Zou Tongqian Chang Mengqian: Fostering The Culture Of Nighttime Consumption To Stimulate The Potential Of Culture And Tourism

Source: China Academy of Culture and Tourism       Data: September 18^th, 2019

(China Tourism News on September 18th  Link： https://h5.newaircloud.com/epaper_detail?newsid=8789686_zglyxw&app=1&from=singlemessage)

Promoting the development of nighttime economy should take measures in accordance with the local circumstance. Localities can choose appropriate policies according to the different periods of development and their own conditions，fully combine with local culture features, achieve the regular and sustainable development, promote the upgrading of culture and tourism consumption. Recently, General Office of the State Council of the People's Republic of China has published Opinions on further stimulate the potential of culture and tourism consumption. It says the nighttime culture and tourism economy will be developed vigorously and a batch of national nighttime tourism consumption clusters will be built. In terms of the development of nighttime economy, market is the foundation and the industrial policy is the important impetus and guarantee. Innovating the policy of nighttime economy and guiding the trend of nighttime consumption culture can effectively stimulate the potential of culture and tourism. The author suggests that efforts should be made in the following aspects:

One, guide the trend of nighttime consumption culture and expand the nighttime consumption groups. When vigorously promoting the development of nighttime economy, localities should fully realize that the nighttime economy is not only entertainment, but also the time and space for interpersonal communication and cultural creation: Young people have more social activities at night, and quite a number of writers and other art workers prefer to create works at night. It is an important task for cities to guide the nighttime consumption to become a cultural fashion. All kinds of culture-themed clubs should take great efforts to develop and the nighttime consumer community should be fostered. Setting landmarks and the business circles collectively in the city, organizing and carrying out nighttime-themed activities such as cultural light festival, tourism performance, sports event, national sports meeting, cultural and art exhibition, theme tea party and nighttime round table forum to expand the consumer group and guide the cultural trend of nighttime activities; The development pf creativity, art or sports-themed clubs will be encouraged. We can use the emotional belonging of some groups for certain themes to strengthen their connection with the nighttime economy, gradually fostering multiple nighttime consumer community. The convenience and preferential treatment of nighttime culture consumption will be enhanced. In order to attract tourists, cities can implement the preferential policies in the scenic areas, such as ticket exemption at night and giving discount in performance tickets according to its own conditions; Governments can set a special account of nighttime economy to subsidize the relevant businesses, strengthening their enthusiasm and motivation to promote the nighttime economy and culture; They can also issue exclusive bank cards for nighttime consumption and giving consumers preferential rights and interests such as special discount for certain business and consumption installment to stimulate people's payment ability for nighttime consumption and reduce the threshold.

Second, foster fashionable nighttime consumption products and create the “must plus” series. First and foremost, the content of products needs to be improved. The nighttime economy can’t only rely on high-end or luxury places, and its target consumer groups should not be restricted to high-income groups. Creating the nighttime mass cultural consumption, for one thing, can enrich the variety of nighttime consumption platforms, provide service for low and middle-income groups and enhance their cultural experiences. For another, it can effectively expand the consumer groups and directly attract more people to consume at night. Relying on local characteristic culture and other resources, localities can create "must see", "must play", "must eat", "must buy" and other "must plus" series products based on the consumer demand for urban nighttime consumption. They can show urban cultural characteristics in a creative and fashionable way, build new landmarks and promote the fashion of urban nighttime consumption culture.

Next, enrich the space attribute of products. In building the space form of nighttime economic products, localities can start from promoting the agglomeration effect and economy of scale to build a large comprehensive commercial complex, which can contain cultural and artistic creation space, catering, entertainment, physical fitness, theme club and other sectors. The one-stop service platform will fully gather popularity. Over the development of the nighttime economy, weather and other factors seriously affect the willingness and convenience of consumers to travel at night, especially the seasonal changes. In order to promote the regular development of urban nighttime economy in four seasons, building the indoor nighttime product is necessary. Cities can design indoor cultural town, art museum, food court, gymnasium, entertainment park to promote the "sustainable" development of nighttime economy. As cities advance the development of nighttime economy, many museums, high streets, walk streets, light shows and boating have become the popular nighttime tourism products. To ensure the sustainable development and vitality of night tourism products, it is necessary to build a nighttime economic development space for tourists to experience, upgrade the quality of sightseeing, and enhance the attraction and vitality of products; More importantly, it is necessary to build night tourism products with cultural connotation based on the city's characteristic culture, so as to promote the fashion process of nighttime consumption culture from the perspective of supply.

Third, create the fashionable nighttime space and achieve the sustainable development of nighttime economy. First, cities can be close to consumers and build a fashionable life circle. As the consumption-oriented tertiary industry, the urban nighttime economy should be located in the place where people gather and have complete supporting facilities. It should be planned centered around people and towards fashion. It should also target with a large number of young white-collar workers with stable income or high-income people, and planned around urban business office areas and high-end residential areas to provide nighttime "shelter" and "supply station" for urban residents to release pressure.

In addition, cities can create nighttime fashionable business circles with different themes through integrating music, film and cultural creativity, and more late night activity places. They can make use of nighttime public transportation “lines" to connect the surrounding late open “points” to form the modern nighttime life “circle”with scale and influence. It should mainly oriented towards middle and low-income groups and make plan in the urban marginal areas or around the ring roads.  With the advantages of low land price and less land restrictions, a comprehensive night entertainment park can be built, which can cover catering, entertainment, shopping, leisure, fitness，etc.

Besides, cities can build fashionable nighttime tourism circles around the cultural heritage. Cultural heritages now develop and open universally in the daytime, mainly focusing on serving tourists. However, with mass consumption and lifestyles change, urban residents and tourists from other places have higher demand for the nighttime tourism. On one hand, nighttime tourism should focus on static tourism sites with lights, leisure and recreational activities. It should also connect with dynamic modern urban landscapes. For instance, tourists can appreciate the sites at night through boating and trails in West Lake of Hangzhou, Qinhuai  River in Nanjing and the Bund of Shanghai, getting a completely different feeling from that during the day. On the other hand, historic district, city wall and other cultural heritage environment should combine with cultural creative space to connect scattered nighttime tourism products. It can build special cultural landmarks of urban nighttime economy, promoting the popularity of nighttime consumption.

Advancing the development of nighttime economy should consider the local circumstance and take corresponding action. All places can appropriately choose related policies in accordance with their own development period and condition, which fully combine with local culture characteristics, achieve the regular and sustainable development of the nighttime economy, promote the upgrading of culture and tourism.