Lotte Duty Free to open second store in Vietnam next year

The new store will be located at the new terminal for international passengers of Cam Ranh International Airport in the central province of Khanh Hoa, well-known for its crystal beaches.
The duty-free operator plans to open the new facility in the first half of 2018 and has secured the exclusive right to run the store until 2028.
Nha Trang, the head town of the province, is among the leading tourist destinations in the country and popular for Chinese and Russian holidaymakers. Several Korean airlines are bringing more Korean tourists to this spot.

Lotte Duty Free’s second store in Vietnam will be located at Cam Ranh International Airport.

The new store follows the official opening of an outlet in the central city of Da Nang, a popular tourist destination in Vietnam, in August. The shop called Phu Khanh Duty Free was set up in a joint venture between Lotte and a Vietnamese company with the Korean company holding a 60 percent stake. Sales of the 1,000-square-meter outlet, which is situated in the Da Nang International Airport, have been targeted at around 30 billion won (US$26.76 million) annually.
Lotte aims at more openings in major Vietnamese cities including Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City in the coming three years to become a leading free-store brand in Vietnam.
Lotte Duty Free’s decision to open tax-exempt outlets in Vietnam comes after it saw sales plunge amid diplomatic tensions between Korea and China over the deployment of THAAD missile system. Of combined sales of 12.3 trillion won ($10.96 billion) raked in by duty-free outlets in downtown Seoul and airports last year, the lion’s share of 70 percent had come from the pockets of Chinese tourists. 
Since then, Lotte Duty Free and its Korean peers have been aggressively exploring business opportunities overseas. Lotte Duty Free, the third-largest duty-free operator in the world, currently runs six airport stores and city branches in Vietnam, Indonesia, Japan, Thailand and Guam.
Lotte Group has now expanded operations in a wide range of business in Vietnam with 12 companies, from retail to fast food, e-commerce, entertainment, real estate, and confectionery.