The U.K. airport luxury brand store: The lure of luxury in a transitory environment

Abstract

This thesis investigates how and why luxury brand stores articulate, establish, and perpetuate luxury brand identity in the airport. Through the construction of luxury narratives, spaces, display, and services, the luxury sensory environments must be able to attract and engage airport passengers. This thesis discusses how the airport is considered transitory and unique, which means that the identity of luxury brands must remain stable and familiar, in an environment which has opportunities to diffuse luxury. Furthermore, the airport in contemporary consciousness is driven by notions of luxury, leisure, pleasure, and the exotic. They are places of possibility and desire, which drives the need for luxury experiences. This is the first study of its kind to explore how luxury branded spaces in the airport are constructed, and how through methods of the expression of luxury display, they renegotiate what luxury means to consumers. Previous research has failed to consider how the perception of luxury is influenced in unique transitory environments, such as the airport.
International airports are now considered luxury shopping destinations in themselves. Since the first duty-free store was established in 1947 at Shannon airport in Ireland, retail in the airport has grown to seventy six billion dollars, and will reach one hundred and twelve billion dollars by 2025 (Adroit Research, 2019). Airport retail proves to be the most resilient global market, and globe travellers are four times more likely to spend on luxury purchases in the airport than in non-airport stores (Blue, 2019)1. Therefore, luxury brands have realised that they can provide a unique offering, experience, and sensory engagement within the airport environment, which act as a microcosm for the retail world.
This thesis offers a set of recommendations for luxury brand practitioners, airport managers and academics in the realm of luxury, and suggests that for an airport luxury brand store to be deemed luxury and important, there are special measures which must be in place. These are window display, store interior design, and sensory experience, which help construct, articulate, and reposition luxury in the airport. This is important, because the airport is a distinct, non-place, transitory environment, which, due to historical associations with glamour, carries with it expectations of luxury experiences. Therefore, to raise levels of luxuriousness, spatial constructs must be in place. The results suggest that luxury in the airport must appear exclusive, at the same time inclusive, through the democratisation of the luxury experience. I reveal that the appearance of luxury brands in the airport has repositioned luxury as an accessible and democratic space to experience luxurious things.
Key words: airport, transitory, luxury, space, display, accessible, experience

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ORCID for Joanne Roberts: orcid.org/0000-0001-5337-1698

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