Winning the ‘World’s Best Airport Shopping’ accolade at the Skytrax World Airport Awards 2024 confirms the direction of travel for Qatar Duty Free (QDF) is working, says QDF Senior Vice President Thabet Musleh.

Doha’s Hamad International Airport (HIA) received several honours earlier this week, including ‘World’s Best Airport Shopping’ for a second consecutive year and ‘Best Airport in the Middle East’ for the tenth consecutive year, alongside the top retail award for a second year in a row.

Thabet Musleh, Senior Vice President, Qatar Duty Free said: “Being ranked by travellers as the world’s best airport for shopping validates our vision for elevating this element of the passenger journey from services to experiences.

“Our commitment to delivering unique retail through pioneering approaches such as ‘Transit Tourism’ has made our home a destination in its own right, and with a raft of new openings and innovations in the works we will continue to find new ways of refreshing and differentiating our offer and exceeding the expectations of customers.

“We are extremely proud to have played a central role in Hamad International Airport’s continued success at the Skytrax World Airport Awards.”

Elevating the retail offer

QDF, which runs more than 200 retail and F&B units at HIA, notched sales growth of +32% in 2023 year-on-year.

In a statement, the travel retailer says it has worked hard to continuously elevate the retail offer to deliver memorable, world-class experiences for its passengers, irrespective of their budgets.

Over the past 12 months alone, QDF has engineered numerous openings, including the unveiling of new concepts from Bally, Montblanc, Ralph Lauren, Tag Heuer, and experiential mixed retail and dining concept Souq Al Matar.

Badr Mohammed Al-Meer, Group Chief Executive Officer, Qatar Airways Group said: “It is a source of great pride for Hamad International Airport to be recognised by Skytrax with a number of awards highlighting our leadership in delivering memorable experiences across all our customer touchpoints.

“First-class shopping is an important element in our overall proposition and the team at Qatar Duty Free continues to push boundaries in retail that set Hamad International Airport apart and establish world-leading standards in the aviation industry.”

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