Airport Experience® News - ACDBE Issue 2026

INDUSTRY INSIGHTS

A MOMENT OF INDUSTRY TRANSITION Looking Ahead: Rebalancing Lounges, Concessions, and the Future Airport Experience

BY GEORGE MBOYA

ver the past several months, I’ve been exploring the rapid evolution of airport lounges. I’ve focused

source of calm, reliability, and comfort. That shift is real, and airports have responded thoughtfully by making space available for concepts that travelers clearly value. At the same time, airports have long relied on the strength of their public food, beverage, and retail programs. These are spaces that deliver not only choice and local character but also essential non‑aeronautical revenue. Concessions help support debt service, maintain infrastructure, and fund large‑scale capital programs. They remain foundational to airport financial resilience. An Opportunity for Alignment What’s becoming more evident is that these two parts of the airport experience, lounges and concessions, are increasingly intertwined. Passenger behavior is shifting, dwell patterns are changing, and airports are working hard to understand those dynamics in real time. None of this represents a “problem.” Rather, it is a moment of transition where stakeholders have an opportunity to come together and take a fresh look at how the commercial environment is evolving. My intention in continuing this conversation is not to argue for fewer lounges or to suggest that concessions are being displaced. Instead, it is to encourage a wider, more ecosystem‑level view of how space, service, and passenger behavior intersect. The goal is alignment and

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on not only how they’ve grown, but what their popularity reveals about the changing expectations of today’s travelers. What began as a look at a single asset type quickly opened into a broader reflection on the airport experience as a whole. Airports today are complex commercial and operational environments, and every decision made within them carries implications that extend well beyond a single space or concept. An Evolving Perspective In my earlier white paper, Reframing the Future of Airport Lounges, I suggested that the rise of lounges raises a fundamental question: What does the modern passenger actually want from an airport, and how do we meet those expectations in a way that strengthens the entire travel experience? Since publishing it, and through conversations at the recent Airport Experience Conference in Nashville, my thinking has continued to evolve. What is increasingly clear is that lounges play an important and growing role, but they exist within a much larger ecosystem whose balance is critical to every airport’s success. Lounges have expanded quickly as access models shift, credit card partnerships broaden, and the definition of “premium travel” evolves. Passengers who once viewed lounges as exclusive now see them as a

Above: George Mboya, CEO, SSP America.

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AX NEWS JUNE 2026