Economic Daily: Cultivating High-Quality Nighttime Economy

During the Qingming holiday, immersive performances, night tours, and light-and-shadow shows continue to run hot across many places. In some scenic areas, nighttime visitor volume makes up more than 40% of total traffic, helping drive consumption from “daytime sightseeing” toward “nighttime experiences.”

Boosting consumption requires not only strengthening consumers’ purchasing power and enhancing their willingness to spend, but also addressing changes in consumption structure and improving supply-demand matching. The “Work Plan for Accelerating the Development of New Growth Points in Service Consumption,” issued by the General Office of the State Council, proposes accelerating the cultivation of new growth points in service consumption. Fueled by diverse scenarios and immersive experiences, the nighttime economy expands the boundaries of consumption time and the dimensions of space, accelerates the release of consumption potential, and is expected to play a comprehensive driving role.

This year, government work reports in many places have mentioned developing the nighttime economy, aiming to tap the potential of nighttime consumption through multi-dimensional policy incentives. At present, however, some regions still face problems such as the homogenization of business formats, the low-tiering of content, and similar spatial layouts. Meanwhile, shortcomings remain in transportation support, public services, and safety assurance, which restrict the release of consumption potential. To promote high-quality development of the nighttime economy, it is still necessary to raise awareness and apply comprehensive measures.

At its core, the nighttime economy is a leisure economy. The peak of nighttime consumption often coincides with weekends and holidays; its rise stems from improved labor efficiency and increased leisure time, making it a natural extension of upgrading lifestyles. A prior survey by the Ministry of Commerce showed that over 60% of consumption occurs at night, and in some large shopping malls, the sales share from 18:00 to 22:00 exceeds 50% of the entire day. Therefore, consumption should follow residents’ leisure patterns: optimize time-slot layout and resource allocation, improve experience quality—not simply extend business hours in a straightforward way.

The nighttime economy is a composite economy built on the integration of multiple business types. The fusion of online and offline channels, as well as cross-industry mashups, has become the norm. Models such as “shopping + entertainment” and “cultural tourism + sports” continue to emerge, indicating that the nighttime economy has no single unified model. Localities should base themselves on their city functions and resource endowments, explore distinctive paths based on actual needs, build a differentiated, multi-level consumption system, and move the nighttime economy from scale expansion to quality improvement.

Developing the nighttime economy should take city culture as the cornerstone. Localities should draw on historical context and traditional nighttime life, coordinate planning for distinctive nighttime economy clusters and theme commercial districts, and introduce diverse business formats—such as theaters, museums, cinemas, and dining and leisure—into areas like old city districts and historic streets. By creating consumption scenarios that combine cultural experiences with life service functions, cities can cultivate distinctive nighttime life brands and enhance both the attractiveness of nighttime consumption and its capacity to carry culture.

Nighttime consumption vitality also needs robust public services as support. Efforts should be made to optimize nighttime lighting systems, extend the operating hours of public transportation, increase the frequency of late-night bus routes, and improve convenience for nighttime travel. Public supporting services for commercial outlets and characteristic streets—such as parking, security, and sanitation—should be improved to raise the level of refined nighttime management and create a safe, orderly, convenient, and comfortable consumption environment.

Cultivating the nighttime economy is a systematic, long-term endeavor. It requires both top-level design and measures tailored to local conditions. From improving hardware facilities to optimizing and upgrading services; from strengthening planning and guidance to pushing pilot demonstrations—every link affects the “quality” of the nighttime economy. We should be good at using technologies such as big data to precisely identify nighttime consumption needs, promote coordinated participation among government, enterprises, and the public, and build a nighttime consumption ecosystem featuring diversified governance and positive interaction. By adhering to a systems perspective, coordinating strength across all parties, and working steadily over time, we can light up the city sky with the nighttime economy and inject strong momentum into consumption growth.

(Source: Economic Daily)