Stepping out the door and saying, "What do you want?"? How to avoid high-end rural homestays in Shanghai becoming "bonsai" and share exquisite and beautiful resources in homestays | Reporter | Homestays

"We have received three batches of company team building clients this week, each batch is fully booked!" One day in August, when the reporter saw Wang Zhiliang, he was busy tidying up his guest rooms with the homestay butler. He is the person in charge of "Yingtian" homestay in Jianshe Town, Chongming District. In the afternoon of that day, another company team will move into 7 rooms of "Yingtian".

The popularity of "Ying Tian" is a microcosm of the construction of the town's homestay industry. As the largest homestay among the 18 townships in Chongming, the total number of homestays under construction in the town has exceeded 260, including more than 80 city and district level star rated homestays. In 2021, the revenue of the homestay industry was over 35 million yuan, and last year's revenue was over 38 million yuan. In the first half of this year, the overall occupancy rate of high-end star rated homestays in the town was 83%.

In the post pandemic era, the outbound and outbound tourism markets have rebounded, and local rural tourism destinations in Shanghai are facing considerable pressure. In this context, the economic development of homestays in Jianshe Town remains stable. What is the secret behind this?

Mountain Royal Residence

How to avoid high-end homestays becoming "bonsai"

The exterior walls are cut with red bricks and then spliced according to the texture of the earth cloth. The roof is made of manually tied reed stalks, and the indoor tables, chairs, and fabric decorations are carefully crafted by local carpenters and tailors. The "Songman" homestay located in Jianshe Town's Qiandong Village is a high-end homestay. However, apart from the exquisite decoration, the elements that truly make this homestay "high-end" are actually not inside the house, but outside.

"Songman" Homestay

In front of the "Pine Slow" house is a large forest of magnolias and sequoia trees, with tall tree crowns blocking the sky and sun. Even if the sun is scorching, walking into the forest can still feel cool. On the right side of "Songman" is the broad Lao Lao River, where guests can not only sit on bamboo chairs by the water to enjoy the scenery, but also paddle on the river surface to play.

"Compared to exquisite accommodation conditions, natural resources such as clear waterways and lush forests are the core competitiveness of Chongming homestays." Chen Qun, Secretary of the Party Committee of Jianshe Town, told reporters that the reason why "Songman" has become popular is because it has found a treasure land by the water and forests, and cleverly integrated homestays with natural scenery. "High end homestays are not just 'bonsai' that can be viewed from afar, they cannot form a strong contrast with the surrounding environment or ordinary rural houses."

The homestay is exquisitely built and beautiful, but when you go out, there is only a dirt road, and next to it is an old local farmhouse. The homestay is out of place with the village environment and has no connection, which is a dilemma faced by some homestays in the suburbs of Shanghai. Chen Qun believes that in the process of rural revitalization, modernization of planning concepts is equally important as the construction of modernization. If the homestay is not easily accessible, surrounded by large rice paddies, the road to the homestay is narrow enough for even a bus to pass through, or tourists can only see small ponds that cannot be played with water when pushing windows in the guest rooms, such homestays will not have long-term vitality.

In recent years, while vigorously developing the homestay industry in Jianshe Town, attention has also been paid to adapting to the homestay industry at the planning level. Through methods such as water management, forest adjustment, and relocation, clusters of water bodies, forests, roads, and industrial land have been created to create space for more high-end homestays to land.

For example, in recent years, the forestry departments of the city and district have carried out pilot construction of forest land utilization. Currently, there are multiple open leisure forest land projects in the city, and the construction of over a thousand acres of forest land in Fu'an Village is one of them. Through careful construction, this forest land is equipped with multiple functional areas such as agricultural culture exhibition area, bird watching area, forest exploration area, and understory stroll area. This not only greatly improves the living environment of villagers, but also attracts star rated homestays such as "Shanshui" to take root by the water in the forest.

Fu'an Open Leisure Forest

"Shanshui" Homestay

This year, Jianshe Town also applied for the pilot of comprehensive land consolidation in the city for the year 2023, which will further improve spatial intensity and industrial concentration by promoting the concentration and connection of cultivated land and promoting inefficient construction land consolidation through the combination of small and large fields. The first phase of the project's renovation area will reclaim over 200 acres of "bamboo garden foundation", nearly 14 acres of ponds and water surfaces, and nearly 15 acres of rural roads, creating cultural and tourism areas in Jidong Village, Hongqiao Village, and Jiedong Village.

"By intensively utilizing fragmented land, the first phase of the project is expected to add more than 660 acres of arable land. At the same time, it will reorganize the river and water systems, rural residential road networks, and create more land landscapes to adapt to the upgraded rural cultural and tourism industry. High end homestays are not a sudden 'bonsai', but a part of the beautiful scenery of the entire region," Chen Qun said.

How to develop diversified business formats in homestay clusters

The development of the "rural tourism" industry in Jianshe Town started very early. In 2006, there was "grandmother's rural tourism" in Qidong Village. Up to now, the small-scale and scattered rural homestay has evolved into multiple homestay clusters.

From "fighting alone" to "developing together", there are not only external factors such as planning guidance and land consolidation, but also inherent logic in the development of the Shanghai suburban homestay industry: compared with other places, natural scenery is not an advantage of rural tourism in Shanghai suburbs, and most tourists hope to have a one-stop tourism experience at homestays. Building a homestay cluster and developing diverse business formats internally can overcome the drawbacks of small size and limited resources of a single homestay and meet the needs of tourists.

Gu Hongbin, the founder of Gu Bobo Homestay Group located in Hongqiao Village, has been busy processing room orders during the summer vacation these days. In 2012, he and his younger brother Gu Hongyu opened a popular Gu Uncle Farmhouse, and later invited nearby villagers to join. Nowadays, 37 households have participated in the operation of this homestay group. Gu Hongbin told reporters that the Gu Bo homestay group has now formed a rural homestay group that integrates accommodation, catering, picking, and agricultural product sales.

Uncle Gu's Homestay Group

Shi Songpei, President of the Construction Town Homestay Association, told reporters that the so-called homestay cluster is not as simple as transforming a row of idle farmhouses into homestays as a whole, but requires a scientific mechanism for resource sharing, functional division, and interest linkage. For example, the "Taotao Jiao" agricultural professional cooperative owned by Uncle Gu's homestay group has an annual sales revenue of over one million yuan. Apart from setting aside 30% as a risk prevention fund for the following year, the rest is distributed proportionally to shareholders and homeowners as dividends, ranging from a few thousand yuan to tens of thousands of yuan.

"At the end of last year, we received over 5000 yuan!" Mao Weihong, the operator of the "Yingsheng Courtyard" homestay in the homestay group, told reporters that due to the dividend mechanism, the shareholders of the homestay group are full of enthusiasm and will not engage in malicious competition with each other, but rather cooperate. "Some are good at making outdoor barbecue, some are good at making rural dishes, some are good at making Chongming cakes, and some sell specialty agricultural and sideline products such as rice wine. Let's all work together to make the 'cake' bigger."

At the beginning of this year, the dividend scene of Uncle Gu's homestay group

Coincidentally, recently, in Fu'an Village, Jianshe Town, a company has leased nearly 50 farmhouses as a whole, creating a staggered development and diverse style homestay cluster. "For example, No. 326 Fu'an Village will mainly undertake the catering function of the homestay cluster in the future; an old factory building that has been idle for many years in the village has also been transformed into a village level business center, and has now entered the stage of equipment installation." Bao Wei, Secretary of the Fu'an Village Party Branch and Director of the Village Committee, told reporters.

How to better attract traffic in rural scenic areas

Homestays are different from hotels in that they not only serve as a place to stay, but also serve as a place to play. How to make homestays more fun and make citizens and tourists willing to play and have fun? Doing a good job in supporting cultural and tourism projects and providing full chain services is crucial.

On a summer night, walking on the rural path in Hongqiao Village, Jianshe Town, amidst the chirping of frogs and insects, one can hear the faint jazz music. Following the sound, one can see a tavern called "Twenty Six Twelve". This is the first small shop in Uncle Gu's homestay group that specializes in coffee and alcohol, transformed from a riverside farmhouse.

"Two Six Twelve" Tavern

"Homestays cannot 'walk on one leg'. In addition to providing guest rooms, they also need to have distinct themes, interesting activities, and supporting projects that are organically integrated with rural industries and the environment." Gu Hongbin told reporters that currently, the homestay group has developed rural cultural and tourism projects such as bonfire barbecue, outdoor movies, lobster fishing, cafes, bars, etc.

In the construction of the "Hongqiao Flower Township" scenic area in the town, a park called "Natural Rolling Pastoral" opened in April this year, covering an area of more than 180 acres. This is an urban pasture that raises more than 60 alpacas. All the alpacas in the park come from the Xilingol Grassland in Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region, where citizens and tourists can experience the wild grazing fun.

"We have an open-air camp that offers Inner Mongolia lamb barbecue and other delicacies. We also offer activities such as special group healing, small architect plans, and nature painting based on seasonal changes. Currently, we have formed a linkage with multiple homestay clusters in the town to jointly launch cultural and tourism projects," Hu Dabing, the person in charge of the park, told reporters.

"Natural Scrolling Pastoral" Farm

In addition, Jianshe Town also provides supporting facilities for the homestay economy in terms of institutional norms and platform construction. Recently, the "Construction Town Rural Homestay Service Quality Standards" were introduced, which is the first rural homestay service quality standard in Chongming and the only rural homestay service quality group standard in Shanghai. A mini program called "Zhujian Jianmai Chongming" has also been launched, which will showcase the homestay resources of Jianshe Town. Citizens and tourists can book rooms, buy specialty products, and inquire about relevant cultural and tourism project information in one stop.

"Our rural industry revitalization is planned around the homestay economy. The popularity of homestays not only has established tourism brands, but also has a good drainage effect on rural industry investment. We will continue to strengthen the entire agricultural, cultural and tourism industry chain, turn rural areas into new tourism destinations, and let 'good ecology' give birth to a 'new economy'." Chen Qun said.