US Travelers Top 2022 Tax Free Shopping in Greece

US Travelers boosted tax free shopping in Greece during the January–September 2022 period, according to a recent survey published by tax refund operator, Global Blue.

The survey, titled “The Greek Tax-Free Shopping market”, notes that visitors from the United States managed to cover the shopping gap created by the drop in Chinese and Russian tourists visiting Greece during 2022’s researched nine month period.

According to the published data, US tourists owned the largest share of tax-free purchases in terms of value during January–September 2022 with 35 percent, followed by the Israelis with 12 percent and visitors from countries of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) with 8 percent.

Source: Global Blue.

Overall, with the EU’s average recovery at 108 percent, Greece managed to top Europe’s September 2022 Recovery Issued Tax Free Spending index, with a recovery at 170 percent vs. 2019. Portugal followed in second place and a 159 percent improvement.

US travelers also topped the report’s Average Transaction Value list with 1,360 euros spend on average followed by GCC’s visitors with 995 euros and post Brexit UK travelers with 925 euros.

Also, American visitors hold the largest share of the “Elite Globe Shoppers” group representation in Greece. The group consists of shoppers who have spent more than 40,000 euros in the last two years and represents 14 percent of tax-free sales in Greece with an average spending of 14,000 euros.

Source: Global Blue.

Other key findings of the survey include:

• Athens and Piraeus hold the biggest share of the country’s tax free spending with 51 percent followed by Mykonos in 2^nd place with a 30 percent share.
• Mykonos’ average tax free spending amounts to 1,730 euros followed by Santorini with 925 euros.
• Travelers making tax free purchases in Greece still prefer fashion and clothing to other shopping categories, but watches and jewelry lead the average spending with 3,700 euros.
• Thessaloniki may have experienced a 14 percent decrease in total tax free spending compared to 2019, but its average tourists’ spending rose by 3 percent.

Source: Global Blue.

According to Global Blue’s world data, following the ease of Covid-19 restrictions in Asia, the recovery of tax free shopping in the Asia–Pacific area is accelerating with Japan’s sales in store reaching 2019 levels last month.

Global Blue is a market leading tax refund operator with more than 300,000 retailer partners around the world.