2013 Bicester Channel Check

CHANNEL CHECK: Luxury Channel Check Posh on parade at Bicester Village

IOJ’s luxury analyst pays a visit to Value Retail’s top-producing outlet village.

My MECCA IS 130 luxury shops in a rural setting less than an hour from London by train. Today the town of Bicester, England, is as much known for Value Retail’s designer outlet village there as it is for its 1,000 years of Saxon history and its proximity to Bleinheim Palace (Winston Churchill’s ancestral home) and Waddesdon Manor with its world-renowned collection of 18th century French decorative arts.

In sum, a visit to Bicester Village is an imperative for shoppers, historians and connoisseurs alike. I took the 42-minute train ride from London Marylebone with Tamara Ben- jamin, who heads up corporate communications at Bicester Village. She told me that the outlet center is one of Value Retail’s nine Chic Outlet Shopping Villages, all located near Europe’s most stylish capital cities and all filled with fashion’s most sought-after labels.

Read my write up in the International Outlet Journal.