Guest column: Omnevo reshapes airline retail strategies with Pre-Order, Pre-Select
This is a special feature from the April 2026 AIX Hamburg issue of PAX Tech, on page 64.
In this guest column, Daniel Haller, Program Director, Omnevo, highlights the benefits of an “exit via the gift shop” strategy for ancillary retail.
Pre-Order, Pre-Select presents a new way forward, treating ancillary retail as a connected ecosystem across the journey
Almost every visitor to a museum, gallery or theme park knows the experience of exiting through the gift shop. It is not just about souvenirs, but extending the journey, creating one last moment of discovery and capturing value that adds to the overall experience.
What if airlines thought the same way? What if every flight did not just end at the destination, but with a seamless opportunity for passengers to engage with personalized retail? That is the essence of our Exit via the Gift Shop strategy, powered by Omnevo’s Pre-Order Pre-Select product.
Facing the challenge
Onboard retail has too often been treated as a bolt-on. The result? Low engagement, inconsistent passenger experience and missed revenue opportunities.
The exit via the gift shop strategy is enabled by Pre-Order, Pre-Select, launched by Omnevo at the end of last year. Pre-Order, Pre-Select presents a new way forward, treating ancillary retail as a connected ecosystem across the journey. It offers retail opportunities everywhere, enabling seatback, mobile and crew-led sales, all part of one flow, and personalized experiences linked to loyalty, preferences and profiles. This strategy also delivers end-to-end fulfilment, ensuring the right product is in the right place at the right time. Simply, integrating retail into moments when passengers are already engaged.
Daniel Haller, Program Director, Omnevo
For the industry, this marks the first time retail has been integrated directly into the complimentary F&B journey, transforming a simple pre-order into a natural upsell. This results in convenience for passengers and a powerful new revenue stream for airlines.
Service, not sales
Ancillary retail is no longer an afterthought. It is fast becoming the future of how airlines engage passengers, build loyalty and unlock commercial opportunities. The more personalized the experience, the more it feels like service, not sales.
There is also a powerful ripple effect: when a passenger logs in to choose their complimentary meal, they are already one step inside the airline’s retail ecosystem. That simple click-through drives organic traffic to the duty free store, turning a routine task into an invitation to explore.Once they are browsing, the chances of conversion skyrocket.
At Omnevo, we see this as the blueprint for the next evolution of inflight commerce: a retail experience that feels natural, personal and connected across the journey. This is just the start of how the “exit via the gift shop” strategy–anchored by pre- order and pre-select–will reshape the way airlines think about retail.
