INTERNATIONAL. The latest data from travel analyst Air4casts has identified a shortlist of international departure terminals where passenger nationality mix suggests new confectionery opportunities for travel retailers, led by Jakarta Soekarno Hatta International Airport Terminal 3, Indonesia.
The Terminals to Watch chart covers approximately 1.99 billion international departures across 1,007 terminal identifiers in 2026, with Helsinki, Düsseldorf and Kuala Lumpur Terminal 2 also among those highlighted.
Other airports featured on the shortlist are Palma de Mallorca, Geneva Terminal 1, Munich Terminal 2 and Zurich.
The shortlist reflects passenger volumes and nationality mix at each terminal, with Air4casts comparing modelled confectionery propensity per passenger across those recording at least five million annual international departures.
The 2026 figures cover actuals through August and forecast data for the September to Decemeber.
The chart is described as an opportunity signal, rather than a ranking of chocolate sales, with a neutral passenger mix indexed at 1.000. The eight highlighted terminals record scores of between 1.215 and 1.235 under the model’s assumptions.
Air4casts said the close scores do not indicate meaningful differences in actual purchasing between terminals. The results instead identify locations where assortment, gifting formats, local products and price points could be tested against observed sales.
The scale of airport chocolate retail is evident in Brussels and Dubai, with Brussels Airport reporting around 850 tonnes of chocolate sales annually and calling itself the world’s largest chocolate outlet.
With 719 tonnes of Dubai chocolate sold in 2025, Dubai Duty Free generated AED845 million (US$230 million) in total confectionery sales across its operations at Dubai International and Al Maktoum.
The figures use varying product and airport definitions and are not directly comparable as a global ranking, but they provide useful commercial context for the terminal opportunity analysis, Air4casts said.
The analysis also matched terminal passenger data with confectionery concession records, with Avolta, Heinemann and Lagardère Travel Retail showing the broadest mapped reach by matched terminals and passenger flows.
Air4casts said the mapping is designed to show where retailers have an existing footprint, rather than provide a measure of shop footfall, conversion or chocolate sales. The passenger analysis is intended as a starting point, allowing retailers and brands to validate the findings against category sales and the strength of local offers. ✈
