Dubai Duty Free Q1-25 sales surge past Dh2.06b - with Dubai Chocolate helping too

Dubai: The Dubai Duty Free sales past first quarter sales of Dh2 billion, with February’s Dh709 million setting a new record for the month. The final Q1-2025 tally for DDF came to Dh2.06 billion.

“We are very pleased with our sales for the first three months of the year, especially in February when daily sales reached an average of Dh25.3 million and kept pace with passenger growth,” said Ramesh Cidambi, Managing Director of Dubai Duty Free.  

Perfumes, beverages, tobacco, gold and confectionery held the Top 5 spots category-wise with perfume sales of Dh371 million and contributing 18% of total revenue. Beverage sales came to Dh258 million, while that of tobacco increased 11% over the same period last year with sales of Dh220 million. Gold demand was up ‘marginally’ with sales of Dh212 million, contributing 10% of total revenue.

Confectionery showed robust growth, taking the fifth spot for the first time with a 57% increase over the same period last year, with sales of Dh207 million and contributing 10% of total revenue.

“The remarkable success of the 'Dubai chocolate' offering has contributed significantly to the surge in the confectionary category with specialty brands such as Fix Chocolate, Locali, I Love Dubai, Bateel and Al Nassma collectively generated sales of Dh80.4 million,” said Cidambi.

“That figure represents over 1.2 million individual chocolate bars sold in the first quarter of 2025.”

In addition, recent renovations in the Arrivals shops led to sales of Dh125 million in the first quarter.