South Korea's two major travel retailers saw their sales grow around 10 percent last year on the back of remarkable spending by Chinese tourists, their records showed Tuesday.

Lotte Duty Free, the country's largest duty-free shop by sales, said its annual sales came to 3.55 trillion won ($3.3 billion) last year, up more than 10 percent from 3.2 trillion won the previous year.

Lotte's sales from Chinese shoppers soared 70 percent in 2013 on-year. It also reported strong performance in online sales, which increased 30 percent. The weakened Japanese yen, however, eroded sales by Japanese shoppers, falling 40 percent, the company said.

South Korea's second-largest duty-free shop, Shilla Duty Free, said it recorded 2.8 trillion won in sales last year, up 9.5 percent from 1.9 trillion won in 2012.

The percentage of sales by Chinese shoppers to its overall sales by foreign shoppers reached 75 percent, Shilla said. Sales by Japanese shoppers dropped 15 percent.

Chinese shoppers preferred cosmetic products, fashion accessories, luxury watches and electric rice cookers, the two companies said. (Yonhap)