Duty free, Riga Airport. Only in Latvia :)
Again the continuing theme about Only in Latvia things.
First of all about positive things, here is Lattelecom Wifi service, few popular pages are open (apollo.lv, draugiem.lv, one.lv, lattelekom.lv), as well it is very easy to get full access, you have to send SMS to number 1188 with text WIFI, then for 0.9Ls (1.2 Euro), you get 1 hour access. 802.11b standard Wifi is not one of the fastest, but it is enough.
I must say, that Internet is the cheapest thing at duty free zone at Riga Airport. Duty Free zone used to be the zone with cheaper prices, sometimes prices are equal, sometimes a bit higher. Only in Latvia, Twix chocolate price at usual stores up to 0.3Ls, duty free zone first shop price (Narvesen) is 0.75Ls. The most amazing thing about the last shop “Last minute”, “Kitkat” 
price there is 1.5Ls (Oh man!!!), instead of usual price 0.24-0.25Ls.
It looks like Latvia has special taxes for Duty free 
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don’t know about fast food, but perfume and alcohol in RIX are ~2-3x cheaper than in Riga, and ~20% cheaper than other airport taxfree zones. Tested
perfume is the same, probably alcohol is cheaper (i have not interested about this).
Although I cannot compare top perfumes that is available at expensive latvian shops to perfumes available abroad (my sister brought to me often some from London).
sorry, wrong. I have compared ~4 different kinds of perfumes in: Paris, Hamburg, Amsterdam, Buenos Aires, London and the in-flight KLM store – in Riga it is most cheapest, with price difference maximum being ~15Euros (Perfume price ~40Eur). For example one Kenzo perfume in RIX costs 17 lats vs 20 lats in Paris and 35 lats in Riga central perfume stores.
I do not say about the price, probably Riga’s prices are cheaper. I have not tried perfume at the airport, but some perfumes are fake at the Riga shops, it is completely different.
not only parfumes are fake, some other products, made abroad are different from those that are in our shop too, for example HARIBO bears, or Nutella
somehow I doubt that the taxfree shops in RIX would sell fake stuff.
jenny,
Some of bears are produced at Aldaris (sometimes there is sticker on it), some of the products produced at Poland, I agree that original one at UK, Germany are completely different.
Normis, I have not checked perfume there, next time I will do. I was talking about Spice and Olympia shops.
yeap, almost everything that is sold in Rimi and have to be originaly produced in Germany, are made in Poland in fact
Ah, unfortunately with different quality
Ive always wanted to go to Riga, and have been looking at some hotel reviews (in the link). Can you recommend anywhere near the center?
Thanks – Chris
near the center all hotels are quite expensive, there are hostels in the heart of old town but it depends what you want and how much you’re willing to pay
Depends on what you are looking for.
I believe it is possible to get normal hostel type room for not more than 10 ls [20$] near the center.
If you are looking for hotel, the price could be high. Which price will be ok for you ?
Made in Poland doesn’t mean it’s fake. It’s just another branch of the manufacturer. If the quality differs – that’s the owners problem and they should solve it. But fake is illegal.
It is not fake, but Colgate here and Colgate in Germany are different.
It could be that German Colgate is manufactured somewhere else.
“It’s just another branch of the manufacturer.” – yep, that’s how i said t
Hi
Hi guys I’m flying throught Riga, I’m in transit flight from London. And i want to buy parfume. I heard that in Riga Duty Free is cheaper then London . Is it true? And what about quality? Thanks
Yes, some people are saying, that Riga pafume is cheaper, but you can compare prices by yourself (just check them in London and Riga). I do not know anything about the quality.