Lotte Duty Free (LDF), South Korea's largest duty free retailer, said that it will turn the 123-story Lotte World Tower, located in southeastern Seoul, into a landmark in Northeast Asia and raise the Lotte Duty Free Shop World Tower’s sales to 4.5 trillion won by 2025. In other words, LDF aims to grow the Lotte Duty Free Shop World Tower into the world’s No.1 duty-free shopping destination.
At a press conference held at the Lotte World Tower, LDF CEO Lee Hong-Kyun unveiled a blueprint for turning the Lotte Duty Free Shop World Tower into the world’s top duty free shop.
LDF looks to have its operating license for the Lotte Duty Free Shop World Tower renewed and jack up its sales to 1.5 trillion won by 2020 and 4.5 trillion by 2025.
“Given that the Lotte Duty Free Shop World Tower’s average CAGR (compound annual growth rate) between 2010 and 2014 was 21 percent, our sales goals are attainable. From the planning stage, we intended to develop the Lotte Duty Free Shop World Tower into a cultural tourism destination attracting foreign tourists,” CEO Lee stressed.
To that end, LDF plans to invest 1.2 trillion won over the next five years and expand Lotte Duty Free Shop World Tower’s total shopping area to 36,000 square meters in time for the completion of the Lotte World Tower, scheduled for sometime in the second half of next year.
To offer foreign tourists things to see, the company has also decided to create a large 123-meter-high musical & light fountain at Seokchon Lake Park. In other words, Lotte is poised to turn the Lotte World Tower into a tourist attraction that can compare well with Dubai’s Burj Khalifa and Singapore’s Marina Bay Sands
On top of that, the company plans to make the Lotte World Tower the largest tourism hub in Gangnam by equipping it with the world's highest observatory (located on the 123rd floor (555 meters high)), South Korea’s first 120-billion-won vineyard-style concert hall for classical music, Lotte Cinema World Tower (Asia's largest multiplex theater), Lotte World Mall's aquarium boasting an 85-meter-long underwater tunnel, a six-star hotel rising 414 meters above ground, etc.