Opinion: Tiger shows that travel retail is an entirely different animal

Tiger opened its first store in a Tube station this week, giving busy-looking New Scotland Yard workers (for the most part) something to think about beyond the little matter of crime as they hurry to and from work. The St James’s Park branch is a bright, shiny shop, about four or five times smaller than a standard Tiger, and the ranging has been carefully adjusted accordingly.

This is get in, get it, get out shopping, and as such it’s almost entirely different from what might be on offer in a high-street store, where browsing time is factored in as part of the equation. The point is that ‘travel retail’ is an almost entirely different animal from what happens elsewhere. If you want to be successful in this arena, it’s about products for now or, at a stretch, something that will last until you get home (desperation ‘gifting’ falls into this category).

This means offers that travellers want but probably really don’t need, and being aware of the fact that you’re in competition with the westbound Circle Line, so the appeal needs to be very immediate.

Self-service setbacks 

And service is still important. Travelling around a number of different London rail termini last week, it was noticeable how many retailers did not use self-serve checkouts (M&S has none in its railway station stores, it appears). Even the uncrowned prince of self-service on the go (with a bar of chocolate, naturally), aka WHSmith, had at least one counter that was manned and this was busy, while the self-serve checkouts were being used only reluctantly.

Looked at this way, self-service remains a fly in the ointment as far as shoppers are concerned. They’d rather wait a few seconds in a fast-moving line than serve themselves and, given the transaction volumes, this probably still stacks up as far as bringing home the bacon is concerned.

“If you want to be successful in this arena, it’s about products for now or, at a stretch, something that will last until you get home”

John Ryan

Shrinking a big store and making it smaller is not what travel retail is about. More thought is required than this and entering into the mindset of a time-pressed commuter means understanding what it is to have just three minutes before your train – about enough time to buy this week’s Retail Week before rushing for the ticket barrier. Oh yes, and the store still needs to look good. This is a burgeoning part of retail, but much remains to be done by so many retailers.