ARI inaugurates Canada’s biggest airport duty-free store

John Rimmer

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The retailer's North American division will open its new 1,250sq m duty-free store at Montreal Pierre Trudeau airport on June 8 following the official inauguration of the airport's new international jetty this week

Canada's biggest airport duty-free store opens to the public on June 8 when Aer Rianta International-North America (ARI-NA) welcomes travellers to its new 1,250sq m (13,450sq ft) outlet in Montreal Pierre Trudeau airport's new international jetty. The store is marked by a 100m-long shop front featuring large lenticular panels depicting scenes from Montreal, reflecting the airport authority's desire to include a strong local flavour in the new design.

ARI-NA operations director Philip Eckles told RavenFox.com: "We had a superb response to the official opening of the jetty, and the airport authority is delighted with the store and the fact that it is Canada's biggest airport duty-free outlet. The airport has built a very practical terminal and gave us a very large space to fill, and we've taken advantage by expanding our ranges across all product categories."

ARI-NA has adopted the Runway Duty Free fascia for the first time at Montreal, following its initial deployment at New York JFK and at other Aer Rianta International locations including Moscow Domodedovo. "At Montreal we've built a spectacular glazed walk-in humidor, and have placed much more emphasis on Canadian products, including foods and textiles," explained Eckles. "There is also much more room for fragrances and cosmetics now." Among the new brands introduced by ARI-NA at Montreal are cosmetics brands Shiseido and YSL Beauté, plus Baccarat crystal, Dunhill, Versace sunglasses, Fossil, Lulu Guinness accessories and an expanded Longchamp fashion range.

The new store brings will serve all Montreal's international traffic, excepting travellers to the US, following the closure of the city's Mirabel airport last year. Until now the retailer has operated four stores at Pierre Trudeau: one each in the domestic and international terminals plus two last-minute stores. Eckles explained that the new store would offer improved efficiencies and economies of scale as it would allow ARI-NA to service its customers in one place.

For more details look out for DFNI June 15.