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looking at the summer market, theme parks remain popular. at the end of august, an article titled "spending 15,000 yuan a day, the 'bitter journey' of middle-class parents to disneyland" sparked heated discussions, describing the dream-fulfilling trip as a "harvest" trip. the author said, "it seems that no matter how high the price goes, there will be parents who spend money."

behind the accusation of consumerism lies an obvious fact: the leading theme parks, represented by disney, have a long-lasting and powerful attraction for tourists. families with strong spending power, young couples and friends, or long-term fans of ips are all the user groups targeted by the parks.

when we turn our attention to the industry, how is the business of theme parks? what has changed and what has remained the same in the market?

01

summer park boom, who is the winner?

driven by the radiation of the leading theme parks, the domestic theme park industry has ushered in rapid development. the 2023 global theme park and museum report jointly released by the world theme park association (tea) and the american aecom group shows that among the top 25 theme parks in the world, 7 are located in china, and in the asia-pacific region, chinese theme parks occupy 15 seats in the top 20. according to the statistics of tourist reception, fantawild, chimelong and happy valley ranked 2nd, 5th and 6th in the global operator list with 85.69 million, 36.09 million and 35.71 million respectively, competing with international giants such as disney, merlin entertainments and universal studios.

the market enthusiasm also continued during the summer vacation. data from meituan and dianping showed that this summer, the number of reviews related to "theme parks" on the platform increased by more than 120% month-on-month, the number of notes and guides increased by nearly 110%, and the overall order volume of theme parks increased by 52% month-on-month.

judging from the search popularity, more personalized theme parks such as "trampoline theme park", "animal theme park" and "forest theme park" are popular, with the search volume increasing by more than 60% month-on-month. beijing, shanghai, huzhou, chongqing and hangzhou are the top five cities in terms of search popularity.

in terms of park types, comprehensive theme parks such as shanghai disney resort, beijing universal studios, shanghai haichang ocean park, zhuhai chimelong ocean kingdom, shenyang fantawild happy world, guangzhou chimelong happy world, and shanghai happy valley are also popular during the summer vacation. the top five source provinces are guangdong, jiangsu, henan, shandong and zhejiang.

judging from the portrait of tourists, female users account for more than 60%, and users aged 30-40 account for the highest proportion.

although economically developed regions and densely populated areas still contribute a relatively high popularity and share, the inclusion of non-first-tier city parks such as shenyang fantawild on the list also reflects the trend of theme park tours becoming more decentralized: it has become a lifestyle widely accepted and welcomed by the general public.

although the cultural tourism and commercial groups to which many theme parks belong told pincheng travel that their operating performance is commercial data and cannot be disclosed directly, as described in "the middle class's "bitter journey", the tourists queuing up will not lie. zhuhai chimelong spaceship park has an average daily passenger flow of 50,000 people; even if shanghai disney tries to control passenger flow with tiered ticket prices, the passenger flow is still stable at over 60,000; and even on weekdays in september, the off-season after the summer vacation, the waiting time for many popular projects such as the "decepticon roller coaster" at beijing universal studios is more than 40 minutes.

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02

marketing melee, speak with ip

another aspect of the hot market is that more and more governments and enterprises are increasing their investment in theme parks. in terms of international ip, asia's first peppa pig outdoor theme park has officially settled in chongming, shanghai, and is expected to be completed and opened in 2027; shanghai jinshan legoland resort will start trial operation next spring; beijing universal studios phase ii construction will start this year.

focusing on domestic brands, the increasingly fierce competition for customers has made the destination present a trend of blossoming in multiple places. mr. a is the person in charge of xiangyang oct fantasy resort. according to sharing, in hubei and henan, which are 2-3 hours away from xiangyang by car, there are many theme park projects under construction or in place, such as nanyang oct, shiyan fantawild, xiaogan fantawild, yichang songcheng·three gorges eternal love, wuhan happy valley, etc. several major domestic theme park groups are constantly expanding overseas.

for a cultural tourism industry that requires heavy asset investment and a long payback period, this is undoubtedly a signal of overcrowding in a market with limited regional consumption capacity, and there is undoubtedly a risk of oversupply. many theme park industry insiders told pincheng travel that in order to break out of the "difficulty in acquiring customers", form a differentiated competitive advantage, and empower the travel experience, ip brand building will be an important solution.

in terms of joint cooperation, xiangyang oct fantasy resort introduced ips such as "classic ultraman" and "super wings" during the summer vacation, and launched supporting performing arts activities such as themed check-in installations, ip parades, stage plays, fan meetings, etc. to fully meet the needs of tourists of different ages; haichang ocean park cooperated with ips such as ultraman and one piece to create theme pavilions, theme hotels, theme restaurants and other scenes to attract fans to check in and experience.

in terms of independent research and development, the limited theme event "shocking color" launched in autumn is back again after receiving great acclaim last year. this year, beijing universal studios has newly upgraded three major scare spaces: jack circus, mansion 81 and surprise farm, as well as two scream areas: jack the clown's crazy celebration and pumpkin grinch's entourage. classic universal studios characters jack the clown and chang si made their debut in beijing universal studios. last year's popular original image "devil rabbit" was also upgraded and returned, and related peripheral dolls and limited food were also put on the shelves.

in order to immerse tourists in the carnival atmosphere of the movie-level blockbuster world, universal studios is more committed to the high-quality presentation of ip content. ye wenhua, creative director of entertainment at beijing universal studios, said that in terms of scene design, beijing universal studios reproduced the real scene of the retro circus in the first half of the 20th century based on the setting of the storyline of jack circus. liu hanfeng, senior manager of costume design at beijing universal studios, said that beijing universal studios designed more than 50 different clown costumes for "jack circus" through changes in materials, colors and accessories. among them, the design of jack the clown was based on the reference to the shapes of orlando and other universal studios theme parks around the world, and further went into every stitch and thread, striving to bring the shock of "breaking the screen" to every tourist; an binjie, makeup and hair manager at beijing universal studios, said that in order to better present rich and three-dimensional characters, the makeup team used more than 9,000 special effects skins, and there were more than 30 different makeup and hair styles for the clown-type characters in the circus alone. in line with the "stunning colors" theme, the decorations and exhibits in the park have been completely renewed. in addition to the extended evening hours, daytime activities such as the minions meet-and-greets are also being carried out simultaneously.

the value of ip strategy is also confirmed at the operational level. according to the financial report data, haichang ocean park's revenue in 2023 was 1.817 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 129.1%, of which the park business revenue reached 1.667 billion yuan, accounting for more than 90%; comcast's universal theme parks (including orlando, florida, los angeles, osaka and beijing) had a revenue of 8.947 billion us dollars in 2023, a year-on-year increase of 18.6%.

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03

are there still opportunities in the future market?

however, if we exclude the well-known international brands, except for huaqiang fantawild, which made a name for itself with "boonie bears", the ip resources of local theme parks are still relatively weak and the degree of development and utilization is insufficient - the problem of homogeneity of park amusement products is therefore unavoidable. on the other hand, many hastily launched theme park projects are invested by local urban investment and tourism investment groups, which have more political attributes than market attributes, and their continued profitability is difficult to guarantee.

the summer market is booming, but looking back, will theme parks still be a good business?

liang zengxian, professor and doctoral supervisor at the school of tourism at sun yat-sen university, said that china's tourism market is large and has a clear growth trend. with the rise of national strength and income, the theme park market will be further expanded and segmented. china's tourism industry is constantly developing international cooperation, and international corporate giants will not ignore the chinese market.

a general principle points out that from the perspective of various theme park groups, their product forms, customer source structures, and target markets are all differentiated to a certain extent. under this pattern, the market share of theme parks and resorts will continue to expand. he believes that with the support of my country's huge population base, there is still room for new entrants, but it is necessary to focus on finding the right direction for differentiation. in practice, theme parks can focus on four aspects: soft services, hardware products, performing arts products, and festival activities to create a surprising travel and vacation experience for tourists.

regarding park ip development, liang zengxian believes that theme parks need ips with relatively long-term appeal and vitality. however, any film, television, animation and game ip has the potential to build an offline theme park. the key lies in whether it has a common target market with the theme park project. he also pointed out that it takes a relatively long time for companies to develop the full capabilities of incubating ip, planning, planning, and building large theme parks, and they need to cooperate with existing companies in the theme park industry chain to transform ip.

for many domestic ip resource providers, this may be a feasible operation direction.

according to the forecast of us research and market for china's theme parks, it is expected to grow at an average annual compound growth rate of 7.2% in the next five years, and the scale of my country's theme park market is expected to exceed 50 billion yuan in 2027.

with the expansion of the market, tourists are naturally looking forward to diversified attractions. the success of black myth: wukong has once again raised the idea of ​​turning traditional cultural ip into theme parks. in addition to lingna belle and bumblebee, the wandering earth, honor of kings and romance of the three kingdoms may not be far away.