ASUTIL 2016 – Latin America Travel Retail in Review

Click here to open the 2016 edition of the ASUTIL Latin America report
Click here to open the 2016 edition of the ASUTIL Latin America report

Welcome to a special edition from The Moodie Davitt Report focusing on the turbulent, fast-changing Latin American travel retail market.

It coincides with the annual ASUTIL Conference, which begins in Santiago de Chile on 8 June.

Delegates to the event will hear a sobering analysis of the current state of the regional industry in Santiago, with sales declines for the first quarter of 2016 in double digits in many markets.

Venezuela’s deep crisis and the currency devaluations in many Latin American countries are factors, but it is the uncertainty generated by Brazil’s political impasse and economic woes that weighs most heavily on the region’s travel retailers.

Peter Dowling assesses Brazil’s problems and how they affect in particular retailers on the country’s borders, notably Uruguay and Paraguay, in this report.

Yet there is also much investment in the region’s largest market. With the recent opening of the Terminal 2 South Pier in May, we discover how Rio de Janeiro’s main international gateway wants to set a gold standard for commercial at Brazil’s airports in advance of the Olympic Games.

Also, the Infrámerica consortium talks about its big ambitions at Brasilia International, and Dufry provides a round-up of its latest store developments in Brazil.

Elsewhere, we examine new opportunities for duty free retail that will soon take shape at major airports in Panama and Costa Rica.

We look at how currency and economic troubles, alongside natural disasters, have hampered the travel retail business in Colombia, Ecuador and Venezuela, and we assess how tourism continues to grow in Mexico.

You’ll find plenty more besides in this special report into a challenging but exciting region for travel retail.

Please enjoy this edition with our compliments.

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