Create a "Golden Week" — a new trillion-dollar consumption engine is coming.

Less than a month after the “Spring and Autumn Holiday” was first written into the Government Work Report, students in many places across the country have received their first spring break. In many areas, it connects seamlessly with the Qingming holiday, stacking up to 5–6 days of consecutive time off—making it look like a new “Golden Week”.

According to past market performance, in the three or four months after the Spring Festival, the culture and tourism market often shifts into a traditional off-season. But this year, this “fixed script” has been completely rewritten.

Data from Qunar Travel shows that from March 31 to April 1, the number of passengers departing by plane increased 1.6 times month-on-month compared with the two previous days. On April 1—i.e., the first day of spring break in most places—the number of departures surged 5.3 times compared with the same day last year, surpassing the first day of the Qingming holiday to become the highest departure peak for this holiday.

Travel intent in cities offering spring break is especially pronounced: among the 8 cities where air ticket volumes for Qingming departures spiked the most—Panzhihua, Nantong, Changzhou, Mianyang, Wuxi, Chengdu, Yancheng, and Nanjing—no fewer than 5 are in Jiangsu.

This has a lot to do with local efforts to actively coordinate and implement paid leave for employees. According to reports, all 13 prefecture-level cities in Jiangsu have issued initiatives on implementing paid leave for employees and aligning the spring and autumn holiday for primary and middle schools, so that working families with minor children can take time off together.

In terms of product selection, in Tongcheng Travel’s bookings for holiday products departing from April 1 to April 6, the share of family-with-children groups is close to 40%, up 17 percentage points year over year. Orders from family-with-children groups show a year-over-year growth rate of nearly 200%. For domestic flights and international flights, the number of passengers under 18 rose 47% and 22% year over year, respectively.

Which provinces whose parents are most active in “bringing the kids along” during spring break? Tongcheng Travel data shows that, as provinces that responded quickly to spring break policies, the three Yangtze River Delta provinces—Jiangsu, Anhui, and Zhejiang—have family-with-children order shares as high as 38%–46%, leading other regions.

When family-with-children groups become the main force for travel, which cities and attractions are more popular?

Qunar Travel has released the TOP10 most popular flight destinations for April 1–6. They are, respectively: Shanghai, Chengdu, Beijing, Guangzhou, Shenzhen, Kunming, Hangzhou, Chongqing, Haikou, and Sanya.

On April 1, the first day of spring break, the national scenic spot search heat TOP10 includes Beijing Universal, Shanghai Disneyland, Xi’an Terracotta Army, and others. Locations with large theme parks and museums rank high in heat, and family-friendliness is fully maximized.

To capture spring break passenger flow, cities across the board have rolled out “big bundles” such as benefits and free tickets, trying to take a share of this “spring break economy.” According to calculations by China Merchants Securities, if the spring and autumn holiday is expanded from pilot programs nationwide, under conservative, neutral, and optimistic scenarios, it could drive incremental GDP of about 23 billion to 103.9 billion yuan, boosting GDP growth by 1.8 to 8.1 bp (basis point, where 1 bp equals 0.01%).

Longer-term projections also show that, as policy support becomes more comprehensive, the spring and autumn holiday could contribute an increase of total retail sales of consumer goods of 1%–1.66%. Each year, it may add 8B to 800 billion yuan in new consumption. With the spring and autumn holiday system implemented over the long term, it may reshape the tourism consumption cycle across the whole year, making it a new normal that “there are more than two Golden Weeks in a year.”

（Source: Economic Daily News）