Original title: National fitness craze boosts China’s sports industry to accelerate
Xinhua News Agency, Beijing, March 21 (Reporter Shi Hao) Spring is blooming, and it’s the season that many people say “If you don’t lose weight in March, you will be sad in April.”
The reporter also decided to keep his mouth shut and move forward. When he went out, he discovered that a new comprehensive sports center was opening near his home. In fact, this business district outside the Third Ring Road in Beijing already has many sports and fitness venues, including badminton, table tennis, basketball, rock climbing, roller skating, yoga, and Pilates.
Photo by Xinhua News Agency reporter Li Gang
Zhou Mo, who was distributing leaflets on the streets, warmly invited reporters to experience the new sports hall. She doesn’t seem worried about too many competitors and is confident about the customer flow after the club opens. “Of course there is competition because there is a market.”
Official data shows that as of December 2023, there are approximately 117,000 generalized fitness venues in China, with 69.75 million offline paying fitness members. People aged 26 to 35 are the main body of fitness consumers, and more elderly people are beginning to enter the fitness consumer market.
Zhang Qing, a sports industry expert and founder of Beijing Juazhidao Sports Consulting Co., Ltd., observed that with the steady advancement of Chinese-style modernization and the growing middle-income group, more and more people regard sports, fitness and leisure as a way of life to enjoy happiness. , keep fit and expand social interaction.
Ma Xiaozhang, who is engaged in the green coffee bean trade, liked to play volleyball when he was in college. He often runs after work. Last year, he became obsessed with Muay Thai and now exercises five or six times a week. “I really like sports! If my body didn’t need an occasional rest, I would really like to go to the boxing gym every day.”
Photo by Xinhua News Agency reporter Chen Zhonghao
Ms. Wang, who works in a company, loves cycling. She goes out for cycling almost every weekend, and rides more than 100 kilometers in a single trip. Her club has more than 400 riders.
Data released by the China Bicycle Association in September last year showed that the number of bicycles in China’s society exceeded 200 million, and about 30 out of every 100 trips made by urban residents across the country were carried by “two wheels”.
In today’s China, all kinds of sports enthusiasts can find their companions. This month, nearly 100,000 people signed up to participate in the 2024 Beijing Half Marathon, and the number of applicants broke the event record. In addition to traditional sports, skiing, skateboarding, surfing, Frisbee, rock climbing, flag football, etc. are also booming.
The fitness craze not only brings health, but also creates consumption and business opportunities. Ma Xiaozhang spends about 1,800 yuan a month on gyms and boxing gyms. Ms. Wang continues to upgrade her bicycles and riding equipment and has invested a total of more than 100,000 yuan.
Published by Xinhua News Agency (Photo by Cao Zhonghong)
“China’s sports industry has truly ushered in a period of development opportunities.” Zhang Qing said that the key is to make a fuss on the supply side. Enterprises must continue to innovate, provide consumers with better products and services, and accelerate the cultivation of new productivity.
Zhang Qing believes that sports equipment, wearable devices and other sporting goods have the greatest business opportunities in the future, and sports drinks, supplements and food also have good “money prospects”. Many supermarkets now have sports facilities for rock climbing, skating, and parent-child interaction, allowing shopping, dining, and sports and leisure to flow into each other. This “movementization of commercial space” is also one of the future development trends.
Gao Zhidan, director of the State Sports General Administration, said that this year will promote the transformation and upgrading of the sports manufacturing industry, encourage sporting goods companies to adapt to personalized, differentiated, and quality consumer needs, launch domestic sports fashion brands; at the same time, enrich the consumption scenarios of fitness and leisure services, and improve Investment and financing promotion and consumer protection systems.
Photo by Xinhua News Agency reporter Fan Changguo
According to the “14th Five-Year Plan” Sports Development Plan, during the “14th Five-Year Plan” period, China’s target sports industry total scale will reach 5 trillion yuan, the added value will account for 2% of GDP, and the total scale of residents’ sports consumption will exceed 2.8 trillion yuan, employing more than 8 million people.
The title of PwC’s “Global Sports Industry Survey (Seventh Issue) China Report” is “Ready to Go.” The report points out that China’s sports industry has great potential for future development and will develop in a higher-quality, more efficient and more sustainable direction.
2024-03-21 14:26:33
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