ETRC considers European travel-retail index

Gavin Lipsith

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The new European Travel Retail Council (ETRC) is to discuss indexing duty-free and travel-retail sales with Association Française du Commerce du Voyageur (AFCOV)

ETRC is to consider the move across Europe, in an attempt to better understand the needs and prospects of the industry in the region. The association, which was founded with the support of Tax Free World Association and succeeded the International Travel Retail Confederation, is to discuss the move with AFCOV.

The French national association implemented its AFCOV Index last year and the service offers a summary of sales across several of the country's travel retailers. Although on a much larger scale than the service offered by AFCOV, ETRC believes a similar index for the whole region would be beneficial. ETRC secretary general Keith Spinks told RavenFox.com that, although there has been a lot of talk about the role of data-sharing in growing the business, it also played a vital part in helping campaigners to protect the business.

"Part of the problem when we approach governments is that they don't have any appreciation of the size of the business, and we have only rough estimates to give them," he said. "With indexing you can't see the scale of the business but you can see what direction it is moving in, which is better than having no clear information at all."