The title of that lovely Simon & Garfunkel song (and album) came immediately to mind this morning as the most unwelcome of alarms woke me at the very unlovely hour of 3a.m. If it’s Wednesday (or any day with a Y in it) it must be a French air traffic controllers’ strike. And so indeed
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Miscellaneous
Now that’s what I call Nice news to wake up to
From a reader (a leading global travel retail director) after The Moodie Report’s Breaking News Alert this morning about Aelia, Dufry and Relay France capturing key retail concessions at Nice Airport. “Moodie San , after all that had happened this week don’t put Dufry and Aelia in the same sentence entitled ‘Breaking News!!’ Blimey I
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Miscellaneous
Tornado time in travel retail
I’m not travelling today. Sorry, yes I am. April Fool’s. Got you didn’t I? Of course I’m travelling. The day’s got a Y in it hasn’t it? This year has flown by like a tornado ripping across the deep south of the USA. And in travel retail terms more seems to have happened in the
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Miscellaneous
A bad case of Canadian shoot and foot disease
Do you think the travel retail industry sometimes shoots itself in the foot? I do. And here’s a glaring example. It’s an advertisement for a cigarette brand, published in an international travel retail publication during the Duty Free Show of the Americas in Orlando. The brand is called Double Happiness. Perhaps it should have been
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Miscellaneous
Concentrating hard in travel retail
It’s been an incredible week in travel retail, and a tragic one in the aviation industry. The latter must come first. The tragedy of Germanwings flight 4U9525, flown into the side of a mountain by co-pilot Andreas Lubitz is almost beyond comprehension. 150 dead, including children and babies; not one body found intact. Horror. One
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Miscellaneous
Show time in Orlando as DFASS/Shilla deal steals the headlines
After a weekend of glorious Florida sunshine it’s a wet and humid day here in Orlando as the annual Duty Free Show of the Americas swings into action. I suspect all the talk at the show will revolve around The Shilla Hotel’s acquisition of a 44% stake in DFASS for US$105 million with the option
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Miscellaneous
Some special toasts for St Patrick’s Day
Today is St Patrick’s Day, a day when the Irish celebrate (and just keep on celebrating) all over the world. It’s also the birthday of Colleen (how well named she was) Morgan (ok then with a Welsh twist), The Moodie Report’s Rhodes-based Special Correspondent and a friend for over four decades. And, not least, it
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Miscellaneous
(China’s) Century duty completed – with a paneful moment
I’m back in London for the weekend for a few days before next week’s IAADFS show in Orlando post a great experience at what I considered to be an excellent China’s Century conference in Shanghai. As any conference organiser will tell you, you can’t please all of the people all of the time (hell, often
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Settling in for Century duty in Shanghai
56 floors up, this is the view from The Moodie Report’s Interim Shanghai Bureau. I’m at the Jing An Shangri-La along with a few hundred colleagues from the travel retail community, here to attend the ‘China’s Century Conference’, organised by TFWA. It’s always a pleasure to be back in this throbbing, sprawling city that (like
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Miscellaneous
Oh Captain, my Captain
Captain! my Captain! our fearful trip is done, The ship has weather’d every rack, the prize we sought is won, The port is near, the bells I hear, the people all exulting, While follow eyes the steady keel, the vessel grim and daring – Oh Captain, Walt Whitman Last week The Moodie Report bade
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Miscellaneous
Toni & Guy: A cut above at London Fashion Week
I have survived my second tour of duty at London Fashion Week (LFW) unscathed (unless you count a case of serious, possibly incurable, shoe envy). You may remember that my debut visit to the event, last September, proved somewhat draining – I just about managed to recover in time for Cannes. Nonetheless I jumped at
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Miscellaneous
Ken Tse: Bringing it all back home
Great to see Ken Tse back in the business. This morning’s announcement by LS travel retail Pacific that they’ve secured Ken’s services as Head of Operations – Duty Free & Luxury represents a masterstroke by General Manager Ivo Favotto. Ivo knows Ken well from their shared time at The Nuance Group and will have been
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Miscellaneous
He’s a Craggy Ranger and he’s ok
Courtesy of our national carrier British Airways, my Yeti-like carbon footprint has probably earned me enough air miles to fly from Heathrow to Neptune four or five times a year, first class of course. As a result let’s just say that I’m well versed in terms of the BA product. I could probably recite their entire inflight