Cai Lian She | New Consumption Daily, December 9 (Researcher Liang Youyun), as December has begun, the heat of the ice and snow economy is gradually rising.

According to Ctrip data, the booking volume for domestic ski resort tickets in the past month has increased by nearly 20% compared to last year. In terms of team travel routes, Harbin ranks first as a tourist destination, with routes such as Harbin + Snow Town and Harbin + Mohe being very popular, and group tour bookings have increased by 40% in the past week.

On Dazhong Dianping, deeply experiencing local features like "Northeast Big Kang" has become a hot topic, with search popularity rising by 154% compared to last week. As of December 9, the pre-order quantity for cultural tourism in the northeast (December - January of the following year) on the Meituan platform has increased by 35% year-on-year, with northeast specialty cuisine, foot massages, and hotels becoming the best attractions for attracting tourists.

This winter’s cultural tourism consumption peak has arrived, and many scenic spots and resorts continue the "Ice and Snow +" strategy from last year. In addition to traditional ice and snow resource advantage areas like the northeast and xinjiang, sichuan, inner mongolia, shandong, and even zhejiang are actively promoting ice and snow-related fitness, teaching, and experience projects.

Looking at current winter tourism, ice and snow consumption has initially formed a blooming pattern across the nation.

Ice and snow tourism, the northeast is ready to go.

On a macro level, this year's ice and snow economic boom is also driven by direct support from national and regional policies. In November, several opinions on stimulating the vitality of the ice and snow economy through high-quality development of ice and snow sports proposed that by 2027, the total scale of China's ice and snow economy will reach 1.2 trillion yuan; by 2030, the total scale of China's ice and snow economy will reach 1.5 trillion yuan.

At the same time, the state encourages the construction of a spatial layout of the ice and snow economy centered around inner mongolia, northeast, and xinjiang, implementing the strategy of expanding ice and snow sports southward, westward, and eastward, promoting the popular development of ice and snow sports nationwide.

In early December, regarding the core areas of the ice and snow economy in northeast, the "Implementation Plan for Promoting High-Quality Development of the Ice and Snow Economy in Northeast Region to Achieve New Breakthroughs in Comprehensive Revitalization" further proposed to support the construction of national and provincial-level tourism resorts and A-level tourist attractions themed around ice and snow; to support localities in introducing measures to promote ice and snow tourism consumption based on actual conditions, exploring specific directions such as establishing local ice and snow days and special holidays, attracting widespread market attention.

Thanks to the boost from the peking Winter Olympics and two consecutive years of skiing and ice sculpture tourism boom, the northeast region is currently the most active and activity-rich area for winter cultural tourism and entertainment.

Recently, the largest ski resort in liaoning province, the shenyang northeast asia international ski resort, officially opened its slopes, kicking off the winter "ice and snow +" cultural tourism themed activities in shenyang. It is reported that this winter, shenyang will launch 6 major sectors with a total of over 300 series of activities, including skiing competitions, professional ice hockey leagues, ice dragon boat racing, ice carnival, and various other sports events, as well as lantern displays, temple fairs, and song and dance performances during the period before and after the Spring Festival.

As last year's top city for ice and snow tourism, harbin in heilongjiang province is currently steadily advancing the ice harvesting work for the ice and snow world, with ice blocks weighing hundreds of kilograms being intensively harvested from the songhua river and quickly transported to the ice and snow world park. According to reports, this year, over ten thousand ice construction workers and nearly a thousand machinery and equipment will participate in the project construction, and the overall area of the park will be further expanded to 1 million square meters, featuring unique ice sculpture landscapes from east asia, central asia, southeast asia, and snow mountain light and shadow, presenting the highest number ever.

From winter 2023 to 2024, the harbin ice and snow world will be in operation for 61 days, receiving a total of 2.71 million visitors, significantly boosting the city's visitor reception scale. During the 2024 Spring Festival alone, harbin received 10.093 million visitors, with total tourism revenue reaching 16.42 billion yuan. With the larger-scale park construction, more complete supporting guarantees, and the backing of excellent reputation over the years, this year's ice and snow tourism in harbin is expected to surpass last year's popularity.

Data from ctrip shows that the bookings for ice and snow tourism to northeast peaked in mid to late November, and a second peak is expected from late December to mid-January next year, likely setting a new high for topics and popularity this year.

The cultural tourism industry in the southern winter is also lively.

Compared to the severe cold of dozens of degrees below zero in northeastern regions during winter, the advantages of non-below-freezing temperatures in southern snow parks and the unique high-altitude scenery have become important promotional subjects for winter tourism in many provinces and cities.

On December 8, the Shennongjia International Ski Resort in Hubei province became one of the earliest quality outdoor ski resorts to open in the south. As a well-established ski resort operating for 20 years, it has garnered attention from southern skiing enthusiasts after the boom in the ice and snow economy. According to incomplete statistics, in the last ski season (from the end of 2023 to the beginning of 2024), Shennongjia Ski Resort received about 150,000 visitors, while the entire Shennongjia tourist area welcomed 500,000 visitors, achieving comprehensive revenue of approximately 0.425 billion yuan.

In the western part of Sichuan, which has numerous high-altitude snow mountains, there are 47 ice and snow sightseeing tourist areas, 17 ski resorts, 5 dry skiing grounds, and 12 ice rinks as of early 2024. This winter, high-quality ice and snow tourism projects such as ice climbing in Siguniang Mountain, skiing in Wenchuan Qiang Valley, and the Dagushan Glacier Ice and Snow World are being actively planned, with expectations to debut with tourists in mid-December.

To fully utilize the ice and snow tourism resources within the province, Sichuan recently launched a 'Winter Travel Sichuan' cultural tourism consumption subsidy program, aiming to invest 0.15 billion yuan in distributing free tickets to all 4A-level and above scenic spots in the province. At the same time, Sichuan will collaborate with local intangible cultural heritage promotion ambassador Li Ziqi, singer Haila Amu, and the internet celebrity cultural tourism director of Ganzi, Liu Hong, to support Sichuan's winter tourism outreach.

In addition to the popularity of skiing and snow appreciation, data from Mafengwo shows that in southern regions, using hot springs to fend off winter chills is also a popular choice among many tourists, with interest in 'hot springs' increasing over 160%. Within Guangdong province, 'Conghua Hot Spring' has topped the list with a 244% increase in interest, while Yunnan's Tengchong volcanic hot springs and Nanjing's Tangshan hot springs, with their local characteristics and mature culinary and scenic offerings, have become favorites among young people.

In contrast, in the eastern coastal areas lacking cold temperatures and natural conditions, indoor skiing, skating, and ice experience venues have become favorites for many consumers. Since December, the largest indoor ice and snow entertainment city in the CNI Yangtze index, Longzhimeng Paradise Ice and Snow World, has entered a peak visitor season, with many teenagers and college students coming to learn skiing skills, and it is expected that the daily average visitor reception will exceed 13,000 in the entire month of December.

Notably, outdoor alpine ski resorts around Jiangsu, Zhejiang, and Shanghai, such as Tonglu Shengxianli Ski Resort, Hangzhou Lin'an Daming Mountain Wansongling Ski Resort, and Jinhua Pan'an Ski Resort, are continuously enhancing their appeal by using artificial snow and building more ski trails, becoming great locations for nearby skiing.

For many southern entrepreneurs, entering the ice and snow economy through the manufacturing of ice and snow equipment is seen as a more efficient way. According to Tianyancha, there are currently about 93,000 enterprises related to ice and snow equipment in China, with Guangdong having the most at about 23,000; Zhejiang and Hebei follow.

According to data from the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, as of 2023, the sales scale of domestic ice and snow equipment-related enterprises has reached about 22 billion yuan. In terms of ice and snow equipment, 6 champion enterprises and 21 specialized, special and new enterprises have emerged, covering the entire industry chain equipment including ice and snow venue facilities, competitive competitions, mass sports, and leisure sets.

Statistics show that in 2023, the market scale of China's ice and snow industry reached 890 billion yuan, and it is expected to exceed 1 trillion yuan by 2025.