BUDAPEST AIRPORT


BARTA: A new stakeholder model to share the retail spoils?


For too long airports and airlines have paid lip service to the idea of creating tangible business co-operations to bolster ancillary activities. Kam Jandu, CCO Budapest Ferenc Liszt International Airport and Chairman of a new ‘BARTA’ initiative – which stands for Brand, Airline, Retailer, Technology Provider, and Airport – tells Luke Barras-Hill why things could be about to change...


B


ARTA, the new initiative which brings together an airline (Wizz Air), retailer


(Heinemann), technology provider (Flio) and airport (Budapest) is aiming to redefine the current operational challenges many airports and airlines face when it comes to ‘knowledge sharing’. Born out of an idea to drive


commercial spending in the terminals and onboard by harnessing the power of digital technology, the partners have engaged in a preliminary dialogue on the potential to create new sales channels, increase store penetration and ultimately, customer satisfaction. Kam Jandu, Chief Commercial


Officer, Budapest Airport, has agreed to act as Chairman for the BARTA project and facilitate the partnership in his capacity as the airport operator. BARTA, he believes, yields encouraging signs to increase commercial spending for all stakeholders involved. “I believe that the potential


is significant and once the main principles are laid out, such as not trying to sell or promote competing products, which an airline can sell onboard, all parties can benefit.”


Potential new model The obvious question is how will BARTA work in practice? At the time TRBusiness went


to press,


conversations on the initiative and its exact mechanics were still ongoing. It is anticipated that Budapest


Airport, Wizz Air and Gebr Heinemann will begin a live test trial, involving a revenue sharing component, later this year, but


JUNE 2017


Budapest Airport: the Launchpad for a potentially ‘gamechanging’ initiative to drive incremental retail spending in the air and on the ground.


concrete detail on how it would work was not immediately available at the time of writing. Nonetheless, Jandu makes clear


that initial conversations have swayed away from focusing acutely on the revenue-sharing component at this stage, to instead looking at certain complimentary products that will benefit all stakeholders mutually over time. Possible examples include the


redemption of vouchers to put towards an inflight meal on Wizz Air linked to certain spend levels in Heinemann’s duty free shop. Such an offer would be attractive to


Wizz Air in increasing spend on F&B onboard, while in turn Heinemann could assess the suitability of certain routes to correlate with aligned duty free promotions. For the airline itself, scaling up


non-aeronautical activities has the positive effect of offsetting future increases in aeronautical charges, Jandu suggests.


While the charges won’t be reduced, they will look to be maintained on the basis that growth in associated non-aeronautical activities will help to sustain its cost base. “The more we persuaded them


that it’s not to compete with them, the bigger the benefit that they saw,” says Jandu. “Now, they’re much warmer to the idea.” Another potential example could


be duty free discount vouchers linked to higher tiered airline ticket bookings, which could be redeemed at a Heinemann store or onboard. It is understood that a core principle


“This conversation wouldn’t


have taken place two to three years ago as everyone was competing for customer spends, but now there is a degree of maturity.”


Kam Jandu, Chairman, BARTA TRBUSINESS 21


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