The big news for those following outbound tourism news from the world’s largest outbound source market was discouraging—best described in a two-sentence introduction a current news summary: “The spread of the Delta variant has prompted a dramatic response from authorities in China, including mass testing and travel restrictions. China’s scrutiny of cross-border travel and trade is also likely to put further pressure on supply chains and affect Chinese imports. As other countries employ a herd immunity approach to living with the virus, what can be learned from China’s zero-tolerance policy?” 

Everyone was looking for an answer to what became a menacing situation:

—According to the usually reliable online news site, bignewsnetwork.com, Chinese officials indicated that the current outbreak is linked to the airport in the eastern city of Nanjing.

—The same news site said that more than 30 Chinese officials were fired or received other punishments for allegedly failing to respond adequately to the latest COVID-19 surge in China.
—Among those who lost their jobs were a vice mayor, along with heads of city districts and health commissions. Also let go were staff in hospital management, airport managers and tourism department officials.
—Other reports said the highly contagious Delta variant was transmitted among airport workers and has since spread from Hainan province in the south to Inner Mongolia in the far north.
—The outbreak in China has resulted in other new travel restrictions, lockdowns of communities and the sealing off of the city of Zhangjiajie’s 1.5 million people.

The irony is that the bad news came in the wake of official reports which indicated that travel was recovering, and getting closer to those of 2019. For instance:

● The Chinese broadcast news outlet, CGTN, reported the Chinese made over 1.8 billion domestic trips in the first half of 2021, up by 100.8 percent from the same period in 2020, official data showed.

● A total of 1.024 billion and 847 million domestic trips were made in the first and second quarter, a surge of 247.1 percent and 33 percent year on year, respectively, said China’s Ministry of Culture and Tourism.

● Domestic tourism revenue stood at 1.63 trillion yuan (about $250 billion) during this period, up by 157.9 percent year on year, it said.

●The country’s tourism industry welcomed a fast recovery in the first half of 2021. Domestic trips and tourism revenue had recovered to about 60.9 percent and 58.6 percent, respectively, of the level of the first half of 2019, the ministry said.

● China saw its per capita expenditure on tourism go up by 28.5 percent to settle at 872.27 yuan (roughly $135) in the January-June period.

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Who is Viya? Midst all of the above, there is one ongoing story that seems to captivate the Chinese appetite for big, “good” news.

From Bloomberg News: “A millionaire at 34 and bigger than ‘Sunday Night Football,’ China’s star saleswoman Viya rules a $60 billion world of live online shopping.”

From Jing Travel—travel marketers might want to follow the example (and success) of their colleagues in Macao—there is this excerpt from its email newsletter.

“Macau Government Tourism Office collaborated with Viya, China’s leading female livestreamer, to host a broadcast selling travel packages and hotel room bookings to the city.

“The Jing Travel Angle: There is no bigger star in China’s livestreaming e-commerce ecosystem than Viya. In nightly broadcasts that blend elements of the infomercial with informal conversation, Viya consistently reaches millions somewhat irrespective of the product at hand. 

“Macau is the latest stakeholder in China’s tourism industry to lean into the strategy with Wen Qihua, the tourism office’s director, making an appearance alongside Viya in a livestream that reached 15 million viewers. The show was a success. In the course of an hour, Viya sold $13 million in exclusive travel packages and hotel reservations.

“China’s livestreaming e-commerce trend continues to grow. Last year, more than 60 percent of the country’s internet users watched livestreams with the market expected to be worth $300 billion by the end of 2021.”

Luxury spacesuits and more about China: The recent success of two separate trips into space by separate teams that included billionaires Jeff Bezos and Sir Richard Branson has them talking and speculating at Jing Daily, the New York City-headquartered publication that analyzes and reports on the Chinese luxury consumer class (Its tagline does, after all, note that its focus is “The Business of Luxury in China”).

Don’t expect those who sell to groups or FITs to ask operators about net rates or meet-and-greets for those coming to the U.S. to take off into space, but be aware of the phenomenon’s appeal to those who have the resources to pay for the product.

As Jing Daily puts it in a recent issue: “Over the past seven years, China has been stepping up its space exploration, with around $6.5 billion raised by commercial space companies ranging from private VCs and commercial firms to regional governments. China landed a rover on Mars in May and made one more giant leap in July when a spacecraft capable of flying to the edge of the atmosphere took off and returned to Earth on the same day … But for now, Mainland tycoons are more focused on enterprises that support the country’s space ambitions, including launch vehicles and satellites, rather than helming their own private crafts.”

There is more about the subject—including such matters as luxury space suits and other space-inspired designs—in the complete article, which you an access here.

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What is a global study tour? And who goes on them? These are just two of the questions raised in an article by Helena Beard, founder and managing director of the marketing and consulting firm at Guanxi is quite involved in the Chinese market, especially as it concerns the UK. (Guanxi is headquartered in Brighton, England.) But on this particular subject, the impact on the United States is obvious. So …

Question: What is the global study tour market?

Answer: A global study tour is a trip abroad made by a school-aged child for the purpose of learning. There are four main categories of global study tour:

1. The most common type of global study tour involves a group of children visiting a foreign country to learn something (usually the language) with some elements of sightseeing as part of the itinerary.

2. “Camp education” is common in the States, where students stay in a camp and confine their activities to the camp and its surrounding areas. The content is around education, with most courses offering a theme; sport, art, science, technology—are all popular. Many of the summer schools favored by high-achieving students applying to America’s best universities offer campsite programs.

3. A third option is the “School immersion” tour, where the student has a curriculum-based experience within a foreign school or university.

4. The fourth type is aimed at students with a clear ambition to study abroad in the future. This type of study tour aims at enhancing the actual university application and is intended to give the student the best chance of success.

The impact of China—the single largest country of origin for international students worldwide—is especially significant for the United States. Some 350,000 Chinese students were enrolled in U.S. universities and schools in the 2019-2020 school year.

Read the complete article here.

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This year, China is expected to become the first country in the world where more than half of total retail sales originate online. Jing Daily has partnered with Wunderman Thompson Intelligence to produce “Transcendent Retail: APAC,” an 81-page report that explores 17 emerging trends and innovations that have taken hold in China and assesses the readiness of local markets to embrace them, with survey data from more than 10,000 consumers in China, India, Indonesia, Thailand, Japan and Australia.

The 81-page report is Filled with actionable insights, expert interviews, and deep market analysis, “Transcendent Retail: APAC” is a great read for any brand, marketer, or retailer interested in leveraging China’s next-generation commerce trends to reach consumers worldwide.

For more on this report, click here.

● Chinese Family Travel Market Looms Large: “Three-child policy set to further boost China’s booming family travel.” This across-the-top-of-the-page headline in a recent China Travel News article on the growing importance of family travel makes its point with a treasure trove of data and charts that area very convincing. They also buttress the opinion of those who are marketing to Chinese travelers that interest by families in “outdoorsy” product is high.

This and other points are noted in a report put out by Tencent-backed online travel company Tongcheng-Elong that focused on family travel in China in 2020 and related trends for the future. 

Some of the information bytes one ought to digest from the report include the following:

—In the first half of this year, spending on family travel increased by 41 percent year-on-year.

—According to the seventh national population census conducted last year, there were 253 million children aged 14 or below in China—a 17.95 percent of the population and 1.35 percentage points higher than in 2010.

—The increase in the number of children aged 14 or younger reflects the potential for the growth of family travel.

—Summer was prime season for family travel 

—Although long-haul trips catering for families with children aged 12 and younger declined 13.8 percent in 2020 compared to pre-Covid levels, long-haul family trips taken in July and August as well as January had shown peak demand. 

—Despite the impact of the pandemic, local family trips started recovering since the second quarter of 2020 and peaked in August and October

—Consumers born in the 1980s and 1990s (aged between 22 and 41) became the major force for family travel, accounting for 44.8 percent and 29.5 percent of the travelers. As a second child was allowed in the 1970s, there was a relatively high proportion of family travel in certain age segments in the age range of age 42 to 51.

—Travelers aged between 22 and 41 were more fashion and quality oriented, which also pushed the family travel market toward diversification and high quality. Tongcheng-Elong’s data showed that while typical family rooms in hotels remained the most popular accommodations, alternative accommodations such as log cabins, tree houses, tents and RVs were also gaining popularity. (Read the complete article here.)

● Fire up the Barbie—for Chinese Visitors: Does this sound like a scene from Beijing?  Families are barbecuing beside their tents at a campsite. The children, who have spent the day playing outdoors, help their parents with dinner by passing them food to place on the grill. But in suburban Beijing?

Take note, U.S. travel suppliers interested in offering an itinerary to Chinese visitors in the wake of the global pandemic, in which outdoors activities are expected to be a sought-after component of a Chinese traveler’s holiday in the USA.

For many Chinese parents, the outdoor barbecue, along with other activities outside, has become increasingly popular. It is a chance to break free from urban responsibilities and get close to nature with their children.

A recently released survey report from Trip.com Group showed that the expenditure on trips by Chinese families in the first half of 2021 has increased by 41 percent from the same period last year, with a surge in camping and outdoor activities.

Not something that have appeared in surveys of Chinese travel intentions in the past, camping and outdoor activities are considered by many parents consider camping to be a great opportunity for children to experience the outdoors and develop skills, curiosity and courage.

In a China Daily article on the phenomenon, Zhao Yihong, a mother in Beijing, said that her son still

recalls their trip to Guangzhou Chimelong Safari Park in Guangdong province two years ago, when they camped in a tent outside the glasshouse of pandas.

For Xiang Yan, a Beijing citizen, camping allows for more freedom and is more slow-paced compared with other types of family trip. He took a camping holiday in early May and is already planning a second one. “Many young parents also consider camping a break for themselves,” he says.

The trend is more evident in larger cities. According to Trip.com statistics, family bookings for camping in and around Shanghai increased by 206 percent in the first half of this year, compared with the same period in 2019, while the number of campsites around first- and second-tier cities account for over half of those in the whole country. Click here for the complete article.

● Chinese spoken here: What every professional in international tourism already knew—Chinese is an official UN language. In an interview with the official Chinese news agency Xinhua, Zurab Pololikashvili, secretary general of The United Nations World Tourism Organization (UNWTO) said that its recent decision to adopt Chinese as one of its official languages reflects China’s growing importance in the world tourism market.

Pololikashvili said that “China is playing an increasingly significant role in the global tourism sector,” adding that China “is a top destination in its own right and, prior to the pandemic, had established itself as the number one source market for international tourists. Including Chinese as one of UNWTO’s official languages ensures the increased participation of China in our organization’s work, reflecting the significance of the country to global tourism.”

According to Pololikashvili, the addition of Chinese “means the UNWTO now has all six official languages of the United Nations in alignment with the UN’s objective of promoting multilingualism and good communication between nations and peoples.” The six languages are now Arabic, Chinese, English, French, Russian and Spanish. He explained that the large numbers of Chinese tourists “help support jobs and businesses” throughout the world. Click here for the complete article.

⦁ Really? China wants to build high-speed train from China to the United States. According to an item by Jack Dunhill in IFLScience.com, which serves the science community, the basic facts are these: China wants to build a high-speed 13,000-kilometer (8,078-mile) train that goes from mainland China, through Siberia in Eastern Russia, under the ocean through the Bering Strait into Alaska, across the mountains of the Canadian Yukon and British Columbia, and into the U.S. Estimated Cost? $200 billion.

The article continued: “The plans emerged in 2014, when multiple news outlets covered a report by the Beijing Times that outlined plans for China to build the 8,000-mile super train. It would be called the ‘China-Russia-Canada-America’ line (catchy, we know) and stretch across all four nations, connecting them together for a trade, tourism, and economic boom. Stretching across the Bering Strait, it would require an underwater tunnel four times larger than the Channel Tunnel, and far more high-tech to boot.”  Click here to read the complete article.

⦁ In China, sex isn’t selling like it used to: “Unfortunately, the distinction between femininity and sexualization is still a grey area for many luxury brands. But changing attitudes about sexuality and gender will determine which brands resonate with society’s values in the future,” Jing Daily recently reported, noting that an Ipsos Chinese survey revealed that “happiness, dignity, confidence, and kindness were the most important attributes in making a woman beautiful, and only 55 percent of respondents considered sexiness important.” For the full article, read here.

⦁ Do you speak Chinese? Something to think about if you’re marketing to China: “I’ve been teaching English for academic purposes at an international school in East China for the past four years. In that time, my school’s enrollment figures have soared, in no small part thanks to its increased emphasis on English-language learning and teaching. Today, it’s expected for even local teachers to exclusively speak English in the classroom, regardless of their accent or ability to express themselves. But is anybody actually benefitting from this embrace of English-language learning?” Read complete article here, courtesy of the Sixth Tone.

⦁ U.S. Organization Cites Unease over Business Conditions in China: The American Chamber of Commerce in China said in its recent annual report on business conditions, points to “growing unease among American and other foreign companies about the impact of economic and strategic tensions between Beijing and their home countries. Brands including Swedish retailer H&M, Adidas and Nike have been targeted by demands online for consumer boycotts. That came after state media criticized them for expressing concern about reports of possible forced labor by ethnic minorities in the Xinjiang region of China’s northwest.” The American Chamber said 78 percent of companies that responded to its survey cited “rising tensions” between Beijing and Washington as their top concern. (From the Arab News on the United States’ Memorial Day. Read here for the complete article.)