Interview: How Play9 and Perth Airport created a new experience for kids

Introduction: Play9 Studios has unveiled its latest Play Space design at Perth Airport, describing the 50-60sq m space as “the perfect mix of interactive, sensory, digital and physical game play.” Play9, part of Australia’s TKM9 Group, specialises in kids’ play and interactive products & experiences for commercial spaces. Martin Moodie speaks to company co-owner and Group Director Tanya Michaelides. With additional comment from Perth Airport Chief Commercial Officer Kate Holsgrove.

Tanya Michaelides is buzzing at the prospect of travelling freely around Australia and internationally now that the country has lifted its inter-state and international border restrictions.

In conversation about Play9 Studios’ new installation at Perth Airport, she says that the introduction was ideally timed both in terms of border openings and consumer appetite for travel.

“We’re noticing a shift, definitely in Australia and also globally, which is why I’m jumping on a plane and resuming normal business,” she says. “It’s nice to get back out and physically walk the spaces, especially with us being specialists in what we do.”

Having built the concept of engaging children’s play spaces in hospitals and shopping centres, Play9 entered the airport space at Brisbane Airport in late 2015 with a concept called Kidszone, an innovative digital play product range that featured free interactive and animated games and challenges.

“We build all the games and all the products,” says Michaelides of the Play9 offer. “We do everything locally here in Australia, and then we dispatch them and have local crews in different countries to install them.

“So we were ahead of the curve in terms of being innovative, even with something as simple as kids gaming on a screen. Because we were bringing kids into an environment where it wasn’t about them being on their personal devices, but instead coming together as kids jumping up and down and exerting energy before a flight.”

As any parent who has travelled with young children will testify, the more energy that can be burned off pre-flight the better. It’s a straightforward, alluring proposition for parents and children and one that I suggest fits well with the desire by many airport companies to deploy space in more experiential ways in the post-pandemic era.

“You’re right, experience has become a really big thing,” Michaelides responds.

“So it’s more about actually creating the airport as a destination and making the experience really engaging even before you get on your plane. We have done that in a really positive way.

“There’s a lot of stress travelling with families so allowing them to burn some of their energy and having time to run around is important, allowing a parent to have a beer, coffee, wine, whatever it is, and really just start to enjoy the moment.

“We have definitely found through research that with airports which accommodate for families, people go out of their way to choose them. In the UK, where there’s multiple airport options, people will actually choose an option that has a catering for families just as they do with a shopping centre.”

Reflecting its roots, everything that Play9 does has a digital twist, Michaelides says.

“It’s really been our bit of magic, I suppose. That applies to everything we do. For example with a slide, as you’re going down it lights up and it has sound effects. Everything is interactive, and that might be through screen or light or sound.”

“Basically the experience is all about discovery so that kids can stay there a little bit longer. So, for instance, we have what we call the cloud xylophone, which lights up and the sounds activate when kids wave their hands. We’ve got a screen inside a model plane where kids can fly. There’s a little embedded colour wheel that keeps changing.  The kids can jump from one of these to another, and it shoots different coloured lights throughout the rainbows and sounds and so forth. Which is fantastic for physical energy as you can imagine. They can look out the windows and see lots of cartoon characters flying past in the clouds and everything like that. So it’s a real mix of physical and digital.”

The value of usage analytics

The Play9 system also offers excellent analytics to airport companies. The Perth Airport installation, for example, features a live dashboard showing the number of usages, the most popular time slots and other important information. “So when we talk about an interactive and immersive and innovative space, it ranges from visually what the family can see to the back end for the airports themselves,” Michaelides explains.

Perth Airport, as with any Play9 client, can choose the menu of games available, she points out. “For example, it might want to change to a flight game… or a travel game because they want to push certain destinations, it’s up to them. So it’s virtually like logging on to Netflix and scheduling it – it’s as simple as that. Through technology, our clients have full control of their play spaces and then they have these live analytics as well.

“We have designed and built that infrastructure so that you don’t just have a sit and forget space, you have a space that feels alive and evolves. It’s always different. So when passengers are coming through again, they see something different – it’s not just a climbing apparatus that’s just sitting there and getting sticky and grubby and old.”

Michaelides saves a big shout-out for Perth Airport, commenting: “In terms of airports, they’re very willing to try new things. They really want to be ahead of the game. They’ve been fantastic to work with, and we’re doing a tactical roll-out with them.”

From a commercial perspective, the concept benefits from requiring no regular staff – apart from a recommended quarterly checking and maintenance. “Parents are essentially in charge,” says Michaelides. “So you’ll notice that in a lot of our spaces we deliberately don’t put things like fencing up. Depending on the market, once you put fencing up, some parents may leave their children and wander off. Keeping a space open places the responsibility on the carers.” {Interview continues below the Perth Airport sidebar below}

Anti-bacterial focus

Importantly in an acutely health-conscious age, Play9 deploys anti-bacterial materials. “In our early years – eight or nine years before COVID – we were getting a lot of work from children’s hospitals and that pushed us to investigate materials to make sure that things were really antibacterial,” comments Michaelides.

“One of the core materials is Corion, a solid surface used in professional kitchens and medical environments. So essentially, they are easy for the clients’ cleaning teams to manage. We’ve also deliberately kept a solid surface white because it feels clean for passengers. As a parent, you don’t want to see some sticky, dark-looking thing. And when it’s white, it’s also really easy to clean as are our screens. We also keep the space fresh and open – there are limited items and they are spread out so there’s enough room to play.”

What is the commercial model for airports? “That’s a really big question that we get asked all the time, how can people monetize?” Michaelides replies. “But that’s not the role of this – the role is to genuinely enhance the experience. And that is why the analytics behind the scenes are so important, because when airports can see how long people are using things they can genuinely say that there’s a need for it within their model.

“It’s a licensing subscription fee which is really cost effective and then we have a quarterly maintenance fee,” Michaelides explains. Some airports will require more regular maintenance so everything is negotiable she adds.

“It’s really important to check everything from a safety point of view. But once we have a client onboard, they generally roll out more with us, because it’s all about long-term planning and saying how can we enhance the experience?”

With the travel world now moving into accelerating recovery mode, Michaelides says that airport inquiries about Play9 are increasing. The concept is now active in multiple Australian and international airports and now that the country’s borders have opened Michaelides is in discussions with additional international customers.

Formats can be tailored to various areas and needs of different airports. For bigger terminals especially, Play9 champions the concept of ‘play along the way’, offering a series of ‘micro pit-stops’ along the journey to gate.

“It depends on the layout of the airport,” Michaelides explains. “For a bigger airport you don’t want to put it all in one location in case it’s a long way from the gates. So we want to be strategic with how it’s laid out. Sometimes it’s good to have micro spaces and sometimes because of the way an airport is laid out, you want some big wow activity, right smack in the middle.

“So we will always assess a space. That is why I’m now loving getting back out there because walking a space and understanding it is really the best way to comprehend how the customer experience needs to come to fruition. We design and make everything ourselves so we always have that flexibility and can tailor the offer. It’s definitely a premium offering, not some cheap children’s buy online – that’s absolutely not us. It’s about premium. It’s aesthetically pleasing and fits with the beautiful design of the rest of the airport.

“You can see with a lot of airports that the children’s experience has been thrown in as an afterthought. So we always want to design it so that it looks really amazing within the space and it matches, say, the marble tiles and feature lighting.”

In the post-COVID age, whether young or old, consumer experience will matter more than ever, Michaelides contends. “For many, it may be the first time that they have travelled as a family. It’s a whole new experience for some families with a whole new generation of travellers coming through.”

It’s a compelling, uncomplicated proposition. Simple as child’s play really.

Note: The Moodie Davitt Report recently launched a publication titled Airport Consumer Experience, in association with Airport Dimensions, dedicated to airport guest services and experiences.

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