L

otte Duty Free, part of the Lotte Group, the biggest retail company in South Korea, plans to open two more outlets in Jakarta and Bali following the success of the company'€™s first outlet at Soekarno-Hatta International Airport.

Lotte Duty Free president Lee Won-joon said in Jakarta on Friday that the new Jakarta outlet would be opened on Saturday and another one would soon open in Bali as part of the company'€™s expansion plan in Southeast Asia.

'€œThe Indonesian market is very strong, particularly Jakarta, because it has a big population with strong purchasing power and it is the center of business activities,'€ Lee said.

The new Jakarta store is located in Ciputra World mall Jl. Prof. Dr Satrio, South Jakarta, and will be officially opened by Korean heartthrob Super Junior who is also the brand ambassador of the duty free shop.

'€œWe believe we can repeat our Korean success story in Indonesia because the potential is here. We can see that from our sales performance in our duty free shop at Soekarno-Hatta, which opened last year,'€ he said.

According to the firm'€™s data, with only 20 percent retail space occupation, Lotte'€™s sales accounted for 40 percent of the total sales recorded by all the duty-free stores in the airport by the end of last year.

He also said that market potential was strong because the growth rate in the number of departing passengers from the country'€™s main gateway had reached 13 percent, which was twice the rate of Seoul'€™s Incheon International Airport. With such a rate, Lotte Duty Free estimates the number of customers in the Jakarta would reach one third of the number in Incheon by 2015. Due to the promising market, the company plans to expand its outlet at the airport.

In addition, he said that the expansion of stores in Indonesia would position the nation as one of the largest contributors to Lotte Duty Free'€™s worldwide sales by the end of 2015.

'€œIndonesia will represent 10 percent of our sales worldwide as we extend our platform here,'€ he added.

Currently, the firm runs stores in 14 locations across Asia, such as Korea, Japan, Singapore and China, occupying 331,000 square feet of retail floor space, with US$2.9 billion sales and a 16 percent compound annual growth rate (CAGR) throughout 2012.

The shop features a variety of quality products, including perfumes, cosmetics, tobacco products and alcohol, as well as various designer brands, such as Coach, Prada, Fendi, MaxMara, Dunhill, Mont Blanc, Chanel and
Estee Lauder.

Lotte Group entered the Indonesian market in 2008 after acquiring 19 outlets around the country from Dutch wholesaler Makro, which it rapidly developed into Lotte Mart hypermarkets.

As of today, there are 24 Lotte Mart stores and the group plans to open up 100 more by 2018.

First launched in 1979, the Group is the fifth-largest conglomerate in South Korea after Samsung, Hyundai Motor, SK and LG.

Lotte'€™s businesses cover retail, food and drink, tourism, petrochemicals, construction and manufacturing. In retail, the group manages Lotte Department Store, Lotte Mart, Lotte Super, Lotte Duty Free Store and Lotte Home Shopping.