Topaz Dublin Airport
Topaz, opened a new state-of-the-art forecourt on a former Esso site at Dublin Airport last December and the business has enjoyed a successful few months.
The €3m re-development took 25 weeks to complete – a tiny shop and a four-pump island were swept away during the revamp, making room for a new state-of-the-art facility at one of the country’s busiest locations.
Around 20 million people pass through Dublin Airport every year – that’s around 55,000 people each week – and in addition to serving the needs of the travelling public, the new forecourt will be a boon to the 18,000 people who work at the airport.
As well as a modern, 150 sq m convenience store, the new facilities include wi-fi internet access, an EV charging point, a car wash and additional forecourt services. It also boasts a much enhanced fresh food and beverage offering, including barista coffee, rotisserie chicken and a menu packed with locally sourced and freshly prepared ingredients – all served ‘to go’ or available in a comfortable new, 50-seater restaurant area.
“Our new site at Dublin City Airport has a constant stream of customers at present,” confirmed Paul Candon of Topaz. “It’s a very high profile location and the flow of custom through it is very steady. We’re certainly very pleased with what we’ve been able to do here and we’ve had some fantastic feedback. This is now one of the most modern and efficient stations in the country. What we were really keen to do was to give people a modern and enjoyable experience when they visited us.”
The new facilities include a cutting-edge canopy, much more prominent signage, energy-efficient lighting, ‘hotel standard’ toilets with baby-changing facilities and live information on departures and arrivals at the nearby airport. The forecourt also offers pay-at-the-pump convenience, bringing the total number of Topaz sites in Ireland that offer the facility to 15.
The site also boasts the first installation of the Helix fuel dispensers in Ireland by Wayne, a global innovator of forecourt fuel technology. The contract builds on an existing relationship between Wayne and Topaz Energy. In 2011, Wayne installed its iX Pay secure payment platform into its existing dispensers across the Topaz retail network in Ireland.
“Innovation like this is very much a part of what we do, we’re always looking for new ways to improve the design and layout of our facilities,” said Paul, who adds that the Dublin Airport site has performed well above expectations in its first few weeks of trading, recording business levels that are 40 per cent above those of the old station.
“Our focus now is to take this on to the next level,” added Paul. “Part and parcel of those plans will be a greater focus on food service. That emphasis on food will be very evident going forward in the company, we’re looking to re-configure a lot of our older stations to provide them with a much wider and more attractive food offering. Traditional things like cigarettes and magazines are in decline and we need to off-set that with new and more attractive growth categories, of which hot and cold beverages are going to be a large part.”
The Dublin Airport site takes its place in a programme of expansion for Topaz that includes the recent announcement of an additional €8m investment in two new motorway sites on the Dublin Cork and Dublin Waterford routes.
One of the stations will be at junction three on the M8 near Ballacolla in County Laois and the other will be situated at junction 5 on the M9. Topaz says that again, both sites will be among the most modern and best equipped in Ireland, providing much-needed facilities to motorists on both these busy routes.
Kevin Toland, chief executive of Dublin Airport Authority, says that the re-vamped forecourt is excellent news for air travellers and airport workers:
“We have been working closely with Topaz to ensure services for motorists and this wonderful new facility will do just that,” he adds. “The Christmas period was among our busiest with 660,000 passengers using the airport and it’s great that they were able to avail of this new station.”
