Hamburg, 14 December 2018. In cooperation with the European Travel Retail Confederation (ETRC), Gebr. Heinemann hosted the initial live test of digital product labelling in its Duty Free shop at Hamburg Airport on Tuesday. This pilot project allowed travellers to visit the ETRC’s labelling website on a smartphone and scan the barcodes of ten common Duty Free articles of various categories such as confectionery, alcohol, and perfume. They could then review detailed product information such as nutritional facts, ingredients, allergens, and information about the manufacturer in several languages.
Compliance with regulations and greater transparency
“Our goal is to ensure that travellers are well informed and have access to relevant and helpful information about the products they would like to buy or consume. The ETRC off-pack solution ensures that retailers and brands will be able to continue to comply with their obligation to inform travellers in accordance with EU regulations,” says Inken Callsen, Director Fulfillment at Gebr. Heinemann. The ETRC labelling platform is the industry-specific response to labelling challenges such as the EU food information regulation (FICR), which was originally developed for the domestic market.
“Reading through tiny font in up to 24 languages on the product packaging to see if, for instance, it contains a certain ingredient, can be quite exhausting. The digital off-pack solution improves transparency for Duty Free customers by providing easy access to essential product information,” Inken Callsen adds.
Conducted by a third party, a comprehensive, ISO-certified customer survey accompanied the test to measure the solution’s user-friendliness and functionality as well as the needs and desires of participating customers accurately. To achieve a representative result, a broad target group spanning numerous demographics was surveyed. The time remaining prior to test customers’ departure flight and their general technological affinity were also taken into consideration.
The demo version of the ETRC labelling website is available in three common European languages: English, French, and German. This range of languages is planned to be expanded to the 24 official languages of the EU – and possibly also to include some non-EU languages such as Chinese.
Important step for the entire Travel Retail industry as test in Hamburg paves way for EU commission approval
ETRC fully supports the principle that consumers should have access to relevant and meaningful information on the products they wish to purchase and consume. ETRC has been working for many years to find a pragmatic solution to providing consumers with product information in a way that meets both the requirements of the regulators and the specificities of our unique consumer, the international traveller.
Julie Lassaigne, ETRC Deputy Secretary General, reports on the first live test of the pilot platform: “We are very grateful to Gebr. Heinemann for facilitating this consumer research with airport passengers in their Duty Free shop. Their direct feedback is very valuable to us, in terms of making further improvements to this platform, to enable us to go ahead with this major project for the Travel Retail industry. The results will be consolidated and presented to our members at the upcoming ETRC Business Forum.”
The pilot test at Hamburg Airport constituted another milestone for the trade association, since the European Commission requires a live test with passengers in addition to the presentation of a demo version.
Julie Lassaigne added: “The digital platform is an important step for our entire industry in terms of developing sustainable solutions together to address the challenges posed by increasing legal regulations for the international Travel Retail market. Our efforts are now concentrated on gaining the acceptance by EU and national policymakers for such a solution.”
Aligned forces for Duty Free
The technical basis for the digital off-pack solution was provided by the Travel Retail Data Innovation Group (TRDIG), an initiative of suppliers and retailers from the Travel Retail market that is currently developing global standards for master data in order to facilitate the automated exchange of products’ master data between industry and retailers. Suppliers place the master data of their items here in the cloud, where it can be retrieved by each of the approved retailers.
ETRC also receives the product information for its labelling website from the TRDIG cloud. However, this ETRC solution is a neutral consumer interface that provides exclusively facts and information about the product. Marketing and advertising are expressly prohibited on the platform. “In principle, it is about a new generation of cooperation and about giving a face to Duty Free shopping by providing facts and data exchange,” explains Inken Callsen.
Press contact:
Gebr. Heinemann
Julia KnorsCorporate Communications
Manager
http://www.gebr-heinemann.de/press
ETRC
Julie Lassaigne
Deputy Secretary General
