British Airways reshuffles inflight retail offer

Lorna Strickland

Print Article E-Mail Article E-Mail Author

Flag-carrier British Airways has made a number of changes to its inflight duty-free strategy on both long-haul and short-haul routes

Flag-carrier British Airways has made a number of changes to its inflight duty-free strategy, including a greater focus on mail-order initiatives. The retailer has removed the duty-free service from some of its short-haul routes, and introduced a mail-order service instead. Flights are affected to and from 11 locations—Amsterdam, Brussels, Paris, Cologne, Düsseldorf, Frankfurt, Hamburg, Lyon, Munich, Stuttgart and Berlin. Travellers to and from these destinations are encouraged to pre-order through www.bagiftshop.com. The retailer is offering the mail- and pre-order service to all its short-haul passengers.

The company revealed that the change in retail strategy was directly affected by strike action enacted by its catering and logistics firm Gate Gourmet. An inflight retail spokesperson said: "It was always difficult to sell on short-haul flights to these destinations. Passengers didn't value the service. There's only so much product you can push on board when you are in the air for just 20 minutes."

Up to five products can be ordered at duty-free prices, which are then delivered to any UK address free of charge. "The service allows passengers to browse the collection in their own time instead of rushing through the magazine with the time restrictions of a short-haul flight," said the spokesman.

British Airways has also temporarily removed its dedicated upper class inflight brochure after only a few months. The airline began the service in October last year aiming to offer its upper class passengers a brochure dedicated to higher end products than in its High Life Shop brochure. Suppliers included Baccarat, Montblanc and Dreyfuss & Co among others. The spokesman said:"The brochure is set to return because we deemed it a success. But we haven't yet fixed a date."