Aldeasa wins 10-year contract extension in Chile

John Gallagher

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Operator set to open more than 2000sq m (21,520sq ft) of retail space

Spanish travel retailer Aldeasa has announced an extension of 10 years to its contract with Chilean civil aviation authority Dirección General de Aeronáutica Civil (DGAC) to run the duty-free outlets at Santiago's Arturo Merino Benitez airport. The structure of the contract will remain largely unchanged from the present agreement.

The extension begins in July 2005 and will allow Aldeasa to substantially expand the retail space under its control. The company's departures store will almost double in size from 64sq m (6,900sq ft) to 1,206sq m (12,980sq ft) and the arrivals store will be scaled up from 212sq m (2,280sq ft) to 818sq m (8,800sq ft). Both stores will benefit from more favourable locations and improved passenger flows, which should yield increased penetration rates.

RavenFox.com understands that Aldeasa has been negotiating the deal for almost 12 months, but that the announcement was delayed as airport concessionaire SCL was renegotiating part of its own contract with DGAC.

Aldeasa—which also operates duty-paid stores at Santiago, Concepcion and Antofogasta airports—posted sales of $17.8m in Chile for the first nine months of 2004, up by 22.5% on the same period in 2003. It is expected to release its full-year sales figures at the end of February. The company is currently the target of takeover bids from the GEA consortium, Dufry and Autogrill.

Six million passengers passed through Santiago airport in 2004, more than half of whom were international travellers.