The current snow season is about to end. Before the next ice and snow season arrives, how to continue the current heat makes it possible to operate the snow farm in the four seasons becomes an urgent problem. The hosting of the 2022 Winter Olympics will bring new support to the ice and snow industry.

01. In 2020, domestic skiing industry will usher in "epidemic" growth

In early 2020, due to the outbreak, snow farms had to be closed after a short period of opening. Until the second half of the year, the snow field heat continued to rise. On the one hand, because the exit is not open, many ski enthusiasts turn their eyes to the domestic, on the other hand, people are holding their homes for a long time because of the epidemic. After entering winter, skiing projects are popular. Ctrip data show that since November 2020, the number of ski theme tourism products bookings has increased by more than 350%.

In recent years, the state and local governments have spare no effort to launch the favorable policies of ice and snow sports and industry, especially near the 2022 Winter Olympics, and domestic ice and snow sports are ushering in development opportunities. According to statistics, the number of ski resorts in 2019 reached 770, an increase of 67% compared with 2014.

Compared with the natural ski resorts in northern winter such as Beijing, Zhangjiakou and Harbin, in recent years, Guangzhou, Shenzhen, Chengdu and other popular cities in the South have gradually landed on the snow and snow project complex. It is reported that the world's largest indoor ski resort also landed in Shanghai, which is expected to be basically completed by the end of 2022, which also indicates that South tourists can also ski at home in the future.

In fact, a large part of the skiing population in China is experienced, and even many people are the first skiing, and most people may only experience it once a year. This is mainly because of the reduction of the opportunity of everyone to travel under the epidemic, coupled with the less leisure and entertainment projects in winter, and the active promotion of ice and snow industry in different regions under the "Dongfeng" of the Winter Olympic Games.

According to statistics of Jilin Provincial Department of culture and tourism, from 2016 to 2019, the number of tourists received in each ice and snow season in the province increased by about 10million. Among them, during the ice and snow season 2018-2019, a total of 843184 million tourists from home and abroad were received, and the revenue of ice and snow tourism was RMB 16.98 billion, an increase of 62% and 86% respectively compared with the ice and snow seasons in 2015-2016.

In addition, China ice and snow tourism development report 2021 predicts that China's ice and snow leisure tourism will reach 2300 million in the ice and snow season 2020-2021, with the revenue of ice and snow leisure tourism exceeding 390billion yuan.

However, looking back to 2020, although the market is rising, the occurrence of skiing safety accidents is also reminding the industry. At present, China's ice and snow industry is still in the development period, and the market supervision system is still imperfect. Both operators and tourists need to constantly improve their self-safety awareness.

As a Beijing snow farm operator said, there is no perfect ski market system. Whether it is a strong ice and snow country in Europe and America or the domestic skiing market in rising period, the supply demand is changing constantly, whether it is the market or the participants, and all aspects still need time to polish.

02. The snow season is about to end, how can the snow farm live longer?

The sudden outbreak in 2020 will stop the "ice and snow season" ahead of time. For ski resorts that rely on 3 months to support the whole year, it is undoubtedly a "huge impact". How to solve the seasonal impact has become the problem of snow field thinking. In fact, the single business model and long cycle have always been the problems faced by ski resorts, but the problems are even more severe in the case of epidemic.

In fact, it is also a business with no low threshold to operate large snow farms. Many snow farms invest billions of assets and even reach 10 billion levels. There are also some large resort snow farms. In order to reduce the operating pressure, there will be more revenue for the projects such as vacation, accommodation, shopping, entertainment, hot spring, etc., to some extent, relieve the operating pressure. Besides the high cost, outdoor skiing is a seasonal project. After the snow season, how to survive the ski resort is one of the problems that must be considered.

It is reported that many ski resorts have been trying to operate in non snow seasons. Some ski resorts have tried to increase RV accommodation and weekend bars, some introduce snow golf, some open special snow shops, even open night skiing, etc.; some also try to provide camp and education with institutions after the end of winter, and try to provide camp and education for teenagers after the end of winter, but few successful ones are successful.

Trying to operate in four seasons can relieve the operation pressure to some extent. On the other hand, it is also increasing the investment cost. After all, the cost of project facilities is also required. It is difficult to keep the balance of income and expenditure for a long time, and the operating pressure of snow farm increases, which is difficult to be long-term. But due to the epidemic situation, the heat of self driving and surrounding tourism is increasing, which may be an opportunity for ski resorts.

It is also suggested that the successful experience of foreign countries can be used for reference, such as the Breton forest mountain resort in the United States to explore the canopy in the air in non snow season, and the winter project of vilwadi Park in South Korea to open the summer project Marine World Water Park, etc., but this is also a project based on different characteristics of the snow field. Compared with domestic ski resorts, it is necessary to find a suitable ski resort The way to manage.

For example, there are some similar music festivals and cross-country running activities in China, which can be referred to in non snow season.

In addition, when considering the operation of the four seasons, the operation and safety of some projects need to be approved by relevant government departments. After all, the safety of tourists is the top priority. Beijing Industry said in an interview with the media that most of the snow farms in Beijing are from leasing. With the strict management of current land policies, the regulation of snow farms will be more stringent. If the project is adjusted in this case, it is also difficult.

In the view of the industry, on the one hand, due to the current situation of the snow farm management has a great dilemma, on the other hand, some of the current policies are not clear, for the snow farm transformation is a problem.

Zhoumingqi, founder of Jingjian think tank, said in an interview with wenlv that at present, there are many ski resorts in China, and the market is generally in a state of oversupply and demand. If we want to maintain a long-term heat, we should not only do well in the quality of skiing products, but also systematize, differentiate, refine and needle the products in the whole winter The targeted products and services provided to different types of tourists are not fixed on a single product, and can have various personalized experiences.

03. How to seize the opportunity of "300 million people participating in the sport"?

Under the bonus of the Winter Olympics, the number of skiing shows a rapid growth trend. According to the white paper of China skiing industry (2019) (hereinafter referred to as "white paper"), 28 new domestic snow farms were added in 2019, with a total of 770, an increase of 3.77%. The number of ski arrivals in the snow resort increased to 20.9 million, an increase of 6.09% year-on-year. In 2019, the number of skiers skiing per capita in domestic snow resorts increased from 1.49 in 2018 to 1.60.

Meanwhile, the state and local governments have been actively promoting the ice and snow industry in recent years, and in accordance with the development plan of ice and snow sports formulated by the General Administration of sports (2016-2025) In (hereinafter referred to as "development plan"), by 2020, the total scale of China's ice and snow industry will reach 600billion yuan, and in 2025, the total scale of China's ice and snow industry will reach RMB 100billion. At that time, the number of direct participation in ice and snow sports will also exceed 50million, and 300 million people will be involved in ice and snow sports. Therefore, the domestic ice and snow sports are ushering in unprecedented development opportunities.

We learned that skiing is gradually becoming popular sport. The entry of many players will naturally lead to the rising enthusiasm of the industry. In addition, skiing fever also drives the heat of related industries, such as hotels, accommodation, and the increase of ski training institutions.

All kinds of signs show that there is still a great room for domestic skiing market to rise. According to media reports, the number of skiing per capita in China is only 1.6 times, and the probability of converting from one-time players to skiing enthusiasts is less than 1%, which still has a big gap compared with the foreign conversion rate of 5%.

With the broad prospect and the hot market, coupled with the bonus of policy, more and more capital and players will be attracted. According to the data of "information query platform for a certain enterprise", there are 5008 ski related enterprises in China by the end of November 2020, of which 1684 ski related enterprises are involved. Harbin has 416 ski related enterprises as the largest number of cities, Zhangjiakou and Beijing are ranked two or three. From the provincial ranking, Hebei, Heilongjiang and Guangdong ranked the top three, and the northeast three provinces accounted for 27% of the country.

At present, ski market is so hot that many people want to take a share of it. Whether it is the operator or capital side, before doing this, we need to consider a balance "degree", rather than blindly do it. In the end, it is the service and quality of the products that attract tourists.

"The emergence of various indoor / outdoor ice and snow tourism projects shows that the market is very large, but it is concluded that the core competitiveness of the enterprise is to consider the brand historical precipitation and product iteration innovation, so only better can we really win the market."