Made in Museum targets airports for "cultural" products expansion

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Rome-based Made in Museum is to open its third airport store, located within the main duty-free area at Vienna airport, later this year. The company, founded in 1995 as a specialist wholesaler of museum merchandise, already operates two stores at Rome airports.

Made in Museum founder and chief executive Lisa Lowenstein told TRW: "We are starting to see a pattern emerging. We have been flooded with over 30 requests from airports, airlines and even cruiselines as well as hotels and museums. We put our expansion on hold until recently, when we completed our retail brand project with BDG McColl."

The company's first retail site incorporating the redesign opens in the MUMOK Museum in the Museums Quartier, Vienna on Saturday. Made in Museum has two company-owned sites in Italy and three franchise sites in Italy and ambitous plans for airport locations in Europe and the Middle East. The company has 50 wholesale clients including well-known museums from Boston to the Vatican and other corporate gift clients. More airport store locations are expected to be announced soon.

Lowenstein said: "Travelling stimulates desire for these [cultural] objects. We have conducted a lot of market research and concluded that the underlying social trend is stronger than that created by technology. We have a totally unique product story. More and more people in the future will be in interested in hand-made things, not just mass-produced or industrial products."