Can Suzhou's "1 Yuan Garden Tour" activate the cultural tourism market
On the afternoon of September 10, the drizzle was raining, but the tourists in Suzhou Humble Administrator's Garden were full of interest.
In early autumn, the dozen acres of lotus flowers in the Central Garden were still a unique landscape in the garden. Several female tourists from the Jiaxing tour group took photos by the pond one after another.
According to data from the Industry Department of Suzhou Gardens and Greening Administration Bureau, in August this year, the number of visitors to the park in Suzhou's landscape system reached 630,000, an increase of 60% over July.
Among them, the Humble Administrator's Garden, Lingering Garden, Lion Forest, Botanical Garden, and Coupling Garden increased by 63%, 72%, 54%, 375%, and 197% respectively.
As of 5:30 pm on September 13, the number of visitors to the Suzhou Garden System scenic spots reached 61,72, a record high since the epidemic.
Behind the surge in visitors to Suzhou's garden scenic spots is the "One Yuan Garden Million Gift" campaign launched by Suzhou on August 1 this year.
"One Yuan Garden Tour" not only has an advertising effect, but also promotes consumption in substance, which has boosted the overall recovery of Suzhou's tourism industry and the prosperity of Suzhou's night economy.
Benefits from ticket sales stimulate a large-scale tourism market recovery
The content of "1 Yuan Garden Tour" includes the launch of 500,000 tickets for garden scenic spots for individual tourists, "1 yuan grab"; the launch of "1 discount tour" for garden scenic spots tickets for teams, of which 300,000 tourists can enjoy the price of 1 yuan; for local citizens 200,000 tickets for the Botanical Garden are "free to grab".
From August 1st, the five major network platforms of Suzhou Garden Tourism, Ctrip, Tongcheng, Meituan, and Suzhou Tourism General Entrance will simultaneously open the "1 Yuan Garden Tour" online ticket-grabbing area.
The ticket scope covers 14 well-known gardens in Suzhou, including Tiger Hill, Lingering Garden, Humble Administrator's Garden, Lion Forest, Couple Garden, Master of the Nets Garden, etc. The deadline for activities is December 31.
According to Zhang Jie, director of the Lion Forest Management Office, 400 1 yuan individual tickets per day are always quickly robbed, and 70% of the tickets are foreign tourists.
Compared with individual travelers, this policy has a more obvious boost to team travel.
The number of group tourists in the Lion Forest Garden in June, July, and August were 1,136, 3,383, and 15,300, respectively, an increase of 12.4 times in August compared to June.
The policy of "1 yuan to travel to gardens" stimulated travel agencies to conduct more in-depth tourism market promotion.
"Suzhou has launched a 1% discount on unlimited tickets to 100 domestic travel agencies, including 300,000 tickets for 1 yuan, which directly lowers the threshold for tourists to visit Suzhou gardens." Qi Zhong, general manager of Nanjing Phoenix Holiday Tourism Co., Ltd., told reporters. To break down the budget of 200 yuan per person, accommodation is 100 yuan, meals are 30 to 40 yuan, and the cost of tickets is only 50 to 60 yuan, and only one garden can be visited at most.
After the introduction of the "1 Yuan Garden Tour" policy in Suzhou, tourists can visit two or more gardens at a lower cost.
Active and wide-ranging promotion has affected the deeper source market.
At present, the Suzhou Tour team mainly comes from Henan, Hebei, Hubei, Guangdong, Shandong and other places, and a large-scale and large-span tourism market has been launched.
Nanjing Phoenix Holidays Travel Co., Ltd. was still a zero group in June. At the end of August, it recovered to 40% of the same period last year, and it recovered 80% in early September.
"In addition to the promulgation of the inter-provincial tourism policy and the high and refreshing autumn in September, the 1 yuan and 1% discount activities of Suzhou gardens have played a key role in promoting." Qi Zhong said.
The effect of "1 yuan tour garden" in driving the surrounding economy is emerging.
According to Qi Zhong, tourists used to visit Suzhou in the morning and Wuzhen in the evening. Now, due to the extended stay in Suzhou, the proportion of overnight stays in Suzhou has increased.
"Suzhou Gardens is willing to use its brand influence and gradually increasing passenger flow to drive related industries to accelerate the pace of recovery." said Chen Dalin, director of Suzhou Gardens and Greening Administration.
At the “1 Yuan Garden Tour” launch event, several “time-honored brands” in Suzhou, including Caizhizhai and Li Liangji, organized a group to participate in the “Huqiu Market” and jointly promoted the “time-honored” specialty products of Suzhou by means of live broadcast and delivery.
Seek economic growth points beyond tickets
Gao Zhigang, director of the Industry Department of Suzhou Gardens and Greening Administration, introduced that in 2019, the 14 garden scenic spots under the administration of the Gardens and Greening Administration earned 700 million yuan in ticket revenue, and this year is expected to drop sharply.
In this "1 yuan tour garden" discount activity, only 1 million "1 yuan" tickets will be released, which means that more than 50 million yuan of ticket revenue will be reduced, while the rigid expenditure of 14 garden scenic spots a year is about 400 million yuan .
"We have to take up the responsibility of gardens as a cultural brand in Suzhou, but also face the economic pressure brought by the epidemic and profit transfer. This prompts us to think about how to expand secondary consumption based on our own reality and develop diversified gardens such as customized experience activities. Tourism products extend the garden tourism industry chain." said Xue Zhijian, director of the Humble Administrator's Garden Management Office.
Since the introduction of the "1 yuan tour of gardens" policy, the number of visitors to the garden scenic spots participating in the activity has been uneven.
The Humble Administrator’s Garden and Lion Forest are located in the distribution centers of tourist attractions on Northeast Street. In addition, they are well-known, which is easy to form an agglomeration effect. The increase of tourists is obvious. Some gardens are relatively remote or not well-known. This policy is introduced. The pulling effect is not significant.
Beginning in the 1990s, Suzhou gardens gradually formed a trend of common development of "large gardens with small gardens".
The Humble Administrator's Garden and Huanxiu Villa, Lion Forest and Yiyuan, Canglang Pavilion and Keyuan are paired to share the people, property and management mode of the big garden.
Compared with the Lion Forest, Yiyuan is not well-known in Suzhou gardens, but it has a high position in the field of Guqin, calligraphy and painting.
In order to explore the integration and presentation of the "dual heritage" of classical gardens and guqin in Yiyuan, the Lion Grove Management Office often plans exchange activities for guqin and calligraphy and painting.
The process of creating characteristic tourism products is also a process of cultural heritage.
Through a series of high-end and characteristic gatherings of famous masters, the popularity of Yiyuan is also quietly increasing. The number of people entering the park has increased from two to three hundred per day to the current six to seven hundred people per day.
Based on the cultural and creative products launched by garden culture, "garden ice cream" is the most popular.
The strawberry-flavored Tiger Hill Tower, the chocolate-flavored Humble Administrator’s Garden Miyama Tower, the cream-flavored Lingering Garden Guanyunfeng, and the matcha-flavored Lion Grove Little Mengshi, have sold a total of 6 items within one month since its launch in mid to late July. More than 10,000 sticks, and the price is not cheap, 15 yuan each.
According to statistics, the conversion rate of "garden ice cream" among garden visitors has reached 5%.
Many tourists held up this "net celebrity" ice cream and took pictures with the real Tiger Hill Tower and Guanyun Peak, which was very interesting.
Looking for economic growth points other than tickets, all major gardens in Suzhou have done in-depth research and experimentation.
In addition to the cooperation between Canglang Pavilion and well-known domestic playwrights to create the "immersive" Kunqu Opera "Six Chapters of a Floating Life", which was rated as "Excellent Case of Cultural Relics and Architecture Opening" by the State Administration of Cultural Heritage, "Humble Administrator Asks Ya" and "Charming Tiger Hill" Night tours such as "Fengqiao Night Park" and "Couple Garden Dream Memories" are all well received and praised by tourists.
The introduction of these cultural tourism products has allowed tourists to stay longer in Suzhou, thereby driving the prosperity and development of Suzhou's night economy.
Open up the entire chain from tickets to travel consumption
"'1 Yuanyou Gardens' has played a huge role in promoting the Suzhou tourism brand and promoting the recovery of the tourism industry, because gardens are the biggest core competitiveness of Suzhou tourism and have a strong appeal among tourists." Tongcheng Research Institute Chief researcher Cheng Chaogong said, however, from a practical perspective, ticket discounts are not enough to move the entire tourism market.
Yang Rui, director of the Department of Economics of Soochow University, also believes that the core function of the current "1 yuan tour garden" initiative is to stimulate a wider range of tourists to view the garden, or that "1 yuan tour garden" is only a solution to the "ticket" node. The appeal.
For tourists, tourism is a series of consumption combinations that involve various needs such as food, accommodation, transportation, and consumption.
Many years ago, Tongcheng tried to issue free coupons for scenic spots through the Tongcheng client and WeChat channels, but the effect was not satisfactory.
"Tickets cannot be sent out." Cheng Chaogong said. Later we discovered that tickets are not the final travel consumer goods, but only the starting point or entrance of a tour. One ticket is not enough to stimulate consumers to start a trip, because consumers also need to consider this The time cost behind the ticket and other economic costs such as transportation and accommodation.
Therefore, from ticket discounts to the stimulation of incremental demand for tourism consumption, there are still many links to be opened up.
Before Suzhou launched the "1 Yuan Garden Tour" policy, it coincided with the Suzhou Municipal Government's promotion of night economic consumption, issuing a total of 65 million yuan in cultural and tourism consumption vouchers, which can be used to deduct the consumption amount for scenic spots and catering.
Tongcheng Research Institute shared a data point with reporters. In August, Suzhou’s accommodation, hotel night consumption, and special meals all increased significantly year-on-year. The cultural and tourism consumption vouchers issued by Suzhou this time essentially opened up the tourism industry. Chain, completely solve various problems in tourism.
Yang Rui suggested that in the future, Internet platform companies can use the big data accumulated in this "1 Yuan Garden Tour" activity to analyze, identify, and dig out the characteristics of tourists' common demand combination, and develop travel service products composed of different demand modules , With the activity of "1 yuan to visit the garden" to stimulate more and greater demand.
(Reporter Su Yan)