One Heathrow Launch, Nearly 20 Years Together: Our Story with World Duty Free
How a brief to hire more than 150 people became a partnership that has lasted through busy summers, a pandemic and a lot of change.
When World Duty Free needed to recruit more than 150 new team members for the opening of its flagship at Heathrow Terminal 5, it called ResourceBank. Every one of those people needed security clearance, which can take up to three months. We delivered, and World Duty Free asked us to stay.
Nearly 20 years on, we are still their retail recruitment outsourcing partner across the UK. This is how that happened.
Recruiting for retail at scale? Let’s talk about what a partnership could look like for you.
The Challenge World Duty Free Faced
World Duty Free is a UK travel retailer where customer experience comes first, and hiring people who deliver it was far from simple.
Summer traffic and seasonal demand spikes meant hiring needs could jump almost overnight. Their shops sit beyond airport security, so every candidate needed clearance, and that can take up to three months, right when the summer peak needs people on the shop floor. They were competing for talent with department stores that don’t have those hurdles, and many retail candidates don’t travel internationally enough to feel a link with the brand. On top of that came more than 40,000 applications a year, each one deserving a fair answer.
Does Your Hiring Look Like This?
You don’t need to be in an airport to recognise it. If you recruit in retail, you may be facing:
- Seasonal peaks and sales events that need a big hiring push at short notice
- Pre-employment checks that slow down start dates
- Competition from other well-known retailers for the same people
- Thousands of applications to sort through fairly and quickly
- The need to hire people who fit your culture and customer service standards, as well as fill the rota
- Hiring across many sites with the same quality everywhere
These are the problems retail recruitment outsourcing is built to solve, and you’re not alone in having them.
Hiring for retail? Tell us what you’re facing and we’ll show you how we’d solve it.
Retail Recruitment Outsourcing Built on Values
We began by asking World Duty Free what great looks like. Together we pinned down the behaviours and values they wanted in every team member, then rewrote the assessment and interview process to find those qualities, rather than matching people to a job title.
With so many applications, we also needed a fair and fast way to sort them. We found the right online behavioural screening tool, tailored it, trialled it and introduced it. Each applicant answers questions about how they would act, and is scored against World Duty Free’s values and focus on the customer. For high volume roles such as Customer Service Assistants, the strongest matches rise to the top. It also helps spot people with the potential to lead.
It made a difference quickly. The time to process new applicants halved. Cultural fit was now measured objectively instead of guessed from a CV, so a wider range of people were put forward, with more diversity and better quality hires.
Better Hires, Better Customer Service
When stores needed to reopen after COVID, we were already in place. In 2022, we helped World Duty Free rehire quickly so they could get back to full strength. That is what nearly 20 years in the same partnership buys you: a team that already knows the business when things move fast.
Want to see how we’d do the same for your stores?
Hi-Tech, Hi-Touch, Year After Year
In 2025 we added an AI-powered assistant that runs structured interviews at the early stage. It asks every candidate the same questions, which keeps assessment consistent, and it speeds up feedback and decisions, especially in busy periods. It never makes the hiring call. That stays with our recruiters and World Duty Free’s managers.
That frees our recruiters to do what they do best: interviewing, talking to candidates and showing off the World Duty Free brand. We also run the careers website and digital interviews, so a candidate’s first impression is one we help shape.
The Outcome
Over the years, our retail recruitment outsourcing partnership has delivered:
- Recruitment across 37 UK sites
- 1,000+ hires a year in peak years
- Over 40,000 applications managed each year
- An average time to offer of 8 days
- AI tools that improve recruitment effectiveness by 33%
- A careers website, digital interviews and a values-based screening process built around the client
It has also been recognised by the industry:
- 2015: Best Embedded Recruitment Team, Recruiter Awards
- 2024: TIARA Long-Term Talent Solutions Partnership Award, recognising 17+ years of collaboration
- 2026: Shortlisted for RPO Team of the Year
“Appointing ResourceBank in 2007 was one of the best decisions we’ve ever made.” – Geoff Hall, former HR Director UK & Northern Europe, World Duty Free
Want to see what this could do for your hiring? Book a 30-minute strategy call
Here’s to the Next Chapter
Nearly 20 years is a long time to work with anyone. What keeps this partnership going is simple: a team that knows World Duty Free’s business, hires for it as if it were our own, and turns up for every peak. We’re looking forward to what comes next.
Ready to talk about retail recruitment outsourcing for your business? Start the conversation
Retail HR Director or Talent Acquisition lead?
Our retail recruitment specialists can talk you through how we hired for 37 World Duty Free sites, with 1,000+ hires a year in peak years and an average time to offer of 8 days. Book a conversation today.
