INTERNATIONAL. Avolta CEO Xavier Rossinyol has described the company’s new consumer loyalty programme Club Avolta as “massive” and revolutionary in terms of its impact on and benefits to travelling consumers.
Club Avolta was launched this evening (30 September) at the Avolta Cocktail in Cannes during the TFWA World Exhibition.
Through the loyalty programme, travellers will receive exclusive benefits and experiences with some of the world’s most-renowned brands, including special access to lounges and events, exclusive product launches, and – importantly – opportunities to give back to local communities.
The programme rewards members when they spend at Avolta stores in one of 73 countries with nearly 5,000 points-of-sale.
Speaking exclusively to The Moodie Davitt Report hours before the public announcement, Rossinyol said: “This is another step on this strategy, on the consumer-centricity and the travel-centricity, we announced two years ago.
“The first step was to put F&B and retail together to get a 360 view of the consumer. This is another step, and I can tell you, it’s not going to be the last one.
“For frequent flyers, I think the loyalty programme is going to be a revolutionary way to engage with them. If you get the level of intimacy you can have with a loyalty programme, you can understand not only what people do in travel retail or travel F&B.
“As we know it’s the same traveller but nobody yet has data on how different travellers interact on F&B and retail. It’s going to be the first time somebody’s going to have that information.”
You can read an edited version of the interview below. Look out for our full filmed interview next week.
Club Avolta will be transitioned into the company’s business throughout October. It will be the largest loyalty programme in the wider travel retail industry, as the company retires Red by Dufry, Avolta said.
Current members of Red by Dufry will have their membership automatically transferred to Club Avolta, with the current app prompting an automatic update for a full member experience.
The new loyalty programme will span all channels and segments of the world number one travel retailer’s business – airports, motorways, cruises and train stations in terms of channels, and travel retail, convenience and food & beverage by segment.
It becomes the first consumer-facing iteration of the Avolta brand – itself unveiled a year ago in Cannes. This will further differentiate the company from its competitors and drive sales, Avolta believes.
Question and answer with Xavier Rossinyol
Martin Moodie: Xavier, in a few hours from now you’re going to be making a special announcement from Avolta, which after last year is becoming something of a tradition here in Cannes. What are you going to be telling the people tonight?
Xavier Rossinyol: I’m not sure we can keep up this speed forever! But, yes, last year at this time we were presenting the new corporate name of Avolta – the result of the merger between Dufry and Autogrill. And this year, we’re going to be presenting the new loyalty programme of the company.
This programme is going to be a completely new way of looking at loyal customers. The name is going to be Club Avolta. Finally, we’re going to use the Avolta brand name for the consumers.
‘Club’ because it’s something special. Firstly it’s a membership that is worth having. It’s going to be a programme accepted in all our points-of-sale across the world – the first time that a loyalty programme will go through every country in which we operate.
It will go through all the business we have. So we’ll cover the duty free, the convenience and the F&B all in the same programme. You as a consumer will be able to benefit from the programme in all our types of business.
What drove the new programme? And what were the key principles you were addressing?
You know we had a very successful programme – Red by Dufry. But it was only for duty free. Then we had another programme for the Italian motorways. But as you know, in September 2022 when we released our new strategy, Destination 2027, we put the consumer at the centre of what we do.
A loyalty programme is, by definition, for frequent flyers. And this segment is very relevant, not only in terms of numbers but also in terms of their expenditure.
As we said when we outlined the new strategy, the same consumer – with their limited dwell time – goes to duty free or F&B or convenience.
So why not extend the benefits across all different segments of the industry? Not only will there be commercial advantages, we will also offer services linked to other loyalty programmes – like in the main airline groups.
The programme will also give advantages at the airport, and in the lounges. It will be a very holistic programme, which will allow us to follow the frequent flyers across their global journeys and across the different sections. So it’s unique. Nobody else has that and we believe it will bring a lot of advantages to the frequent flyer.
How are you going to drive awareness of the new programme? Because that’s going to be critical, as with any loyalty programme.
Absolutely. Look, we know there are many loyalty programmes. If you take any iPhone, you will have downloaded many of them. But at the end of the day, you use very few of them. So it is not only about the initial awareness; keeping yourself relevant across the months and years is very important.
So the first thing that is going to be different is that whatever the name of the store or restaurant, you will see – just like a popular credit card – something that says Club Avolta accepted here.
We have more than 5,000 points-of-sale in 73 countries. So just the size of our network is going to make the programme very visible in the large majority of airports around the world.
There will be a specific marketing campaign and, of course, the loyalty programme also has a digital version. So most people will use it as an app, and we will make sure you are very quickly aware of the advantages the programme has for you, step by step.
You mentioned the size of the Avolta estate. You have this giant footprint across those three sectors globally. What’s the roll-out programme? You’re going to be telling the trade about it tonight. What happens next?
We announced a year ago that we would introduce this programme and I said it will be out a year later.
A lot of people in the company have worked very hard to make it happen, so we launch it tonight. You’re going to be able to download it tonight and start using in some locations already tomorrow. In the next three months it’s going to be rolled out across all our entire network.
That’s quick.
Yes. We believe that one of the key points of the new Club Avolta is the possibility to use it in so many different locations. And that’s why we want to make it acceptable in as many points-of-sale as we can as quickly as possible.
Sum up for me, Xavier, the ambitions behind Club Avolta, and how you’re going to measure the success of those ambitions.
That’s a key question. In a loyalty programme one of the key metrics is active users – the people that enroll in the programme and use it.
But apart from the figures, it’s very important to emphasise the quality of the engagement. I think the loyal members of Club Avolta are going to engage with us in a different way, because what we’re saying is pretty striking.
I mean, you will see your loyalty programme being accepted in a duty-free store in Asia, in a convenience store in Europe, and in F&B in the USA.
Outside the industry, people don’t know who is behind the different F&B and retail concepts, but they’re going to see there is something unique, something accepted in so many different places.
So the quality of the engagement and the result data will be key. But not data for the sake of data – data to better understand the consumer and to adapt, again, our offering to that consumer.
It’s another step on this strategy, on the consumer-centricity and the travel-centricity, we announced two years ago. The first step was to put F&B and retail together to get a 360 view of the consumer. This is another step, and I can tell you, it’s not going to be the last one.
Interesting. We’ve spoken about convergence before. I’m seeing that word a lot in some of your releases, and seeing it in hybrid concepts that you are introducing around the world. So today’s initiative is, if you like, articulating that convergence by having a consumer-centric Avolta-linked branding for the loyalty programme.
You’re absolutely right. We have disclosed that this year 25% of the tenders in the USA have included some type of hybrid space.
To name another example, with the new duty-free stores in Spain we are including F&B inside the stores as a way to enhance the experience and to bring more people into them.
You know, I’m from Barcelona and I do support Football Club Barcelona but we have opened a Real Madrid Café, which is a way to bring a different crowd into the duty-free store.
We need to keep giving consumers – the travellers – something different, something surprising, because that’s the way to get them engaged with our offering. If we keep giving them the same all the time, there comes a moment that they are not interested anymore.
And it’s not only the offering; it’s how you present that offering and that experience.
Everybody talks about experience. But experience is more than if you’re buying a perfume and just being allowed to test it. It needs to be something that really makes your travel itself as exciting as the destination and that’s what we want to do.
And it’s not just the job of Avolta or the brands – both in retail and F&B – or the airports. But altogether we can really make an experience that is different,
Words like discovery, surprise, magic and fun – a word you personally use quite a lot and I notice your teams around the world are starting to as well – are all part of that original vision, aren’t they?
Going from A to B many times is stressful. You have the luggage; maybe you are with little children; or you’re late; your flight got delayed; or your transfer is shorter than you expected.
So, in general, travelling is stressful and we – the travel retail and the travel F&B sectors – are the nicest opportunity airports have to provide not only a consumption moment but also a fun and entertainment moment.
Our dream is that people will actually go to the airport ahead of time – 30 minutes ahead of time, one hour ahead of time, just to enjoy the offering.
And it has to be more than just offering some products. You need to offer entertainment, you need to offer fun.
It’s so interesting to see how you do a magic trick. We are training 3,000 of our employees to do actual magic tricks, and you see the face of a child being impressed by somebody in our stores doing a magic trick.
You make that passenger happy, you make the child happy. You make the parents happy and more relaxed.
And the moment they are more relaxed they will have a higher propensity to buy something at the store. So you have happier passengers, higher chances to have a consumer, making the airport, the brand and the operator happier.
Just a couple of questions to close out, Xavier. How transformative will Club Avolta be for the company? What are your ambitions for it?
I think Club Avolta is extremely important but it’s only one element of what we’re doing.
So we are transforming our physical stores, restaurants, shops, duty free and convenience. We are transforming the digital engagement with everybody. We are getting more and more data from our stores, and we are using that data to better understand general consumers.
For frequent flyers, I think the loyalty programme is going to be a revolutionary way to engage with them. If you get the level of intimacy you can have with a loyalty programme, you can understand not only what people do in travel, retail or travel F&B.
As we know it’s the same traveller but nobody yet has data on how different travellers interact on F&B and retail. It’s going to be the first time somebody’s going to have that information.
It’s the first time that we are going to have a 360 view of the passenger. The potential information you get from that and how you can use it afterwards to do a better job, I think, is massive. Time will tell as always.
Very interesting. Revolutionary indeed. Tonight, Xavier, you are going to talk to stakeholders from across the industry down here in Cannes. But do you have a wider overarching closing message to those members of your team around the world, your airport partners and your brand partners about what’s happening here today?
I think this is another step in a very clear long-term strategy that is all about consumer-centricity.
When you talk about consumer-centricity and traveller-centricity, this is something everybody is talking about outside the industry. Sometimes you risk it being perceived almost as empty words.
But you know, at Avolta we are very proud of walking the talk. So everything we do is thinking about the consumer – Club Avolta, the hybrid concepts, the newest stores, the smart stores. And we will not stop, because after two years on this strategy we are convinced that’s the way to go – and that’s the way to go for everybody in the industry.
Happier consumers will spend more. I have said many times that we can double the industry because of the increased number of passengers over the next 15 years. And we can double the industry again by increasing the spend per passenger.
And that is by increasing the loyalty, increasing the offering, and increasing the spend per passenger thanks to doing a better job.
There are very few industries that can say they will double and double in the next ten years. So we continue with our strategy of traveller-centricity.
A suitably upbeat note to close on, Xavier. This is a great tradition we’ve created speaking about a big announcement at Cannes. I hope you’ll have another 12 months hence…
… No pressure. We will try our best. ✈
