Lotte Duty Free’s 23rd ‘Lotte Family Festival’ took place earlier this month and the biggest DF&TR player – in the world’s biggest DF&TR market of South Korea – readily admits that Hallyu [the ‘Korean Wave’ that has swept Korean culture to huge popularity since the late 1990s] has transformed this event and its business.
This year’s family festival from 15-17 April at the Jamsil Sports Complex was hosted by Lotte Duty Free CEO Jang Sun-wook. The event is described by Lotte DF as “Hallyu’s representative cultural event”.
Lotte DF has been a driver of the Korean Wave with its festivals and publicity events using Hallyu stars. Through its parent conglomerate it has been able to leverage hotel and theme parks operations and, together with 19 overseas sales offices, has established a cooperation system with 250 local travel agencies.
Through its marketing operations such as VIP events, the Lotte DF Family Festival and fan meetings, the company has directly attract 2.45m foreigners over three years (2012-2014).
The retailer is already planning its next Hallyu event: around 3,000 Chinese fans are scheduled to visit Korea from this month to June to participate in a fan meeting for Lotte Duty Free’s new model, singer Hwang Chi-yeul.
(Source: Travel Retail Business )