Airport Experience® News - Retail & Amenities Issue 2023

Left: Many concessionaires point to Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport as the shining example of what’s possible with concessions pricing, since the airport has no contractual restrictions. Since the change in policy, the airport has received minimal customer complaints.

Above: Nick Crews, CEO and managing partner of Crews Companies, says concessionaires are seeing product cost increases of 5 percent to 10 percent, and on top of that, wage increases of 15 percent to 30 percent.

What makes these challenges even more insurmountable is the fact that in the vast majority of airports, concessionaires are not free to raise prices. Most major airports in North America require their concessionaires to price items within a narrow band – usually anywhere from “street” pricing to “street plus percentage,” which is usually somewhere between 10 and 18 percent. Changing these pricing restrictions is certainly a top priority for concessionaires, but most airports are proving unwilling to eliminate pricing caps at this time. “It’s important to note that food and beverage and retail concessionaires

are the only independent businesses at an airport where the airport controls prices,” says Andrew Weddig, executive director of the Airport Restaurant & Retail Association (ARRA). “Airports don’t control airfares; airports don’t control rental car charges; airports don’t control advertising fees; airports don’t control TNC fares. All of us are important contributors to the overall passenger journey, the overall passenger experience. We ask, why should airports control prices in just one aspect of the passenger journey and negatively impact an independent business’s ability to deliver a great passenger experience?”

Above: AndrewWeddig, executive director of the Airport Restaurant & Retail Association, says food and beverage and retail concessionaires are the only independent businesses at an airport where the airport controls prices. He asserts that allowing concessionaires to manage their own prices in a manner that best fits their conditions is “a natural remedy to a critical problem.”

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