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IRELAND. Aer Rianta International (ARI) is targeting a doubling of profits over the next five years as it enters a new phase of its development. That’s according to CEO Jack MacGowan, speaking to The Moodie Report this week as the company hosts its 25th anniversary celebrations in Ireland.
“Our vision is all around profitability, built on great retailing and service,” said MacGowan. “Yes, we have to grow our top line, but what matters is profit. We have delivered consistently to our shareholder (the Irish state) and will continue to do so even more in future.”
Last year ARI’s profits hit €27 million, though they were influenced by one-off transactions such as the sale of some of ARI’s shareholdings in Russia.
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“We want to take the values that have defined ARI into the next 25 years.“ |
Jack MacGowan Chief Executive ARI |
The news comes as the company hosts a two-day anniversary celebration, culminating tonight (Friday) with a special gala dinner at the stunning Adare Manor Hotel in County Limerick.
The company is hosting business partners, dignitaries and many senior executives past and present, who have helped ARI grow from a fledgling division of airports group Aer Rianta (now DAA) in 1988 into a business with managed turnover of well over US$1 billion a year. The company is firmly positioned among the world’s top 15 travel retailers by annual sales value.
Key milestones in ARI’s history range from the opening of Moscow Duty Free in 1988 to the building of ARI-Middle East as a regional force since its creation in Bahrain in 1993; entry into North America in 1998, expansion into India in 2010 and its first retail operations in China last year.
The company has been one of the industry’s great pioneering forces, with corporate headquarters Shannon Airport the birthplace of duty free (in 1947), and with executives that helped open up duty free markets around the world. Famously, even before ARI was created, Aer Rianta executives were behind the opening of Dubai Duty Free in 1983 – with original members of that team Colm McLoughlin and George Horan still leading Dubai Duty Free today.
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From Delhi (above) to Montreal (below) and from Kunming to Beirut (bottom), ARI has been a pioneering force in the world of travel retail for the past 25 years |
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In an interview with The Moodie Report (to be published in our Cannes Print Edition), MacGowan said: “We’re proud of our history over the past 25 years, and we want to take the values that have defined ARI into the next 25.
“We have some of the best retailers and general managers anywhere in the industry, and they embody the values of flexibility, a “˜can do’ spirit and a focus on great customer service. They bring a dash of personality to the business too. The best retailers have a very good and intuitive entrepreneurial trader mentality. If you couple that with the extrovert, easy-going Irish personality, then you have the platform to build a great business – one that has been a major influence on the wider industry down the years.”
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The Irish Whiskey Collection: One of the company’s retailing successes of recent years |
*We’ll bring you news and images soon from Friday night’s anniversary celebrations, where The Moodie Report Chairman Martin Moodie is guest speaker. The full interview with Jack MacGowan will appear in our October Print Edition, available in hard copy at TFWA World Exhibition and online at this website in digital format.
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Adare Manor: A stunning venue for the 25th anniversary celebrations |
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