Belgian Sky Shops notes passenger change at Charleroi

Gavin Lipsith

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The loss of high-spending British passengers on Ryanair's axed London Stansted route from Charleroi has affected business at the retailer's outlets

Belgian Sky Shops has reported good growth at Brussels South Charleroi Airport, despite the loss of Ryanair's service to London Stansted. High-spending British passengers were key to the retailer's liquor and tobacco sales, but commercial manager Marc Leemans told RavenFox.com that, while duty-paid tobacco sales were down since the routes closed at the end of April, new flights from other airlines to Scandinavia and Poland had bolstered liquor sales.

"Passengers from Stockholm and Warsaw also have a culture of buying liquor," he said, "so it is only tobacco which has suffered. There are also other flights to the north of Spain now, although passengers do not buy the same things. So there has definitely been a shift and it is something we will have to cope with in our stores."

Ryanair, which at one stage accounted for around 95% of traffic at Charleroi, recently threatened to withdraw from Belgium altogether after the European Commission deemed illegal subsidies were granted to the carrier. The company is still in dispute over the repayment of the subsidies, an issue that could jeopardise Charleroi's plans to build a new terminal by 2006.

Leemans said that penetration through its stores at Brussels International airport had dropped slightly since the accession of ten new countries to the EU in May, although there had been a 30% increase in passenger numbers from those countries. But as those travellers represented only 3% of total traffi before accession, he said there had been minimal affect.

"We should see a bigger effect in the autumn or winter, when people traditionally take city breaks and may be encouraged to fly to Budapest or Prague for example," he told RavenFox.com, "but our strategy will still focus on attracting all passengers into our stores, not just those. If we are successful, those passengers will follow the trend."