Airport Experience® News - Retail & Services Issue 2025

ONE-ON-ONE

THE 20-PERCENT GOAL WH Smith North America’s New CEO Shares Aggressive Expansion Plans

BY CAROL WARD

ditor’s Note: Huw Crwys-Williams is a veteran retail executive but is new to North American airport retail. The former WH Smith group strategy director in the UK joined the company’s North American division in April. As CEO, Crwys-Williams is tasked with leading the company’s development and expansion in North America. AXN’s Carol Ward spoke with Crwys-Williams about his deep dive into the market, the challenges facing concessionaires and his plans to lead WH Smith North America to 20 percent market share. E

WARD: Can you set the stage by sharing a bit about what brought you to the North American division of WH Smith? CRWYS-WILLIAMS: I’m only a few months in. I had a month-long handover with Toby (Keir), my predecessor. My background is all retail – I love the industry. This opportunity came up because Toby wanted to move back to the UK with his family. Toby’s done a great job here over the last four years. When I was approached about the role, it was just super exciting. The North American market is such a massive opportunity in the travel space – for everybody, not just for us – and for us, as slightly newer [players] on the block, we’re growing fast. For me personally, the opportunity to learn all about the North American market, plus join an exciting, growing business was really the motivation for me to make the big move from London over to Las Vegas. WARD: What are your early goals and vision as you settle into this new role? CRWYS-WILLIAMS: The reality is that we’ve got some clearly stated public goals [stating] we want to get to 20 percent of the North American airport retail market. That remains the big focus for the business. It’s a simple but tough target to go for. At the moment, being new to this role, I’m just doing a huge amount of learning and listening, not only internally with my

teams here, but also externally with our airport partners and our ACDBE partners and everybody in the industry that I can learn from. I’m just trying to Hoover up as much knowledge as possible. WARD: Regarding the 20-percent goal, at what percentage do you estimate you are currently? CRWYS-WILLIAMS: I think there are two measures – the stores that we’ve got open that are trading, and then all the stores we’ve won but have not yet opened. And then we’ve got the third bit, which is the bit we still need to win to get the 20 percent. There is no perfect data on the size of the North American [airport] retail market. Roughly, at the moment, we think we’re probably at about 13 percent share. We’re probably at least half of the way in between 13 percent and 20 percent to get to our 20 percent goal with stores that we’ve won but have not yet opened. We’re making very good progress. WARD: Do you have a time frame attached to that goal? CRWYS-WILLIAMS: We’ve always said we wanted to get there within about four years. It’s always hard to pinpoint because of course it relies on what RFPs come out to market. That’s a bit of a blind spot for us. The more RFPs we [respond to] into the market, the quicker we’ll get there.

Above: Huw Crwys-Williams, CEO, WH Smith North America.

32

AX NEWS SEPTEMBER 2025