[THE INVESTOR] Hanwha Galleria will hold a grand opening event on July 15 for its downtown duty-free store that had a limited opening in December inside the 63 Building in Yeouido, western Seoul.

Located on a 10,072 square-meter site, the outlet of the duty-free store business unit of Hanwha Group has attracted some 530 international brands even though it failed to host the so-called “Big 3” fashion houses -- Chanel, Hermes and Louis Vuitton. 


Hanwha Galleria started operations since it earned operational rights at Jeju International Airport in April 2014. Following the business rights for the first Seoul store, the company is also joining a bid to operate another store in downtown Seoul that will be decided later this year.

In the first quarter, Hanwha posted 43.7 billion won (US$38 million) in duty-free sales, more than double that of 16.3 billion won a year ago before its Seoul store opened. But with increased investments recently, operating loss also soared to 8.4 billion won during the same period.

The Seoul store’s daily sales are estimated at about 500-600 million won.

By Lee Ji-yoon (jylee@heraldcorp.com)