Williams: Alpha’s airport business in good hands

The statement from Autogrill on the integration of World Duty Free (WDF), Aldeasa and Alpha Airports Group referred to two of the companies’ CEOs: Aldeasa’s José María Palencia, who will head Aldeasa and take control of Alpha’s non-UK airport retail operations, and WDF’s Mark Riches, who will add Alpha’s UK airports portfolio to his responsibilities. But Autogrill opted to remain silent on the future role of Alpha CEO Peter Williams.

 

Remaining silent is not a route often taken by Williams, and the former Selfridges boss was keen to offer DFNIonline his perspective on the reorganisation. Williams supported the decisions to appoint Riches—“one of the doyens of the industry”—and Palencia—“a man with great experience of the international travel-retail market”—to their roles overseeing the UK and international markets respectively. And he believes the two-pronged approach to airport retail is the correct one for the new travel-retail mega-group to follow.

 

“In the UK, WDF and Alpha have virtually identical models,” said Williams. “So there had to be integration. About 85% of the business is through WDF with BAA, so it makes sense that Mark manages it. He has been working for the business for many years, and Autogrill rightly values relationships with airports.

 

“Aldeasa has a lot of international business, including some in the territories where Alpha’s international divisions are present—notably Alpha Asia led by Paul Topping and Alpha USA led by Rod Wiltshire—so it is right that José María Palencia and Aldeasa should look after those businesses.”

 

That leaves Alpha to focus on its inflight business in retail and catering, which Williams said are virtually operated as independent, single-country companies. “There will be organisational changes to that business, and you can expect more details on what that will mean shortly,” he said.

 

Williams declined to comment about his own future at the company, but said that he expected his position to be clarified officially in due course. In the meantime he can reflect on having steered Alpha through one of its most challenging and rewarding chapters of its history. After taking the reins in May 2005 when Alpha’s shares were suspended and its creditors circling, Williams helped to give the company a new focus that saw it become the target of a competitive bidding process, with the eventual acquisition more than doubling shareholders’ money based on the stock price at the time.

 

More recently, Williams has championed the renovation of Alpha’s customer-facing store image—he calls it “reinventing the travel-retail experience”—with the new Biza fascia. It’s a strategy he believes lends new meaning to travel-retail by creating an image and store experience that customers can relate to. Williams tells DFNIonline he has emphasised the importance of the strategy with the Autogrill board, and they appear to agree with his thinking.

 

Whatever Williams’ role in the new company, if any, it is clear that in a relatively short time Williams has done a great deal to fight what he sees as complacency among travel retailers in failing to adapt to the needs of their customers. And Autogrill, through its new travel-retail structure, is well placed to make a positive change to the market.