Dubai Duty Free sales pass $195m in April; top spenders and products revealed as viral Dubai chocolate sells AED1m a day
It represents an 18 per cent increase over April 2024 and positions April 2025 as the fourth best month on record for the airport retailer since operations began.
Ramesh Cidambi, Managing Director of Dubai Duty Free said: 'November and December 2024 were record months, joined by January 2025, so it is great to see that April sales are in the top four monthly sales rankings now.
Dubai Duty Free sales
'April was a busy month passenger-wise with Eid holidays, Easter and the Arabian Travel Market pushing up passenger numbers. However, as far as we know, sales outstripped passenger numbers, which is a very positive indicator for us'.
In April, the top five product categories sold were perfumes, liquor, tobacco, gold and confectionery:
Perfume sales reached AED128.72m ($35.26m) contributing 18 per cent of total revenue and showing an increase of 16 per cent over the same month last year
Liquor followed closely with sales of AED92.5m ($25.34m) an increase of 13 per cent
Tobacco saw a 25 per cent increase year-on-year with sales of AED73.95m ($20.26m)
Gold sales amounted to AED71.57m ($19.61m), contributing 10 per cent of total revenue and an increase of 35 per cent
Confectionery continued to demonstrate strong growth, achieving AED69.54m ($19.05m), marking an 84 per cent increase from the same month last year and accounting for 10 per cent of total revenue
The Fashion boutiques in Terminal 3's Concourse A and B combined outperformed their sales from last April, recording a 12 per cent increase. This is notable, considering that these boutiques have been lagging in sales since the first quarter of 2024.
The Preloved luxury segment, which is available in the airport retailer's Reklaim outlets, delivered impressive results of AED9m ($2.4m) since it was introduced in December 2024 of which AED3.52m ($970,000) was generated in April alone.
Meanwhile, the viral Dubai chocolate continued its remarkable success story with sales hitting AED28.6m ($7.84m) in April, which is an average of AED1m ($274,000) sales per day.
Other notable performers include ticket sales for the milestone Dubai Duty Free Millenniummaire Series 500, which was sold out within a record 7 days, underscoring strong demand for this popular promotion and adding to the total Millenniummaire sales for April of AED21m ($ 5.26m).
Cidambi said: 'This robust performance can be seen across all categories both in-store and online, with online sales increasing by 3 per cent in April. We are also seeing an increase in the average passenger spend and that is also very encouraging'.
Sales in Departures across the operation reached AED638.27m ($174.87m) representing 90 per cent of total monthly sales and an increase of 19 per cent compared to the same period last year.
Arrivals sales reached AED51.22m ($14.04m), representing 7 per cent of total sales and an increase of 17 per cent over April last year.
In terms of top source markets for Dubai Duty Free:
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