Local touch for global retail at Cancun Duty Free

Cancun | Cancun Airport is one of Latin America’s most busy airports. Recently the new terminal 4 was opened serving dozens of international flights mainly to North America but also to other destinations across Latin America.

Noteworthy is the heavily digitized travel retail concept, the first time Dufry rolled out the new generation store concept in Latin America. invidis inspected the 1.900 m² twice in the past 12 months to experience firsthand how the concept proves itself in everyday life.

To make it short – we love it. Dufry has managed to find the right balance between global product offering and local experience. In contrast to other airports, the new Cancun terminal offers sufficient space, the necessary ceiling height and perfect location right behind security. But it is the smart use of LED and other digital touchpoints which make the travel retail store exceptional.

The highlight of the new shops is the New Generation Store, which allows Dufry to better interact with and to increase the number of passengers attracted to the store and to offer them a more personalized shopping experience through digital communication. LED ribbons and LED encased pillars as well as interactive touch points at the shelves allow the communication with customer to be more flexible and to adapt to different nationalities according to arrival and departure flights. This allows to better tailor messaging to the specific preferences of the changing passenger profiles and to increase the communication impact, with the goal to increase sales.

The new shop concept presents a high degree of customization, to connect customer with this digital atmosphere through integrated audio and advertising. For example, six brands can play their advertising throughout the store using the digital screens for 30 seconds exclusively. The total domination of one brand is quite impressive and can’t be missed.

The duty-free shop of Terminal 4 is setup as a walk-through shop featuring a strong sense of place through typical design elements of the Mexican culture such as wrestling “lucha libre”, typical tiles and tequila. The store presents two main theme areas: The „Essence of Mexico“, located in a premium position in the store center, offering a selection of local products including tequila, mezcal, wines and other Mexican alcoholic drinks and the „Taste of Mexico“, where local confectionery such as chocolates, natural vanilla, gourmet coffee, hot sauces like habanero, jalapeño and chipotle, salt worms, biscuits and Mexican ‘dulce de leche’ are offered among other specialties.

Check-out is relatively small and slightly hidden behind the huge tequila area, it seems sufficient for the traffic which picks up with the first wave of northbound flight around noon. In the morning hours the walkthrough store is mostly fenced of as only national flights depart.

Not everything is perfect as the tobacco section proofs. Most likely the retail designer thought of creating a special touch point by integrating bar type screens into the shelf-system. Unfortunately, the setup as well as the content foil this idea as seen here in August 2019. Nothing which can’t be fixed, but 2×6 wall with bar-type display seems like a waste of resources.