The recovery of the cultural and tourism market is accelerating (big data observation)

data

The Dayuwan Commercial Street in Kunshan, Jiangsu is brightly lit at night.

Photo by Yuan Xinyu

Students are conducting research and practical activities in Handan, Hebei.

Photo by Ma Yaqing

Tourists are experiencing paper making at an ancient paper-making art museum in Quanzhou, Fujian.

Photo by Xu Huasen

Core Reading

This summer, the cultural and tourism markets in various regions have shown significant recovery, with new tourism formats such as "study tours," "parent-child tours," and "night tours" becoming new engines to drive tourism consumption.

The rich and high-quality supply of tourism products better meets the needs of tourists, and the demand for cultural and tourism consumption is accelerating. Both supply and demand are working together to promote the better development of the cultural and tourism market.

The recently passed summer tourism peak season is a window to observe the popularity of the cultural and tourism market. The "2023 Summer Tourism Market Monitoring Report" recently released by the China Tourism Research Institute shows that according to comprehensive calculations, the number of domestic tourists this summer reached 1.839 billion, achieving a domestic tourism revenue of 1.21 trillion yuan. The tourism heat this summer is significantly higher than the same period in 2019, and many scenic spots have received the highest number of tourists in history.

Market heat continues to rise

"Departure!" Recently, the "Thousand Cars and Ten Thousand People" self driving tour across the Greater Xing'an Mountains with the theme of "Fantasy Arshan · Camping Life in Northern Xinjiang" has been launched. Accompanied by the departure signal, a convoy of dozens of RVs and self driving vehicles honked their horns to signal. Led by the leading car, the convoy embarked on a self driving journey. The convoy will cross the Greater Khingan Mountains, cruise from the city center of Alshan to the Alshan Port, experience the China Mongolia border tour, and finally return to the Lujiaowan Camp in Alshan City.

Experience the pleasure of self driving and appreciate the beautiful scenery along the way. Since the beginning of this year, the cultural and tourism market has rapidly recovered, and self driving tours have become a mainstream way of traveling. The booming development of self driving tours is a microcosm of the sustained rise in popularity in the cultural and tourism market. According to data released by various tourism platforms, the recovery momentum of the summer cultural and tourism market is strong. According to data from Meituan and Dianping platforms, domestic tourism consumption orders have achieved significant growth since the summer compared to the same period in 2019. According to the 2023 Summer Cultural Tourism Data Report released by Tiktok Life Service, its users have clocked in more than 400 million times and actively searched for tourism related content more than 500 million times, up 147% year on year.

The report from the China Tourism Research Institute points out that the summer market is steadily opening and rising, and the industrial prosperity is spreading from upstream formats represented by transportation, accommodation, catering, etc. to downstream formats represented by shopping and entertainment. The occupancy rate of accommodation facilities in various regions has increased. In the first half of the year, the tourism, shopping, and entertainment industries, which were relatively lagging behind in prosperity, were also influenced by the favorable market conditions. For example, concerts brought in billions of yuan in revenue for cities such as Haikou. The distribution of passenger flow spreads from major source cities to numerous remote destinations across the entire region. The proportion of tourist inflow in North China, Northeast China, Southwest China, Inner Mongolia, Xizang and some regions of Xinjiang generally exceeds 2019.

Accelerated recovery of multiple business formats

According to data released by the China Tourism Research Institute, the demand for summer vacation tourism has been unprecedentedly strong this year, with tourists traveling further and spending more time outside. Regions with higher latitudes or elevations such as Harbin, Changchun, Urumqi, and Kunming are popular destinations for summer tourism, with a high proportion of out of town tourists. In Xizang, Qinghai and Xinjiang, the proportion of foreign tourists in some typical destinations once exceeded 75%.

During the summer, urban tourism destinations with rich cultural heritage and high convenience are more favored. Concerts, music festivals, and other events are becoming important factors in attracting young people to travel, and various festival activities have become new engines to drive tourism consumption. Following performances to travel, many popular performance venues have become popular check-in spots in the local tourism market. According to Lu Mengxi, the director of Meituan Cultural and Tourism Research Institute, the performance economy is a specific form of integration of cultural consumption and tourism consumption. The sustained activity of the performance market is conducive to attracting more tourists and driving the growth of multiple industries such as accommodation, transportation, and catering in the region.

Nighttime cultural and tourism consumption continues to rise. According to relevant platform data, since the summer vacation, the search volume for "night tours" has increased by about 80% compared to the same period last year. Life service categories represented by dining and dining, leisure and entertainment, etc. have reached their peak consumption throughout the day at 7 pm.

Parent child travel is one of the important summer outings. According to relevant platform data, in July, hotel bookings related to "parent-child tours" increased by 150% compared to the same period in 2019, group purchase orders for "children's meals" increased by nearly 400% year-on-year, and the number of catering stores providing children's meal services increased by over 155% year-on-year. The search volume for "parent-child photos" increased by 45% month on month.

New supply stimulates new vitality

This year, there are also more options for vacation destinations. Recently, at the opening ceremony of the 2023 China Tourism Conference hosted by the Ministry of Culture and Tourism, 19 ski resorts were awarded national level ski resorts. In recent years, the Ministry of Culture and Tourism and the General Administration of Sport of China have continuously expanded the supply of high-quality tourism products, created high-level skiing facilities, and provided high-quality tourism and vacation services. In 2022 and 2023, two batches of 19 national level skiing tourism resorts were recognized and launched.

During the summer, leisure vacation has become an increasing choice for consumers. Leisure vacation products continue to enrich, and in recent years, the evaluation of national tourism vacation areas has been continuously carried out. National tourism and leisure cities and blocks have been launched one after another, meeting the diverse and personalized leisure vacation needs of the people and injecting new impetus into the heating up of the tourism market.

With the deep integration of culture and tourism and the continuous development of the market, the demand for cultural and tourism consumption in China is showing a clear upward trend. The supply side business entities closely follow the new trend of cultural and tourism consumption upgrading, create new cultural and tourism products, new formats, and new scenarios, launch more high-quality products and services that meet the taste of tourists, and stimulate stronger development momentum in the cultural and tourism market.

Watching competitions, appreciating folk customs, and enjoying delicious food... In Rongjiang County, Qiandongnan Miao and Dong Autonomous Prefecture, Guizhou Province, "Guizhou Village Super" has created a new consumption scene and attracted many tourists. On the Tiktok platform, there were more than 17000 topics related to "Guizhou Village Superman". Netizens watched more than 10 billion times, liked nearly 200 million times, and shared more than 8 million times. The catering orders of Rongjiang County in Tiktok increased by 113% month on month and 327% year on year.

The popularity of "Guizhou Village Super" reflects the demand of tourists for experiencing authentic local culture and rural competitions in the context of the current upgrading of cultural and tourism consumption. According to local government statistics, the "village supermarket" has attracted more than 420000 tourists within a month, including 303900 local tourists and 116100 out of town tourists. In May this year, Rongjiang County received 1.0737 million tourists, a year-on-year increase of 39.73%, and achieved a comprehensive tourism revenue of 1.241 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 52.08%.

The relevant person in charge of the Resource Development Department of the Ministry of Culture and Tourism stated that China's tourism market has vast space. In the next step, the Ministry of Culture and Tourism will continue to enrich the supply of cultural and tourism products, promote the matching of cultural and tourism supply and demand, release the vitality of cultural and tourism consumption, and use the recovery and revitalization of the tourism industry to help the economy continue to recover and improve.