Friends who follow the public account "Youzi Travel Notes" will not be in bad luck.
Regarding "B&B", let's start with Lijiang.
Lijiang is a travel destination with thousands of inns.
This is a living ancient city, and the gathering of inns also illustrates its vitality.
When traveling to Lijiang, you must stay in an inn. If you have never experienced inn life, then... your visit to Lijiang is in vain.
However, there is another word that has become popular in the past year or two - homestay.
More and more tourists are choosing B&Bs, and more and more investors are turning their targets to B&Bs.
Looking at the reports about B&Bs, we can see how popular B&Bs are.
Take Yuzu itself as an example. When an article about inns is posted to the respective media platforms, if the word "B&B" is added to the title, the number of reads will double.
B&B, as an "imported product", originated from Europe and emerged in Japan and Taiwan. In recent years, it has spread to the mainland and has become very popular.
What is a B&B?
Maybe many people confuse B&B and inn without knowing the meaning of B&B.
In fact, a B&B refers to an accommodation place that utilizes spare rooms in self-occupied residences, combines local humanities, natural landscapes, ecology, environmental resources, and agricultural, forestry, fishery, and animal husbandry production activities, operates as a family sideline, and provides tourists with rural life.
Do you understand this? It’s an upgraded version of the farmhouse!
In Japan and our province, Taiwan, such "farmhouses" have something deeper in them. Integrate a sentimental and attitudinal lifestyle into travel, making it a rural tourism product that tourists love.
B&B, also known as "Shijuku" in Japan, is a small privately run family hotel that is rented to the public for rest or temporary accommodation.
The basic features of a Japanese B&B are: free WiFi, eye-catching personalized design, and the purest Japanese cultural experience.
Taiwan's B&Bs vividly express individualism and life aesthetics in the form of "home".
B&B is exquisite and unique, with rich themes, full of the owner's ingenious ideas, and a cultural atmosphere with regional characteristics. It is scattered among the quiet and peaceful green mountains and green fields, and beside the ebb and flow of the coastal beaches, conveying to tourists the spirit of Taiwanese people Romantic feelings and tenderness in the bones.
Whether it is a B&B in Japan or a B&B in Taiwan, the concept of home is very obvious.
's warm and comfortable accommodation experience, up-to-date local cultural experience, and moderately affordable prices have naturally created an unstoppable trend for homestays.
However, when this trend of homestays spreads to the mainland, how much of the soul is left in it?
Let’s talk about the price first:
Because it uses idle rooms in the home, the setting service is not as good as that of hotels and inns. Therefore, the price of traditional B&Bs is much cheaper than that of hotels and inns.
What about B&Bs in the Mainland? It’s more expensive than a youth hostel, more expensive than an inn, or even more expensive than a star hotel.
Of course, there is a reason why these B&Bs are expensive: their buildings are often designed by famous designers; their housekeepers often provide 24-hour one-on-one service; and their bed sheets and quilt covers may be from international brands.
Let’s look at the scale:
Taiwan’s B&B legislation stipulates that ordinary B&Bs should have no more than 5 rooms, and special areas should have no more than 15 rooms.
So, what about mainland B&Bs?
There are 15 less guest rooms that I would rather call "B&B", and the average number is 20+.
Following, let’s talk about family elements:
Well, sorry, whether it is Lijiang or Dali , there are very few aboriginal families opening inns, let alone B&Bs.
So, let’s talk about local culture:
A B&B in Hualien, Taiwan. Its owner may be a fisherman. He will share with you his experience of catching a typhoon while fishing at sea, and escaping death in the violent storm. of pursuit.
There is a B&B in Alishan, Taiwan. Its owner may be a farmer. He will invite you to pick vegetables in the vegetable garden and cook delicious food together.
A B&B in , Hokkaido, Japan. Its owner may be a reclusive writer. He will talk to you about the tea ceremony and show you a leisurely lifestyle that is completely different from yours.
What about B&Bs in the Mainland, especially those in Dali and Lijiang?
Oh, they have a butler. 24-hour one-on-one service to answer all your reasonable or unreasonable questions and meet all your reasonable or unreasonable needs.
By comparison, it is not difficult to find that many B&Bs in the mainland are more of "boutique inns" or "resort hotels." Whether it is the basic design of the B&B, the corresponding facilities and equipment, or the considerate butler service, it is all commendable.
However, the form of "home", "unique cultural experience" and "owner's life philosophy" mentioned in Japanese and Taiwanese B&Bs are rarely seen in mainland B&Bs.
Looking at the rapid development of the homestay industry in the Mainland, there are both joys and worries.
For example, in the B&Bs in Tianmu Mountain, a large number of investors spent real money to knock down the old houses, build new ones, forcibly raise the configuration of the B&Bs, and decorate the B&Bs with high-end designs and magnificent decorations, forcibly replacing the original ones. The "Tianmushan Farmhouse" full of local flavor has been turned into a star hotel or a high-end inn.
Perhaps in their understanding: this is what a B&B should be like.
What about branded B&Bs in popular tourist cities?
For example, Dali or Lijiang.
To put it bluntly, many brands of "B&B" are actually some mid-to-high-end inns that have replaced their gold-lettered signboards with "B&B" as a gimmick and used crowdfunding (or venture capital) as a way to recruit more funds. In a certain place, Or establish more B&Bs under the same brand in multiple places.
Do you understand? Just use other people's money to build more hotel chains.
Note, if you are a tourism practitioner and you are preparing to participate in a crowdfunding campaign for a B&B brand, or you are an inn owner and you are also planning to build a B&B... you may think that we are giving "B&B" Discredit.
However... it doesn't.
Although "B&Bs" in mainland China, especially those in Dali and Lijiang, have a lot of flaws, in fact, this is a powerful trend of marketization.
Take the once-famous inns in Lijiang as an example, but now they are deserted.
(Ahem, in fact, it’s because Yuzi Travel’s studio is in Lijiang and he is most familiar with the Lijiang market.)
Economic growth is slowing down; Lijiang’s reputation is declining; the market is seriously saturated; prices are being increased at all levels; Ctrip ’s comprehensive Monopoly; and endless vicious competition.
Various factors have caused many inns in Lijiang to struggle.
However, the market has market rules, and it follows the principle of survival of the fittest. Coupled with the injection of homestays, Lijiang’s inn market is bound to usher in a new reshuffle. The strong get stronger and the weak get eliminated.
So, how to become the strong one in a shuffle?
’s answer is: use a brand to package an inn, highlight the characteristics of the brand, and thereby break through the competition among many peer merchants. But in fact, the establishment of a brand does not happen overnight, and it requires spending a lot of RMB.
Crowdfunding is the best and most popular way to attract money for brand building. I spent tens of thousands of yuan to become a shareholder of an inn. From then on, I got free rooms when traveling and good dividends at home. In fact, the gathering of shareholders not only means abundant capital flows, but also free and spontaneous shareholder publicity.
How much traffic will a shareholder bring through promotion in his circle of friends? This goes without saying.
When the three elements of inn, brand and crowdfunding collide, the mainland version of B&B comes into being.
However, it is not enough to just have a B&B brand without the connotation of B&B.
Even if it is a chain brand B&B, it must enrich its own connotation.From "life" to life, we combine high-recognition and highly differentiated human services and operations to highlight the characteristics of the B&B owners and perfect every detail in the guest rooms.
Developing individuality, showing personality, and embodying warmth are the three common features of B&Bs. B&Bs are designed to reflect the simplicity and enthusiasm of the owners, not the super luxurious appearance.
If you want to make your inn more competitive when opening an inn in Lijiang, then you can consider branding and crowdfunding to build your inn into a more competitive mainland version of the brand B&B.
has less cold decoration and more warm feelings.
If you are an investor participating in crowdfunding, you should also be aware of the risks and invest with caution.
For example, for a certain B&B brand (there are some rumors, I dare not mention it by name), every time it is time for shareholders to pay dividends, a new project is launched. The so-called dividends automatically become investment funds for new projects. Correspondingly, the days for shareholders to wait for dividends are far away.
