On April 6, 2022, in Nantong City, Jiangsu Province, ring-tailed lemur of Nantong Forest Wildlife Park was eating. Nantong Forest Wildlife Park will be temporarily closed from April 1, and the zoo will make every effort to ensure the healthy life of wild animals in the park. (People's Vision/Photo) Under the live broadcast camera of
, "The Mountain" leisurely turned its head and pointed its butt at the tourists. The two powerful hind paws suddenly digged up the dust on the ground, and the soil immediately flew. Seeing King of the Beasts showing a silly side, tourists outside the glass wall exclaimed a burst of praise.
The magnificent figure of the "mountain" is also attracted by the tens of thousands of viewers from all over the country in the live broadcast room. This male Siberian tiger has a full stage feel, proudly showing sniffing - I saw it grinning, tilting its head, and sniffing left and right. This is the reaction of the cats to catch the odor.
"Our tigers will exchange their own sports field, and they will mark their own smell every time they come out, and the way is to kick a few times." The "anchor" from Nanjing Hongshan Forest Zoo (hereinafter referred to as Hongshan Zoo) explained this. Hongshan Zoo has a long history and is the only public welfare zoo in the country that can support itself. Its animal welfare and environmental abundance are talked about by domestic zoo enthusiasts.
Nowadays, this internet celebrity zoo is deeply affected by the epidemic. An employee of Hongshan Zoo told Southern Weekend reporters that due to the impact of epidemic control, the number of tourists from other provinces dropped sharply in 2022. Since October 29, Hongshan Zoo has been temporarily closed due to the epidemic.
Not only Hongshan Zoo, but also under the epidemic, many domestic zoos have suffered heavy losses. On July 18, 2022, the meeting of the Management Working Committee of the China Zoo Association was held, and representatives from 51 zoos across the country attended the meeting. The meeting minutes mentioned that factors such as community lockdown, reduced travel for elderly and children, reduced income of urban residents, blocked cross-provincial travel, and bad weather have greatly reduced the number of tourists to the zoo. "Many zoos have reduced their annual income by 50%-70%, and some zoos have not even opened throughout the year."
In order to survive, major zoos have "got the Internet" and replaced offline viewing with live broadcasts. After accumulating popularity, traffic will be directed to cultural and creative malls, online ticket sales, cloud adoption and other income-generating projects. Can these innovative methods save the zoo in the era of mobile Internet? Will the anchor of
sing " The Story of the Red-Cutted Crane "?
When a reporter from Southern Weekend met Zhai Haochen, he was broadcasting live in Heyuan. At this time, Nanjing is about to usher in a cooling down, and a few drops of cold rain have fallen from the sky. The ticket seller constantly reminds tourists to scan the code to purchase tickets - only by presenting a 48-hour nucleic acid negative certificate and Sukang code green code can you enter the park.
Zhai Haochen is a staff member of the News and Publicity Office of Hongshan Zoo and one of the anchors of the zoo. On October 28, Hongshan Zoo announced its closure due to the epidemic. The Zoo WeChat official account immediately announced the restart of the live broadcast: "It's closed again, and our live broadcast is here again."
The theme of this live broadcast is named "ZOO Live Watch Season", which is held three times a day on multiple platforms such as Weibo , B station, and Douyin . Each live broadcast lasts for about two hours, leading fans to visit a venue in-depth.
Southern Weekend reporters found that Hongshan Zoo had tried the live broadcast in 2018. During the closure of the park due to the epidemic in February 2020, Hongshan Zoo launched the "ZOO Live Broadcast". Since then, the live broadcast park has been retained and five rounds have been launched by April 2022.
"Our red-crowned crane should have one female and one male, right?" During the live broadcast, Zhai Haochen confirmed to the breeder beside him. At this time, a viewer asked in the live broadcast room which red-crowned crane was a male, and Zhai Haochen asked the keeper for help again. "The larger one in front of me is a male," replied the keeper.
Zoo Live tests the anchor’s reserves of natural knowledge, which is still a big challenge for Zhai Haochen, who is a professional broadcast host. He told Southern Weekend reporters that he would accumulate animal-related knowledge by listening to the breeder's explanation and searching for popular science materials.
live broadcast on the Douyin platform also requires the ability to liven up the atmosphere.Zhai Haochen occasionally asked fans of the live broadcast room some questions: What is the bird that looks very similar to ostrich ? Some fans also teased him, "Can the anchor sing "The Story of the Red-Cutted Crane"?" This is a song about the Red-Cutted Crane Rescuer.
In addition to popular science, live broadcasts have also been placed on other wishes. The live broadcast room is accompanied by a donation link for the public welfare project "Let it go wild". At present, more than 180,000 people have donated more than 2.64 million yuan to achieve the fundraising goal. According to the project description, the fund will be used to operate the Hongshan Zoo.
At present, many well-known zoos are trying to live broadcasts, including Shanghai Wildlife Park , Beijing Wildlife Park , Beijing Wildlife Park , Xining Wildlife Park , but not every one can replicate the internet celebrity effect of Hongshan Zoo - Hongshan Zoo's live broadcast on Saturday afternoon attracted a total of 25,000 viewers.
Li Huanbin, director of the planning department of Qingdao Forest Wildlife World (hereinafter referred to as "Qingye"), told Southern Weekend reporters that in addition to the live broadcasts jointly with Ali , the number of viewers of daily live broadcasts is between 10 million and 10,000.
On April 30, 2022, in Nantong City, Jiangsu Province, staff from Nantong Forest Wildlife Park explained the knowledge related to Siberian tigers to netizens. (People's Vision/Photo)
The main reason for the reduction is the number of tourists from other places
that many zoos are envious of the traffic of Hongshan Zoo.
November 12th, at 2:30 pm, there were two hours before Hongshan Zoo stopped entering the park. The electronic screen next to the ticket gate showed, "Number of people entering the park today: 5,008 people." If it were a normal zoo, the traffic flow in such weekends during the epidemic is worthy of happiness, but the daily level of Hongshan Zoo is far from enough.
An article published by the China Wildlife Association in 2014 revealed that Hongshan Zoo has 5 million passenger flows every year, and the average daily passenger flow is over 10,000. Even in 2021 under the epidemic, Hongshan Zoo set a daily passenger flow of 51,000 people during the Qingming Festival holiday, setting a new historical passenger flow high on April 4th.
Before the outbreak of the epidemic, the number of passenger flows in several well-known zoos hit new highs. On the third day of the Lunar New Year in 2017, the total number of tourists entering the park in Chimelong Wildlife World and Chimelong Ocean Kingdom hit a record high. On May 3, 2019, the number of visitors to the Shanghai Wildlife Park broke the record since its opening.
A staff member of the Hongshan Zoo souvenir shop told the Southern Weekend reporter that the current passenger flow is about half of the time before the epidemic. The reduction is mainly for foreign tourists, while a large proportion of local tourists are the elderly who are free tickets and consumers who hold annual cards. The staff member said that in order to demonstrate public welfare, the annual card price of Hongshan Zoo has remained at 80 yuan all year round, which is only equivalent to the price of two single-day adult tickets.
Different zoos depend on cross-provincial travel differently. Hua Jie, a popular science writer who once published "Hot is a serious matter to visit a zoo ", told the Southern Weekend reporter that the population of some zoos cannot support the flow of tourists, so he hopes for tourists from other provinces and even the whole country. This is an example of Xining Wildlife Park located in Qinghai. "Xining itself has a small population, so Xining Wildlife Park is positioned as a national market and attracts tourists with the help of Xining's status as a tourist city."
Some zoos that try to deploy markets in other provinces have also postponed their plans due to the epidemic. Li Huanbin said that they have radiated influence to cities such as Xuzhou , Tianjin, Beijing, and Shanghai through advertising. However, the zoo is still mainly local tourists, accounting for more than 90%.
Even though she specializes in the local market, the epidemic has always affected the zoo. The minutes of the aforementioned meeting of the Management Working Committee of the China Zoo Association mentioned that "one-third of the zoos have taken closed measures in the first half of 2022, some of which last for 120 days." In September 2022, Guizhou Forest Wildlife Park faced a cut off feed supply due to blockage of logistics channels and asked the public for help.
It should be pointed out that the epidemic has hit zoos on a global scale. In September 2022, the 186-year-old Bristol Zoo in the UK announced its bankruptcy due to years of losses.
relies on ticket revenue
In fact, zoos are a business that relies on ticket revenue worldwide.
The 2020 financial statement released by the Toronto Zoo in Canada shows that 14.46 million of the zoo's revenue of more than 16.6 million Canadian dollars came from tickets and donations. In April 2020, the zoo also had to raise funds publicly to raise funds for animals due to sharp decline in revenue.
is divided according to ownership, and domestic zoos can be divided into private and public. Several respondents told Southern Weekend reporters that no matter what system is adopted, tickets account for 80 to 90% of the zoo's income.
Take Chengdu Zoo 2019 department final accounts as an example. In 2019, the unit's business income (mainly composed of ticket income) was more than 78.54 million yuan, accounting for 89.86% of the revenue. Shen Zhijun, director of Hongshan Zoo, revealed in an interview with " China Tourism News ". In 2008, Hongshan Forest Zoo had an annual income of 20 million yuan, of which the ticket income was more than 19 million yuan.
Another important source of income for the vast majority of public zoos is financial appropriations. Public zoos are divided into three types according to financial appropriations: full subsidy, differential subsidy and self-investment. . Deputy Secretary-General of the Chinese Zoo Association . Yu Zeying told the Southern Weekend reporter that the units with full subsidies are two lines of income and expenditure. The zoo’s expenses are borne by the finance department, and the ticket income is also paid in full; the difference subsidy unit is a relatively common type. The zoo pays costs with tickets and other income, and the finance department provides certain special subsidies; self-investment means that there is no financial subsidy. Nanjing Hongshan Zoo once mentioned in a copy of Douyin fundraising that it is the only public welfare unit in China that can collect and support itself.
Chengdu Zoo's 2019 departmental final accounts showed that fiscal appropriation revenue was 7.7603 million yuan, accounting for 8.88%, while the operating income composed of vending machines and parking lot revenue was 267,900 yuan, accounting for only 0.31%.
During the epidemic, financial support is not endless. The minutes of the aforementioned China Zoo Association mentioned that the government funding support for public institutions zoo in 2022 has been reduced. Therefore, many zoos cannot carry out normal maintenance and repair of zoo cages and safety facilities in a timely manner, resulting in historical debts and may bring safety hazards to their normal operations in the future.
This makes the importance of ticket revenue even more prominent. However, public zoos emphasize public welfare, and ticket prices are often low and often remain unchanged all year round, which affects the risk resistance of these zoos.
Southern Weekend reporters analyzed 68 zoos in major cities across the country (provincial capital cities and independent planning cities) and found that the average ticket price of 50 public zoos is 46.8 yuan, and the median price is 30 yuan. There are 7 zoos with tickets of RMB 10 or less. The most extreme example of
is free admission. Li Huanbin said that starting from June 1, Qingye responded to the call of the Qingdao Municipal Government and directly waived the ticket with an original price of 100 yuan until December 31. As a result, the passenger flow has indeed increased significantly, increasing the sales of second-sale products such as meals and souvenirs in the park, but it is still difficult to make up for ticket revenue.
, private zoos are more flexible in pricing. According to statistics from Southern Weekend reporters, the average ticket price of 18 private zoos is 126.3 yuan, and the most expensive price reaches 295 yuan. For this reason, building a private safari was once regarded as a good business.
industrial and commercial registration information shows that in 2019, China added 40 new safari-related companies, with annual registrations reaching the highest in history. According to data released by China Research Institute of Industry and Technology, from 2015 to 2019, the number of enterprises in the zoo industry increased from 557 to 1,122, and the asset scale increased from 300.074 billion yuan to 360.762 billion yuan.
However, like public zoos, private zoos have also suffered heavy losses during the epidemic. Haichang Ocean Park once announced that in 2020, when the epidemic occurred, the park had a net loss of 1.45 billion yuan for the whole year, and its turnover decreased by nearly 60%.
On February 6, 2021, Beijing, the zoo posted slogans to remind citizens to pay attention to epidemic prevention and safety. (People's Vision/Photo)
reduces salary for employees or reduces meal prices for animals?
The zoo passenger flow decreased and ticket revenue decreased, but the operating cost of did not decrease as a result.
According to Huagui Observation, animal feed and personnel salary are the two most important daily expenses in the zoo, among which labor costs account for a larger proportion."A large urban zoo requires at least one or two hundred employees. Based on the average salary of 7,000 to 8,000 yuan, plus the salary of retired employees, it is a considerable number in a year."
takes Guangzhou Zoo as an example. A reporter from Southern Weekend checked the final accounts of the Guangzhou Zoo department in 2021 and found that the total expenditure of Guangzhou Zoo is about 56.5 million yuan, of which the wage and welfare expenditure and subsidies to individuals and families are about 51.43 million yuan. In comparison, according to the 2021 budget of the department of the Guangzhou Forestry and Gardening Bureau, the zoo's feed purchase cost is about 10.52 million yuan. In addition, there are also project expenses such as wall repair, parking lot upgrades, and security system construction, which are mostly one or two million yuan.
etching indicates that some animals are particularly "burning money" in feeding. For example, there are water birds and who eat sea fish or fresh live fish, and some zoos only feed lions and tigers high-end meat. In the face of difficulties, whether to reduce salaries or meal prices for animals or lower meal prices has become a multiple-choice question that many zoos must answer.
Yu Zeying said that according to the situation of some member units learned by the association, many zoos have chosen the former. "We have learned that the performance salary of many zoo employees has been reduced a lot, but their work is actually more tiring and busier under the epidemic. The zoo not only needs to ensure the epidemic prevention and safety of tourists and employees, but also needs to ensure the health and safety of animals." Li Huanbin said that Qingye insists on not reducing wages or delaying wages. The finance department is also trying to raise money through loans and other means.
According to Tencent Guyu, as early as 2020, Hongshan Zoo deducted its employees' performance in half a year in order to ensure the supply of animal feed. The aforementioned Hongshan Zoo employee who was interviewed claimed to the Southern Weekend reporter that he had not paid a month's salary in 2021, and he was reduced in 2022. The value of
live broadcast and adoption is not only about generating income
On July 23, 2020, an online live broadcast room was placed next to Monkey Mountain at Hongshan Forest Zoo in Nanjing, Jiangsu Province. Through live broadcast, the anchor allows netizens to intuitively understand the dynamics of the zoo and the living habits of various animals. (Visual China/Photo)
needs to be open source under throttling. Zoos have begun to explore how to broaden revenue generation channels and innovate business models.
As early as 2012, Hongshan Zoo launched an animal adoption activity. After the adoptee pays a fee ranging from 500 to 2,000 yuan, he can go to the venue to experience the animal's breeding experience and assist in cleaning. During the epidemic, the zoo launched "cloud adoption" for people who are inconvenient to come to the park. The original offline visit was replaced with a monthly peer-to-peer live broadcast, allowing adoptive people to watch the adopted animals, and there is also an electronic certificate as a commemoration.
Aoye has also practiced "cloud adoption" since 2020. Li Huanbin introduced that the animals that can be adopted by Qingye include Siberian tigers, giraffes, alpacas , red panda , etc. The adoption price for small animals is one yuan a day, while for large animals is one yuan a year. Adopted people can also enjoy exclusive live broadcasts. If you have the opportunity to come to the park in the future, you can assist the keepers in making toys, cleaning, etc.
Facts prove that the public is very enthusiastic about "cloud adoption". During a live broadcast with Alibaba, Aoye promoted "cloud adoption" to the live broadcast room audience and received a large number of applications, including many overseas adopters. The team finally chose about 500 adopted people. The purpose of setting this upper limit is not to expect "cloud adoption" to deviate from the original intention of popular science publicity. Li Huanbin said that the small income brought by adoption does not help the zoo to relieve difficulties.
Another potential path is cultural and creative sales. Since 2021, many zoos across the country have launched cultural and creative products based on their own celebrity animals, including the orangutan "Leshen" toys at Hongshan Zoo, the rabbit horn hand-painted realistic style plush pillow cushion at Xining Wildlife Park, etc. However, Yuan Li, director of the Asset Management Department of Hongshan Zoo, also admitted in a media interview in June 2022 that the resources that can be invested in the surrounding sales business are limited, and after deducting various costs, there is still a distance from profit.
is also "bringing goods". Aoye chose to sell tickets and Aoye's camping tents online through Douyin live broadcast.In a 4-hour live streaming broadcast, Aoye sold a total of 50,000 yuan worth of tickets, and calculated at 100 yuan per ticket, with about 5,000 of them. Li Huanbin said that in the past, more than 10,000 tickets could be sold in offline channels a day, but there was still a gap in the results of TikTok's ticket sales, and there was a subsequent refund rate of about 40%.
Yu Zeying said that the value of live broadcasts, adoption and other activities is not only about generating income, but also about ensuring the emotional connection between the zoo and the public and raising the public's awareness of zoo participation in the construction of the zoo. She still remembers when she was visiting the zoo abroad, she saw the name of the zoo donor written on the back of a bench in the park. "The proportion of ticket revenue has gradually decreased, and at the same time, the proportion of personal donations, adoption and public welfare activities has gradually increased. This is the development experience of some foreign zoos."
Southern Weekend Reporter Haiyang Southern Weekend Intern He Dingyu
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