Neil Grice attended the FOSD follow up conference on the 16th September 2011, at the Network Rail Boardroom Paddington Station. The event was organised by FOSD and was attended by a number of (TOC) Train Operating Companies, Architects, IT Specialists and Retailers.
The conference was in effect a follow up to the main conference in June which Neil Grice of Grice Collins Long was on the panel on a question and answer session regarding the future of retail in railway stations.
At the time of the meeting in June, Neil’s views that whilst overall the offer was definitely getting better, there was still considerably more work to be done on stations and also that the variety of both offers and companies represented on the major railway station needed to be enhanced and widened.
At the follow up meeting, this theme was taken up further by both other agents and various other experts in the field and there was and appeared to be general agreement that railways and in particular the championship and first division of railways (i.e. those that aren’t the mainstream Network Rail and are not in say the top 50) generally continued to be very poorly provided for and efforts needed to be made to encourage retail into these areas.
Neil Grice indicated to those present that they were working with a number of companies who were looking to considerably enhance the vending experience to provide branded and quality offers as this was likely to be the only answer for a number of stations where customer numbers were too low to justify a manned outlet.
Neil Grice however also confirmed that due to his work on the motorway service area market, they were aware of a variety of new regional and local catering and CTN operators who were prepared to combine in effect a newsagent and coffee offer which could work well in a large number of stations where customer numbers justified its existence.
Other innovations were discussed at the conference including the importance of safety and the rolling out of help points to as many stations as possible over the course of the coming months and years and the ongoing dilemma of upkeep and maintenance costs which were proving excessive in a large number of stations.
Neil Grice again pitched into the conference that actually securing good quality income from operators for these smaller stations would allow TOCs to generate income which could be put towards maintenance, either by way of a straight spending of the income or the ability to securitise this income, assuming that the leases and covenants were strong enough.
For more information regarding the event or Grice Collins Long, please contact Neil Grice.
