Tourists headed to Turkey for a new reason – the devaluation of the Turkish lira about popular foreign currencies made Turkey a sought-after destination for shopaholics. Turizm Gazetesi writes about this, referring to the data of the Turkish Statistical Institute (TUIK).
According to them, the number of tourists who said they came to Turkey for shopping increased by 23% compared to last year, from 1 million 686 thousand to 2 million 74 thousand. At the same time, even in the successful year of 2019, for the entire year tourists, who named shopping as one of their goals, scored only 1.7 million.
At the same time, the publication notes that tourist purchases have become a source of vitality for retail trade. Tourists spent $4.9 billion on clothes and shoes, spending increased by 8%. Spending on souvenir purchases increased by 10% and amounted to $1.1 billion.
Tourists also spend money on health care. As the Turks write, “expenditures for the health care category, which includes hair transplant procedures,” increased by 9.8%, reaching $1.7 billion.