Story of the Week - Concessions

For the past two months, I've been writing a series of articles about airports that are trying to add more local retail and food/beverage concessions to their mix.  You can see this week's story  here at Aviation Daily's free web site.

I became interested in this because in my old job at Delta, I spent a lot of time at ATL.  People were always telling me that I had to eat at Paschals, which features Southern cooking and is considered an institution in Atlanta.  I ate there, and it was great.  It got me thinking about what other airports were doing across the country.

The first person I called was Ann Ferraguto, co-founder of Alexandria, Va.-based AirProjects Inc., a retail development consultancy specializing in airports, among other venues.  Ann was kind enough to tell me about airports moving toward this trend, including GEG, PDX and YUL.  From there, I heard from other airports about their programs, including BNA, OAK, MIA and SDF.

I'm originally from OAK, so when I heard that they were adding local barbecue joint Everest & Jones at the airport, I was delighted.  OAK is famous for its many barbecue restaurants, and it's nice to see that this one will be represented.  I live in Baltimore, and BWI has been doing some wonderful things too, bringing in  vendors including Phillips Seafood, Bill Bateman's Bistro (known for its buffalo wings) and Uncle Teddy's Pretzels (the best in the world, according to me and my co-worker Steve).

Every airport I spoke to said that their concession programs were designed to give passengers a taste and sense of their local region.  Airports are the first and last place passengers see when visting a city.  As Ann said in my first story that appeared in the July 11 issue of Aviation Daily/Airports, "when you're in Philadelphia, you want a cheese steak. When you're in Boston, you want seafood.  Airports do better when they have a strong mix of local and national brands."

Comments

[Ian Harbison]

Lucky Americans! If you wonder why airport food is so bad in the UK, it is because BAA charge so much for the franchises that only large companies can afford them. The result is mass produced junk food at high prices served by staff with no motivation.

Clearly, they have a different philosophy at BWI, where they also do 'retail management'. Perhaps they could bring the policy back home!

[Brett]

I definitely agree that having local food is better. I'm really not interested in yet another Burger King, but when I'm in PHX, I head over to Blue Burrito Grille on the US Airways side of terminal 4. Mmmmm.