Walking through a newly renovated airport feels a bit like walking through a mall in an upper-middle-class neighborhood. There are juice stands and concept-driven chicken shops. The floor has a sheen to it that catches the wink of LED lightbulbs hanging overhead. And amid sculptures and murals, these airports are full of designer stores, such as Louis Vuitton and Hermes, luggage stores like Tumi and Samsonite, and beauty stores selling everything from makeup to body lotion.
As someone who scrambles around the airport looking for the most amount of food for the least amount of money, wearing a sweatshirt that says “NEW ORLEANS,” with my hair in a bun that looks like a rats’s nest, I’ve never been too concerned about stopping at the higher-end stores that airports have to offer. Nothing about my appearance says “designer,” and certainly nothing about my wallet says “luxury.”
So who is actually shopping at these stores, and what are they buying? I’m not the only person wondering. In a post on the r/Travel subreddit, one person asked how it’s even possible for some of these stores to stay in business.
“I feel like every time I’m at an airport I walk by dozens of stores without a single shopper,” the post reads. “Everything from Gucci to toy stores and everything in between. How do these places stay in business? Like who walks into an airport and decides to buy a $5,000 Gucci purse? And I can’t imagine rent is cheap in an airport? I’m honestly starting to think luxury brands just use these stores as a form of billboard. Any insight would be much appreciated, thanks!”
Everyone was quick to remind the poster that rich people do, in fact, exist. “I think you’ll have to come to a realization there are many travelers who are way more wealthy than us. If people can pay $8,000 on business class fares and $25,000 on first class fares, they can absolutely afford a $5,000 Gucci purse.”
And that’s so fair! It is sometimes easy to forget that rich people are real. But these types of airport stores aren’t exclusively for the rich. Some people shared that they could find something they wanted cheaper at the airport than they could back home. One person shared that they were able to purchase a Nintendo Switch while they were traveling abroad. They “realized while there it was almost $200 cheaper than back home” in Canada.
Another person wrote that they tend to “stock up on toiletries and cosmetics when we are at duty-free as well,” because they can purchase products that aren’t available in their own country.
Many people noted on the thread that purchasing big ticket items can also help save money, as duty-free shops are tax-free—and that luxury items are sometimes cheaper in airports abroad than they are at local stores. “That $5000 Gucci purse might be $8000 back wherever that traveler is from,” one commenter wrote.
“Whenever I want to buy something designer (usually purses, perfumes, and sunglasses), I do it at an airport for this reason,” another commenter added.
So, it turns out that those of us who don’t understand the point of the luxury stores and high-end shops in airports are simply in too low of a tax bracket. If you’ve got the cash to purchase luxury items, it turns out that you can save a pretty nice chunk of change by getting that designer bag at the airport. And then you can say, “Yeah I got this in Paris!” without clarifying that you got it at the Paris airport.