INTERNATIONAL. Airports are underestimating the importance passengers place on food & beverage options and airport shop and restaurant offers, according to a new study.
Some 48% of the 2,589 travellers surveyed by global loyalty agency ICLP said the range of food & beverage outlets on offer influenced their decision in choosing which airport to fly from.
By contrast, ICLP said its airport survey data had indicated a failure to realise that the choice of food & beverage outlets was among the top five most important passenger priorities (based on 35 airports surveyed).
Some 60% of passengers surveyed said they would welcome airport shop or restaurant offers but only 10% of airports considered this to be an important factor in passenger airport choice, according to the survey.
While 40% of passengers said they would be interested in being part of an airport loyalty or reward programme, just 7% of airports recognised the importance of passenger loyalty schemes.
ICLP said the survey showed that airports are failing to understand what passengers see as important factors when choosing an airport, believing that travellers’ selection criteria are rational, rather than emotional.
It found that 97% of airports believe that proximity to home or office influences a passenger’s choice of airport, but just 66% of passengers claim this is a factor in their decisions.
ICLP said efficient check-in and security clearance at the airport was also an “area of misalignment”, with 82% of passengers stating this as an important factor when choosing an airport compared to only 41% of airports.
“As we can see from the recent data there is a stark misalignment between what airports think passengers want and what passengers actually want from the airport,” commented ICLP Managing Director Mignon Buckingham.
“If practical considerations such as proximity and convenience are not the sole influencers in a passenger’s choice of where to fly to and from, then airports need to tap into other ways they can appeal to potential customers. Airports need to consider the ways in which they can collect more passenger data, and use it to reduce this misdirect, focusing instead on offering services that will have real resonance with their specific passenger demographic.
“Understanding that passengers are not just motivated by purely practical factors, but also by things such as food and retail outlets, travel retail offers, and loyalty schemes, allows airports to increase the influence they have on customer behaviour. This means they can encourage passengers to turn their time at the airport into an experience, rather than just a part of the process of getting from A to B. They have then paved the way for genuine customer engagement, which in turn can drive a rise in revenue and repeat visits.”
