Helena moved to Dubai eight years ago and has been working since 2004 for African + Eastern. Her first role with A&E was in the on-trade channel as a wine sales executive, and she has since moved into the travel retail division. She was appointed Sales manager – travel retail in 2009. In this capacity she looks after all travel retail customers in the UAE – with the biggest customer being Dubai Duty Free. Helena recently completed the WSET Wine Diploma Level, and now runs a range of wine trainings for travel retail customers and runs WSET courses up to advanced level.
Originally from Belgium, Helena began her career in the wine industry in South Africa, in sales & marketing. Once back from South Africa, she worked for a media agency in Russia, Switzerland, Iceland, Kyrgyzstan and Qatar. Helena was brought up exposed to many different European languages and is fluent in 5 languages.
David Maddison heads up Initium Onboard’s Retail Partnerships Division. Previously, he was the International Sales Manager for BAA’s Airport Express Alliance, the trade sales and marketing alliance for the Heathrow and Gatwick Express Air-Rail links and was responsible for the concept and successful implementation of “virtual” stock free in-flight sales activities of both services with major airlines operating into London. He has spent over two decades in the aviation industry, much of that time with Qantas Airways and OAG.
Eisa Adam Ibrahim is a graduate of Business Studies from University of Sudan. He started off his career in manufacturing, and went on to advertising / marketing to organizing and selling exhibition spaces.
He then shifted his career focus to the shopping mall industry making a debut with Sabco, in Muscat, Sultanate of Oman, in the year 1988 over to Al Harthy Complex, in Muscat, gained potential knowledge into all the intricacies of a shopping center, and went on to assume the position of Mall Manager at the Al Ghurair Centre, and now is the General Manager of Burjuman Centre & Al Reef Mall.
As the General Manager of BurJuman Centre, he has worked extensively, endlessly putting his heart and soul over the years into developing this mall as second to none; today, it is due to his expertise in operations, marketing and administration that BurJuman stands as a retail icon with the image of a better class of shopping and which has redefined the shopping experience in Dubai.
Born in 1951, Gunnar Heinemann grew up in Hamburg.
After graduating from high school he attended the military service which was followed by his studies of Economics in Zurich and subsequent stays in London and Paris.
In November 1978 he entered Gebr. Heinemann as co-owner and is today general partner and member of the Gebr. Heinemann board.
He is married with 2 sons.
Rachael Green began her career in 1988 with UK food retailing giant, J Sainsbury, where she quickly found her calling in Training and became the Regional Training Manager for the group. She joined the head office of the Co-Operative Retail Services Group in 1997 where she was responsible for Management Development across the company. She later moved to Coca-Cola and Schweppes as Regional Training Manager.
Rachael moved to the Middle East and joined the HR Department of Dubai Duty Free in 2000 as Training Manager. In 2001 she was appointed Recruitment and Employee Development Manager.
During her time with the airport retailer, Rachael has been responsible for the set up of the training department and the implementation of several company-wide training and development programmes including Cultural Diversity, Selling Skills, Service and Leadership skills. She has also been involved with a number of other HR initiatives concerning employee engagement, performance management, elearning and coaching.
She has also overseen and driven the recruitment of thousands of shopfloor and back office employees, ensuring that the staff strengths are in line with Dubai Duty Free’s growth and expansion plans.
Dubai Duty Free currently employs 4,000 staff, representing 46 different nationalities.
Uwe Faber has worked for P&G for the past 15 years. He worked on diverse categories in DACH prior to entering the TR business. Initially responsible as area manager for UK/Ire, he later organized and led a Global Travel Retail Trade Marketing organization which largely determines P&G’s channel strategy. Following an interim Management assignment in the Middle East, Uwe was given Global Category Management and Shopper Insights responsibility for P&G Prestige Products.
Based in Geneva, he has developed a shopper based Category Management approach to the fragrance business that is being adopted by numerous top retailers around the world.
Combining shopper understanding and category POS data shared by retailers, he helps these to better profile their equity and win in their market place.
Isabelle moved to Jordan almost 3 years ago to contribute to the expansion of Amman International Airport, specifically in charge of all commercial developments and customer service, including the retail at the New Terminal under construction, due to open Next Summer.
A dedicated airport person, Isabelle originally joined Aéroports de Paris in 1992 and has been since then faithfully accompanying the great commercial changes of the Parisian group, occupying a range of positions within the travel retail division, marketing and international commercial development (Asia, Africa, Central America).
Proud to be a key element for the commercial and customer service enhancement of Queen Alia International airport, leading all current commercial tenders (from F&B to car parking as well as lounges and transit hotel) Isabelle is also intensely participating in the transfer of competencies to the local Jordanian team and leading them in structuring a comprehensive set of marketing tools to provide Amman Airport with the highest level of service.
Garrett has worked in the duty free industry with Aer Rianta International since 1989. During this time he has held senior management positions in fast moving and environmentally challenging duty free operations in Russia and Ukrain . Since April 2011 he is the General Manager of the multi award winning Bahrain Duty Free.
Garrett is a dynamic, confident and visionary leader who recruits and inspires strong and experienced management teams. In conjunction with these teams he creates great places to work which become profitable duty free businesses. He believes strongly in maximizing customer value via clearly defined and communicated strategic market management. This gives all performance orientated team members a sense of purpose and direction which in turn will bring added shareholder value.
Dan Cappell is a veteran of the Industry having worked on all three sides of the Trinity, initially during 22 years with Nestle SA, the last ten as General Manager of Nestle International Travel Retail. In 2002 Dan moved to the Middle East as Deputy Managing Director of Abu Dhabi Duty Free & Inflight catering. He then spent a short period of time with Aer Rianta International-Middle East before returning to Abu Dhabi, where he has held a number of key senior roles within the commercial function of Abu Dhabi Airports.
Dan is currently Senior Vice-President Business Development with a wide remit across the airports commercial business that is being led by the Midfield Terminal project. He cites playing golf badly, cooking and reading as his main forms of relaxation.
Alan Brennan is an Irish national, with a 360 career in Travel Retail, which started with DFS in the Finance & Buying department across different product categories. After leaving DFS, he moved to a senior Sales and Marketing role with a leading UK based agency overseeing and managing the Pan European development of blue chip brands in the Liquor, Perfumery and Tobacco categories.
In 1999, he joined Nestlé ITR (NITR) as regional sales manager for Europe managing the development of Nestlé confectionery business during the post Duty Free abolition era. In 2001, he moved to Dubai in the U.A.E. to take up the role of regional business manager for the Middle East/Part Asia region. During his time in Dubai, he managed and drove the rapid development and growth of Nestlé business in this dynamic region, whilst completing a 2 year MBA with Leicester University in the UK.
Since late 2009, Alan has taken up a new position at NITR head-office in Switzerland to lead its global Customer Marketing department, managing the development of its Perfect Store™ category initiative, shopper research and in store visibility program.
