For readers who may not be familiar with TFWA, what is its role within the global retail industry?
TFWA is a not-for-profit organisation that brings together the global duty free & travel retail industry. Our members span brands, retailers, airports, airlines, cruise and ferry operators, border stores and other stakeholders across the travel ecosystem, and our role is to provide platforms for connection, insight and business development.
Travel retail is a distinctive part of the wider retail landscape because its customers are uniquely travellers. People are moving between countries, markets and cultures, often with time to explore and discover products in a different way from how they would in traditional shops or online. Our industry is a significant global retail channel in its own right: the latest TFWA Handbook puts annual duty-free and travel-retail sales at around $74 billion. Revenue generated by travel retail is an important part of the investment at travel hubs which supports and enables connectivity, business and leisure travel, and brings families and friends together across the globe.
Our flagship event, TFWA World Exhibition & Conference, takes place each year in Cannes, bringing the international travel retail industry together at scale. Exhibitors span categories including beauty, wines and spirits, confectionery and fine food, fashion and accessories, watches, jewellery, electronics, tobacco, gifts and home goods, with many of the world’s leading luxury brands represented. In 2026 this includes the likes of BVLGARI, Campari, Clarins Group, Hermès, Chanel, Estée Lauder, Lindt, Moët Hennessy and Zegna. At the same time, the exhibition provides an important launchpad for emerging brands and new categories, from digital-native beauty brand Cocunat and wearable technology company HiFuture to premium Italian food brand Bio Orto and innovative Scottish whisky producer InchDairnie. This breadth reflects the changing nature of travel retail, where discovery and newness are becoming increasingly important alongside established global names.
TFWA also organises the TFWA Asia Pacific Exhibition & Conference in Singapore, which brings together a similarly broad range of categories and brands, and throughout the year TFWA provides insight-led research and activities. Across everything we do, our aim is to understand changing traveller behaviour, evolving market conditions and new commercial opportunities, and create platforms that help businesses respond to new trends and grow.
How does travel retail differ from traditional high-street or domestic retail?
Travel retail is a markedly different environment from traditional retail, because almost every aspect of the customer journey is shaped by the fact that people are travelling. You have a captive audience, but also one that is time-sensitive, often navigating an unfamiliar environment and thinking very differently about what they want to buy.
The operating model is different too. Airports are complex, highly regulated environments, with security requirements, restricted deliveries, extended trading hours and significant operating costs. Retailers and brands also have to work within a concession model alongside airport operators, and other stakeholders, so there are more layers involved than you would typically find in shopping centres or on the high street.
At the same time, that creates a unique opportunity. Travel brings together an extraordinary concentration of consumers from different countries, cultures and spending profiles. People are often more open to discovery, gifting and treating their loved ones and themselves when they travel, which gives brands an opportunity to engage customers in ways that are difficult to replicate elsewhere.
Travel retail isn’t simply a high-street store transplanted into an airport or similar transport hub. In an increasingly digital world, travel retail provides a genuine touch point where customers can physically see, smell and taste a wide range of fabulous products, beautifully packaged and highly giftable, at attractive prices.
What can the wider retail sector learn from the way consumers shop while travelling?
Travel provides a particularly interesting retail environment because the consumer is already in a different mindset. They may have more time to browse, are exposed to international brands which they may not find on their local high street and often are looking for products that connect with the destination or the experience of travelling.
The challenge for travel retail is to ensure that the offer is compelling enough to become a meaningful part of the journey, rather than simply another point of purchase.
This is particularly relevant to younger travellers, who are looking for experiences that feel authentic, local and shareable. That has implications for everything from product development and store design to storytelling and the categories that retailers choose to present.
What are travellers looking for from retailers today, and how is that changing?
Travellers increasingly want more than transactional shopping. They want retail experiences that feel engaging, distinctive and relevant to their journey. Authenticity is particularly important, with younger consumers showing a strong interest in experiences that reflect the destination and offer something they cannot find elsewhere. Earlier TFWA research found that 49% of beauty shoppers valued the opportunity to own something unavailable elsewhere.
This is encouraging a shift towards more immersive retail environments, from interactive brand experiences to spaces that bring together shopping, dining, relaxation and local culture. There is a growing opportunity to make retail part of the overall travel experience, rather than something that sits separately from it.
At the same time, travellers expect the same levels of convenience and immediacy they experience in everyday retail. Frictionless journeys and seamless digital services are increasingly important. Smarter use of data can help retailers understand different traveller profiles and anticipate what customers may want, while technologies such as mobile ordering, digital navigation and streamlined checkout can remove points of friction.
What does the future of travel retail look like to you?
I see an industry that will continue to evolve significantly, but one with strong fundamentals. The next few years will require resilience and a willingness to adapt. The opportunity is to become even more relevant to the traveller. That means understanding changing passenger profiles, making better use of technology and data and creating retail experiences that people actively want to engage with.
It also requires collaboration. The industry is interconnected, with brands and retailers highly dependent on the locations in which they operate – airports, cruise ships and other similar stakeholders. None of us can respond effectively to a changing travel environment in isolation.
Ultimately, travel retail has a distinctive proposition. It sits at the crossroads of retail, travel and experience, and it reaches consumers from multiple markets and cultures. The challenge, and the opportunity, is to make that proposition as relevant and compelling as possible for the traveller of the future.
