Glen Morgan moved to Abu Dhabi three years ago when he joined luxury travel retailer DFS as Vice President of Retail Operations. An experienced retailer, he began his career with Marks & Spencer in the UK where he held a number of positions in various stores over his 14 years of service.
In 2002, Glen joined M.H. Al Shaya where he held several key management roles – the last of which was as Senior Operations Manager for Debenhams, Middle East where he was responsible for 20 stores across six Middle East countries. He was the General Manager of M.A.P Luxury Division Indonesia, where he was responsible for luxury brands such as Harvey Nichols, Armani, Ferragamo, Loewe, and Max Mara, prior to joining DFS Abu Dhabi.
Dr. Peter Mohn (42) graduated as a Psychologist and earned a Ph.D. in Business Psychology at the University of Göttingen, Germany. Peter is of Norwegian origin, has lived in Denmark, Belgium, The Netherlands, Finland, UK and Germany and lives in Switzerland since 2002. Peter has been working for various leading global market research agencies since 1993 and has been in top management positions since 2000. He has been specializing in Travel Retail research since 2004 and consults various leading brands as well as shop operators in this field.
Based at Lake Geneva, m1nd-set is specialized in Travel Retail and Airport marketing research & consulting on a global basis. m1nd-set conducts consumer research at airports, at border shops, on ferries and cruises on over 60 markets worldwide for global Travel Retail brands as well as operators, airports etc. m1nd-set conducts quantitative and qualitative research on many different subjects, such as Travel Retail shopping motivation & behaviour, mystery shopping, brand awareness and evaluation, price elasticity (conjoint surveys), promotion effectiveness, observation of shoppers, travel retail exclusive product testing, segmentation surveys etc.
Keith Hunter is the Chief Retail Officer for Urban-Air Port Ltd (UAP), a cutting-edge company providing innovative ground infrastructure as a service for Future Air Mobility, and is creating a fresh and ambitious retail and advertising division delivering experiential retail for each UAP, sponsorship opportunities and a comprehensive online collaboration of brand and service partners for the UAP App.
Keith also co-founded Hunter Palmer – Global Retail Solutions, a specialist travel retail and food & beverage consultancy, working collaboratively with airports, airlines, operators and brands.
Previously, as Senior Vice President of Qatar Duty Free for Qatar Airways, Keith spearheaded the Hamad International Airport retail, food & beverage and advertising offer, from inception through to the opening and operation and also served as a board member of the Middle East & Africa Duty Free Association (MEADFA) for 5 years.
Sherif Toulan serves as the Chief Executive Officer of IDF in Egypt. In this role he oversees the company operations including its diverse subsidiaries. Mr Toulan’s combined efforts have played an integral part in diversifying the operations of IDF and growing the business vertically and laterally thereby establishing IDF as a nationwide benchmark in the industry.
During his tenure, Mr Toulan succeeded in acquiring a number of airport retail concessions for IDF. In 2010 he founded Global Brands, a subsidiary of IDF the with a focus on the local market In 2013, he established Heinemann -Egypt, of which he is currently Chairman. Heineman Egypt is a joint venture between Global Brands, Global Trading and Technology and Gebr. Heinemann who are now operating its Duty Free Shops in Sharm El Sheikh Airport.
Mr Toulan joined IDF in 1997 as Business Development Coordinator responsible for Business Development and Strategy implementation and since then he has held a number of positions with increasing responsibility.
Part of the MEADFA Board since 2009, Mr Toulan served as Vice President (2019-21) before being elected President earlier this year. He also serves on a number of boards and associations. He is currently a Member of the Board of International Duty Free (IDF) and Global Trading and Technology, one of the subsidiaries of IDF with core focus in tobacco machinery and spare parts. In addition he is an active member of both the American and German chambers of commerce in Egypt.
Sherif Toulan holds a BA from the American University in Cairo and an Executive MBA from North Western University.
A former president of MEADFA, John Sime is Vice President Retail Services at Emirates Airline, one of the world’s fastest growing airlines.
John has been employed by Emirates since 1997 and is tasked with the development of the company’s onboard retail programme and the operation of a global rewards platform for Skywards members.
Before joining Emirates John held positions with several major duty free operators, including Aer Rianta International and Harding Bros. John has worked in most duty free retail environments, including ferries, cruiselines, airports and airlines.
Paul Griffiths is Chief Executive Officer of Dubai Airports, with responsibility for the operation and development of Dubai International as well as Dubai World Central, which will eventually be the world’s largest airport with capacity to handle 160 million passengers and 12 million tonnes of freight annually.
Paul joined Dubai Airports as its first CEO in October 2007. Exactly a year later, on October 14, he orchestrated the flawless launch of Terminal 3 at Dubai International and on June 27, 2010 successfully opened the emirate’s second airport, Dubai World Central. He achieved another milestone in Dubai’s aviation history on January 2, 2013 with the similarly flawless opening of Concourse A, the world’s first purpose-built A380 facility.
Prior to moving to Dubai, Paul was Managing Director of London’s Gatwick Airport, the second largest airport in the UK. Before joining airport operator BAA in 2004, he spent 14 years with the Virgin Group, working closely with Sir Richard Branson as a Board Director of the Virgin Travel Group, embracing the commercial activities of both Virgin Atlantic Airways and Virgin Trains. Prior to this, in the 1980s, he spent four years in Hong Kong developing the marketing, commercial planning and technology functions for the then start-up airline Dragonair.
Paul’s career in transportation arose out of the strict advice of his father not to pursue his passion for music. An accomplished organist, Paul has managed to combine a high-profile career with a schedule of concert and recital engagements, and has made many public appearances as a recitalist, continuo player and soloist in concerti with major orchestras.
Paul is married to Joanna (also a concert organist and composer) and has three children between the ages of 9 and 22.
Anthony Chalhoub is currently joint Chief Executive Officer of the Chalhoub Group and General Manager of four luxury brand distribution companies in the region: Habchi & Chalhoub, the Louis Vuitton joint venture, MAC and Fitra.
It was in 1975 that Anthony joined the Group founded and managed by his father, immersing himself in business life by moving to Kuwait where his parents had already been working for several years developing Franco-Kuwaiti relations. He worked hard to promote and gain acceptance from the prominent names in perfumes, high fashion and jewelry.
Mindful of maintaining the image of the brands that placed their trust in him and to keep France’s high profile in the Middle East; he has performed all his functions as Overseas Trade Counselor starting in 1991 and took an active part in the “France in Kuwait” exhibitions of 1991, 1994, 1996 and 2004.
Sarah Branquinho is an active advocate for the duty-free and travel retail industry, and the key dual role it plays in enhancing transport infrastructure and the passenger experience. She is President of the European Travel Retail Confederation, the representative organisation for the duty free and travel retail industry in Europe, Chair of the UK Travel Retail Forum and a member of the Board of the Duty Free World Council. Sarah was also recently elected to the ACI World Business Partners Advisory Board.
With thirty years of experience in the duty free industry at TFWA, then managing the consumer mobilisation programme and the ambitious research projects which underpinned the lobby to save intra-EU duty free, Sarah joined BAA and its retail company World Duty Free where her remit for business relationships and external affairs grew with the company. With World Duty Free’s recent acquisition by Dufry AG, the overall business now accounts for one in every four travel retail sales worldwide.
