over the past months and years. Finally, by introducing a dedicated event zone, we plan to bring in a very special retail-tainment dimension to the airport which will specifically transmit the spirit of Toulouse.”
This is the second big contract gain for Nuance in France in recent months. In July the company was selected as Aéroports de Paris’ partner in a new Fashion & Accessories joint venture covering Paris-Charles de Gaulle and Paris-Orly airports, which begins in 2009.
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