“Pushing boundaries”: Gary Leong launches Gulf Pacific
Travel retail veteran Gary Leong has launched Gulf Pacific, with plans to take the lead in revolutionizing travel retail experiences and provide comprehensive services across retail, branding, media, manpower solutions, and F&B.
With over 20 years’ in the retail industry, Gary has vast experiences in spearheading the expansion of a number of luxury retail brands both via domestic and global travel retail channels, with his most significant achievement being expanding the travel retail channel of a global beauty brand to over 230 POS in 26 countries in just five years.
Crafted with a deep understanding of stakeholder needs, customer insights, and the evolution of the current travel retail landscape in Asia, Gulf Pacific aims to create seamless connections for clients eager to tap into the profitable segment. With the current generation of consumers becoming more digitally-enabled and exposed to numerous e-commerce platforms, understanding consumer behavior and spending habits to improve sales conversion has become more important than ever before.
“My new journey with Gulf Pacific allows me a creative outlet to dig deeper for ways to propel the industry to greater heights,” Leong said. “Our attentions are purely on delivering a full approach concept designed for full-funnel campaigns, catering to brands that wish to enter the domestic and global travel retail markets. Gulf Pacific will not only add value to on-ground activations by increasing conversion rates but harnessing the power of networking and selling to specific target audiences. We are excited to be at the forefront of the expansion of the industry by introducing revolutionary concepts to maximize every moment of the travellers journey – both for the individual, and for the brand.”
Gulf Pacific, together with its founder, who has first-hand experience in the China market, has harnessed valuable insights into the industry after witnessing the evolution of the retail landscape in key years of 2000 to 2023.
Translating that experience into Gulf Pacific sees expertise in marketing, public relations, media exposure, social media management, event management, and live-streaming sales, all exclusively tailored to the distinctive needs of Chinese consumers. During the pandemic, Leong managed to navigate expansion on the island of Hainan, and by the end of 2023, developed over 15 POS for a major beauty brand.
Focused primarily on delivering the travel retail experience revolution, Gulf Pacific in its early stages already has managed to secure an array of impressive clientele. From household names to innovative start-ups, with a full portfolio to be revealed in due time, the company’s current focus is its partnership with the VMSD Group.
VMSD collaborates with Aston Martin and Bowmore in a travel retail activation
With over 30 years of experience, the VMSD Group has been at the forefront of helping international brands increase their visibility and enhance consumer engagement worldwide. Specializing in both global travel retail and domestic retail, the VMSD Group offers a wide range of end-to-end services designed to address the rapidly evolving retail landscape including concept design and technical drawings, global production, logistics, project management and manpower solutions.
VMSD Group’s track record includes delivering activations, pop-ups, and events across 20+ airports and domestic shops, including Singapore, Hong Kong, China, Japan, Dubai, Australia, and beyond. VMSD Group also specializing in providing extensive manpower solutions to major travel retail hubs across the region.
Jacelyn Lee, VMSD Group’s Managing Director, commented, “Our partnership with Gulf Pacific is a pivotal step forward for the VMSD Group. Leveraging on decades of retail expertise, the synergies between our companies will unlock new opportunities and elevate our capabilities across the Asia-Pacific region. We are excited about the potential for growth that this partnership represents, both regionally and globally.”
“The VMSD Group is our first partnership, and a significant one at that,” Leong added. “As we continue to innovate this sector of the industry, other categories such as media and F&B will have partnerships with that same drive and synergy. Our first point of action with the VMSD Group will be to add value to their manpower solutions by honing their selling skills, and arm them with deeper insights into the customer base. The result will be staff that are able to actively pitch to a demographic, instead of repeating marketing pointers that do not resonate, leaving the funnel ending at awareness.”
Gulf Pacific’s partnership with VMSD is already well underway at Changi Airport, facilitating brands and two major Korean duty-free retailers with their intensive need for activations and staffing daily over 37 duty free stores spanning 4 terminals, with 24-hour operations. With Changi’s recent announcement of its fifth terminal and global air passenger volume expected to double by 2040, this marks a promising start for Gulf Pacific to expand even further throughout APAC.
REGION Asia International
