Hyundai Department Store Duty Free Co., a unit under South Korean retail giant Hyundai Department Store Group, will open its first duty-free store in the posh neighborhood of southern Seoul next month.

Hyundai Department Store Group, which was the only one of Korea’s top three retailers without a travel retail business, won its first license in December 2016.

The new duty-free store is to open within the Hyundai Department Store’s COEX branch in Gangnam. It will span three floors - from eighth to tenth - to offer various goods ranging from luxury fashion items to cosmetics and electronics.

Ahead of the store opening, the travel retailer on Thursday will sign an agreement with China’s leading social trip-planning platform Mafengwo to cooperate on attracting Chinese tourists to Seoul. Mafengwo boasts nearly 150 million subscribers and 140,000 travel-related posts per month on average.

The company also named Korean singer/actress Yoona and actor Jung Hae-in, who have a strong fan base in Asia, as its official models, and launched a promotional event, offering rewards to people who sign up for duty-free store membership prior to the official opening.

By Lee Han-na and Cho Jeehyun

[ⓒ Pulse by Maeil Business Newspaper & mk.co.kr, All rights reserved]