International economic development consulting and financial advisory firm IOS Partners has been awarded a major multi-airport master planning consultancy to evaluate the opportunities for private-public partnerships for regional airports in the State of São Paulo, Brazil. Under the agreement, IOS Partners will focus on rationalizing State participation in the regional airports, and identify and compare […]
Latin America
ForwardKeys: Argentina’s economic woes entice tourists
International travelers are flocking to Argentina, taking advantage of the poorly performing peso to boost the value of their holiday spending money, reports travel booking analyst company ForwardKeys. Bookings for March to May are ahead 11.2% compared to last year, says the research firm. For South America as a whole, bookings are ahead 5.8%. In […]
South American duty free sales struggle as regional recovery stalls
The duty free business in the Mercosur countries has continued to struggle in the first four months of this year, with expected improvements in Argentina and Brazil stalled, likely until the end of the year. ASUTIL Secretary General José Luis Donagaray told media in a webinar this week that the industry does not expect to […]
Panama tenders $9 million cruise terminal operation
The Panama Maritime Authority has announced the tender for the operation and maintenance of the cruise terminal on Perico Island. The terminal is located at Panama City’s Amador Causeway, near the Pacific entrance to the Panama Canal. In this phase of the project, the terminal will be able to berth two large ships up to 380 meters/1,247 […]
Argentina’s Monica Ariaudo’s award-winning store designs serve travelers throughout the Americas
Monica Ariaudo and her team of architects at Estudio Ariaudo in Buenos Aires have played a part in the design of nearly every travel retail development in Argentina and Uruguay in recent years. One of the leading retail architects and shop designers in Latin America. Ariaudo takes an active role in the duty free stores […]
One on One with Rene Riedi, Division CEO Central and South America for Dufry
Managing the LATAM airport duty free business in challenging times The duty free and travel retail business in South America experienced one of its most difficult years in recent memory in 2018, a situation that took place practically overnight. A company like Dufry, which has airport operations in nearly every country in the region, […]
Currency stability returns but outlook for travel retail remains uncertain
Most Latin American economies are experiencing a comparatively quiet start to the year. The currency devaluations that caused such problems in the middle of last year have dissipated, at least for the moment. Both the Argentine Peso and the Brazilian Real have been holding their own against the US Dollar although financial analysts worry that […]
WEBB Banks reinforces number one position in Caribbean
WEBB Banks, the newly created wine and spirits super distributor, is having fantastic success in the region, CEO Andy Consuegra tells TMI. Created from the joining of North Carolina’s Banks Channel and Miami’s WEBB, the merger gave the combined company the scale, the leverage and breadth of portfolio that the partners did not have separately, […]
Rituals global expansion gathers pace as brand opens first store in Americas travel retail at London Supply
Rituals teamed up with Essence Corp, its Americas distributor, to open the brand’s first travel retail store in the region, located at London Supply’s Puerto Iguazu duty free complex. The 28sq m shop-in-shop, which opened Feb. 2, features a large assortment of Rituals products including fragrance sticks, candles, perfumes, gift sets and products from […]
Waked sues National Bank of Panama for losses due to actions taken after company was listed on US Clinton list
Abdul Waked, founder of former leading travel retail company Grupo Wisa, has filed a multi-million-dollar lawsuit against the National Bank of Panama (BNP), claiming damages, loss and loss-of- profit stemming from actions taken after Waked and his businesses were included by the U.S. Treasury Department on the “Clinton List” for activities linked to money laundering […]
ASUTIL to meet with Brazilian and Uruguayan officials to clarify border store product restrictions
Following its announcement in January regarding the harmonization regulations issued by Mercosur at the end of 2018, South American duty free association ASUTIL will be meeting with government officials of Brazil and Argentina to clarify the list of products that had been excluded for sale in the region’s border stores. In a webinar on Friday […]
First Brazilian border duty free store could open by the end of the month
Brazilian businessman Marcos Lemos has confirmed to Travel Markets Insider that his company expects to open the first duty free shop in a Brazilian border town at the end of February/beginning of March. This store – under the façade of “Caraballat Free Shop” — will be the first to open in Brazilian territory since the Brazilian government […]
3Sixty and Avianca Holdings sign agreement for On Line Market Platform for Latin American airline network
3Sixty (formerly DFASS) and airline group Avianca Holdings (AVH) have signed an agreement to convert the current inflight concessions with AVH’s controlled airlines into an innovative pre-order duty free and duty paid platform. The new Joint Business Agreement (JBA) will start with Avianca (Colombia), Aerogal (Ecuador), TACA (Peru), and LACSA (Costa Rica), and will service […]
London Supply Golf Tournament raises more than $723,000 for charitable foundation
Argentine duty free operator London Supply announces that it has raised US$ 723,357 for the company’s charitable foundation from the company’s 15th Annual Golf tournament. The event took place in the Uruguayan resort of Punta del Este on January 4, 2019. This year the funds will be directed to a variety of causes, with most […]
Total passenger traffic rises 6.9% in Argentina, but growth slows from 2017
Passenger traffic at Argentina’s airports reached 29.2m in 2018, up 6.9% over the previous year, reports EANA (Empresa Argentina de Navegación Aérea). Although the growth is in line with average growth over the last ten years, it shows a significant slowdown from the 15% increase in 2017. Domestic traffic grew by 12.4% to 14.2m passengers, […]
