Our regular feature, brought to you in association with Duty Free Global from Ireland, celebrates memorable scenes, moments, launches and campaigns related to the global aviation and travel retail sphere.
GERMANY. Our latest choice of images come from a flying visit to Munich Airport’s new Terminal 1 pier, which officially opened on 13 April following a €665 million investment from the airport company.
There we discovered just how Munich Airport alongside its retail and food & beverage subsidiaries – eurotrade and Allresto respectively – have injected ‘Bavarian soul’ into the environment, design and offer. [A full report with comment and additional images will follow.]
The new pier gives Terminal 1 Non-Schengen – home to around 40 carriers – a warm and welcoming feel, with neat cues from Munich and Bavaria presenting a strong regional identity.
We also like the manageable scale of the 95,000sq m space, with all retail and dining clustered around a distinctive airside marketplace that houses eye-catching digital media walls that will come into their own as passenger traffic ramps up further.
Duty free is among the signature concepts here, with the airport’s first walk-through store a new landmark. It sits neatly at the start of the airside marketplace journey (following a generously spaced decompression area post-security) and is nicely connected to speciality retail and F&B later.
P&C leads with hero brands up front and some firsts for the airport in a dedicated K-Beauty space, a larger focus than ever before on niche fragrances and elegant back wall treatment for global power brands.
Spirits, tobacco, confectionery and destination goods sit segmented across the corridor, with attractive curation by category and importantly, full visibility throughout the store and between categories.
Add in sizeable boutique spaces for Emporio Armani, Tumi, Boss and Polo Ralph Lauren, eurotrade’s own multi-brand luxury bags store plus one of the most beautifully appointed (and largest) Breitling stores you will ever see, and this represents a rounded, tailored and accessible offer to match a diverse international audience.
In dining, the Allresto-managed spaces combine well-known local heroes, airport-specific, tailor-made concepts and international brands, all blending flexibility between dine-in and to-go.
Käfer Restaurant brings a famed Munich brand (already an airport staple) to the pier with classic Bavarian dishes, an open kitchen and extensive wine selection while next door ODEON by Käfer appears as a cocktail bar-deli in atmosphere befitting an underground (premium) urban bar.
Cucina Popolare houses much-loved Italian specialities in a space that carries terrific apron views while Münchner Leibspeise is home to a mixed and multi-brand concept spanning Bavarian and global cuisine.
Even without the planned-for strong Middle East passenger contribution, spend per passenger is trading well, says airport management in the three weeks since opening, aided also by ‘late gate announcement’, which keeps dwell times high in the commercial area.
In its communications about the new pier, Munich Airport said the goal is “to make the airport feel like a gateway to Bavaria, not a generic transit space”.
Our visit and experience of touring with the senior commercial team underlined how those credentials have come vibrantly to life in this gateway to southern Germany. ✈
