Dublin Airport to open the first ever honesty box cafe in an airport
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Dublin Airport to open the first ever honesty box cafe in an airport

Dublin Airport will trial the first honesty box-based take away cafe store in an airport anywhere in the world.

The Honest Eats Co fridge - believed to be the first of its kind in the world - will be installed at Marqette’s airside location in Terminal One later this month.

Stocked with a selection of sandwiches, wraps, salads, pastries, snacks and drinks - the stall allows passengers to name their price - by contactless or card - when they come to pay for their items.

The new initiative is a scaling up of the airport’s honesty payment system first used for its Plane Water brand. Since 2014, Dublin Airport has operated an honesty payment system for its water stations in both terminals.

And data from the Plane Water honesty payment initiative showed that about 92 per cent of passengers pay the €1 charge for a 500-ml bottle of water.

“We are constantly seeking to improve the passenger experience at Dublin Airport and are delighted to be working with Marqette to trial the new Honest Eats concept,” said Dublin Airport Managing Director Vincent Harrison.

“Honest Eats has the potential to work really well in an airport setting where passengers in a hurry want to grab high quality food and drink on the go,” said Marqette owner Michael J Wright.

“We’re really excited to be working with Dublin Airport to test this new concept.”

Mayo-based retail software company CBE is supplying the software for the payments system. The initial trial will last for about four weeks and data from the trial will be shared with participants in the upcoming InspireFest Conference in Dublin as part of a mini-hack competition to further refine and improve the Honest Eats concept.

After the initial trial the longer-term plan is to put smaller Honest Eats units around the airport.

“We’re effectively testing a minimum viable version of the Honest Eats concept and we hope that data from the trial... will allow Dublin Airport and Marqette to develop this idea into a fully developed proposition that could be used both here in Dublin and potentially at other airports globally,” Mr Harrison said.