Aldeasa extends AENA 14-airport contract

Gavin Lipsith

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The Spanish airport authority has dashed rival retailers’ hopes of a tender, signing a new contract with Aldeasa expiring at the end of 2009

Spanish airport authority AENA has extended Aldeasa’s retail and duty-free concessions at 14 airports until December 31 2009, according to Aldeasa’s 50% shareholder Autogrill. The news will come as a bitter blow to rival retailers—notably Dufry Group and Aelia—which had been anticipating a tender for the past year, following the expiry of Aldeasa’s old contract on December 31 2006.

The extended contract covers airports in Alicante, Almería, Barcelona, Bilbao, Girona, Ibiza, Jerez de la Frontiera, Málaga, Menoría, Palma de Mallorca, Reus, Santiago de Compostela, Sevilla and Valencia.

The  extension of Aldeasa’s concessions follows much speculation that AENA would tender its business, dividing the 14 airports in up to three tenders. The division of the network was expected after AENA’s recent announcements saying it intended to give Spain’s provincial governments more control of their regional airports. The extension will give AENA more time to work out exactly how to orchestrate such a complicated move, and how to structure retail concessions around it.