RUSSIA. In this new series to close out 2020, we put the focus on the heroes and heroines who stood up as a global pandemic raged and ensured that travel retail store and restaurant environments were safe and hygienic, that shelves were stocked and that customers – though few in number – could still enjoy a memorable shopping experience, even in constrained conditions.
With the assistance and input of our partners at airport companies, airlines, travel retailers, brands, airport promotion agencies and others, we present the stories of some of those individuals and teams who ensured that a pulse still beat through travel retail this year. As reported in The Moodie Davitt eZine, we salute these front line workers as our People of the Year, with our online coverage building on the pictorial in our year-end edition.
Here we feature the staff at Free Trade Vladivostok, which runs the duty free shops at Vladivostok International Airport. The company only opened an enhanced duty free departures store a year ago, but since March the business has been hit by a -95% fall in international departing passenger traffic, when growth of +25% had been estimated for 2020.
The lack of Asian tourists in particular has hurt the region hard, but the staff at the airport duty free shop are still trying to “give positive emotions to each occasional passenger” coming through, we hear.
The staff at Free Trade Vladivostok passes on their wishes for good health to their colleagues around the world and leave you with this message: “Take care, be strong and optimistic. We will pass these hard times and become stronger.”
Watch out for more stories this week in which we recognise the front line workers of the aviation and travel retail sectors.
