China Sees Ice Economy Boom

The Beijing 2022 Winter Olympics has ushered in a rare development opportunity for China’s ice and snow economy amid the Spring Festival.

Chinese consumers bought winter sports gear and equipment for the week-long holiday that ran from January 31 to February 6 to celebrate the Lunar New Year, which created a burgeoning boom for the ice economy. 

The turnover of ice and snow equipment grew by 107 percent compared to last year, winter sportswear rose by 99 percent and related protective gear increased by 41 percent during the shopping festival, according to Chinese e-commerce giant JD.com. 

The Beijing Winter Olympics has encouraged 346 million people to participate in winter sports and related activities, according to the country's winter sports governing body, which means one in four Chinese people have enjoyed winter sports or related activities at least once. It surpassed the goal of 300 million the country set in 2015 when Beijing won the Olympic bid.

With the high participating rate comes a rapidly expanding market for China’s winter sports industry. Indoor ice rinks are set up in trendy malls in major cities; ski resorts are also built in low-latitude high-altitude regions of the country; schools and universities start to offer winter sports courses.

Winter sports are extending to other regions besides North China, offering all-year-round entertainment.

The winter sports fever is also injecting vigor to ice and snow tourism. For example, Jilin Province, a ski paradise in Northeast China, has held the “Snow Expo” for five consecutive years since the winter of 2015 as a prelude to the Beijing 2022 Winter Games.

During the 2018-2019 snow season, the province attracted more than 84 million visits, and the tourism revenue reached 169.8 billion yuan, an increase of 62% and 86% respectively compared with the figures of the same period three years ago.

Furthermore, the 2022 Winter Games will be a new starting point for the development of China's ice and snow industry. The technological achievements accumulated in the Winter Olympics including the manufacturing of equipment and the construction of venues will be applied to ice rinks and snow resorts nationwide to benefit ordinary customers.

Today, Jilin is home to 46 ski resorts, with 347 ski trails extending 298 kilometers and covering 1,032 hectares. Besides the fantastic equipment, offering corresponding supporting services, such as accommodation, rehabilitation, and cultural activities,

Also, Bing Dwen Dwen, the cute mascot of the Beijing Winter Olympics, has been selling like hotcakes. Online stores have sold out of Bing Dwen Dwen souvenirs and long queues have been seen outside official Olympic stores.

Ice and snow are as valuable as gold and silver. The Beijing 2022 Winter Olympics provides golden opportunities. Its legacy won’t just be the chilly ice and snow, but rather a winter sports fever that fuels the development of the ice and snow industry and enriches people’s lives.

Jilin explores ice-snow economy through "airplane theory ”

China has seen the fastest growth of its ice and snow economy in recent years and has become the world's largest market in the sector, according to a report released by Jilin University recently.

Jilin University's Key Laboratory of Ice and Snow Tourism Resorts Equipment and Intelligent Service Technology, took a year to complete its 2022 China Ice and Snow Economic Development Index Report, which aims to measure and forecast China's ice and snow economic development using several ice and snow indicators.

The report proposed the "airplane theory" as a way to look at the ice and snow economy.

The concept uses the growing and escalating ice and snow demand, and ice and snow technology as the "airplane engine" of economic development.

The specific weights of the current stage of China's ice and snow economic development is set out in the report.

The "airplane's head" represents ice and snow sports, which account for 25 percent of that weight. The "airplane's fuselage" represents ice and snow tourism, which accounts for 40 percent of the weight. And the "two wings" that balance the development of the economy represent ice and snow equipment, and ice and snow culture, which account for 25 percent and 10 percent, respectively.

Data shows that China's ice and snow economic development has shown a linear upward trend since the beginning of the 13th Five-Year Plan (2016-2020).

Other than in 2020, with the novel coronavirus pandemic impacting the sector, each year has succeeded the previous one, ever since 2016.

Driven by the Beijing 2022 Winter Olympics, the chain growth rate exceeded 34 percent in 2021, and the development of China's ice and snow economy is expected to maintain a chain growth rate of nearly 30 percent in 2022, the report said.

Along with the Beijing 2022 Winter Olympics, China's ice and snow tourism will show a new face in the international arena, and attract more foreign tourists in the post-pandemic era, the report said.

At the same time, with the release of Chinese people's enthusiasm for participating in and experiencing ice and snow tourism, ice and snow tourism consumption will play a massive role in boosting China's domestic demand and realizing the central domestic circulation, provincial medium circulation, and municipal microcirculation of China's ice and snow economy, the document said.

Foreign enterprises eager to cash in

The Beijing 2022 Winter Olympics has opened up a new vista for the Chinese market that might potentially reshape the world's ice and snow industry, as foreign investors are eager to pitch in.

TechnoAlpin Snow Making Equipment, a world-leading company in snow-making, has benefited from the Games as a major supplier of snow-making equipment, systems and related technical services to the competition venues.

"The privilege of supporting such high-end ice and snow events has been a great boost to our effectiveness and reputation," said Florian Hajzeri, general manager of the firm, noting that the Games provides "the most comprehensive and widest" opportunity for the company.

The passion ignited by the Games has stimulated unparalleled zeal for winter sports in the country. Zhou Xing, PwC China Sports Industry Leader, commended that ice and snow sports are among the hottest topics in China's society and have been carried out in over 30 provincial-level regions on the Chinese mainland.

Industry data showed that the number of ski resorts in China rose from 568 in 2015 to 770 in 2019, and is expected to top 1,000 this year, nearly doubling in seven years.

"China has built a lot of new ski resorts in recent years, and no other country in the world has done this at the same scale and quantity," said Hajzeri, adding that the company will seek opportunities to work with Chinese ski resorts in infrastructure maintenance and system upgrade.

"The ice and snow industry experienced rapid development before the Winter Olympic Games, and now it has turned to high-quality development," Wang said, noting that not only outdoor ski resorts, but also indoor ski resorts, snow parks and professional ski resorts will be developed in the future, which means more possibilities in the industry.

In addition to the fast expansion of ice and snow venues, Olympic fervor also triggered mounting demand for ice and snow sportswear, with multiple trending topics spread on social media since the opening of the Games.

"There will be an important share of consumers looking for high-quality garments which are able to combine the best performance with a fashion twist," said Stefano Colombo, marketing and sales director of Colmar, an Italian sportswear manufacturer specializing in ski wear.

Colombo also predicted that fierce competition will exist in China's ice and snow market in the future.

Eyeing trillion-yuan-level growth potential of China's ice and snow market, Zhou said investments will involve the whole ice and snow industrial chain, highlighting a wide range of opportunities in the fields of venues, garment and equipment, machinery, merchandise manufacturing as well as training and performance.