Lotte’s flagship duty-free store to report W4tr in sales

Lotte Duty Free’s flagship store in Sogong-dong is expected to report 4 trillion won ($3.5 billion) in annual sales, the largest amount among other duty-free stores around the world.

Korea Customs Service data requested by Rep. Choo Kyung-ho showed Sunday that Lotte Duty Free’s Sogong-dong store earned 3.9 trillion won in sales from January to November this year. Considering that average monthly sales were around 350 billion won, Lotte Duty Free said this year’s total sales would hit the 4 trillion-won mark by year’s end, up 30 percent from 3.1 trillion won last year. 

The company said the figure would be the largest sales amount from a single duty-free store in the world. Lotte is currently the world’s second-largest duty-free company by sales, after Dufry in Switzerland. 

During the first 11 months of the year, Shilla Duty Free -- the second-largest duty-free operator in the country, trailing behind Lotte in terms of market share -- reported sales of 2.6 trillion won from its main store at Hotel Shilla in Jangchung-dong.

Shinsegae Duty Free’s Myeong-dong store and Shilla Duty Free’s IPark store in Yongsan reported sales of 1.8 trillion won and 1.7 trillion won respectively. 

From January to November, combined sales from domestic duty-free stores came to 17.3 trillion won, a nearly threefold jump from 6.3 trillion of sales in 2012. Last year, domestic duty-free operators reported total sales of 11.7 trillion won. 

By Kim Da-sol (ddd@heraldcorp.com)