This May Day, “taste buds travel” has become a new choice for young people to travel during the holiday, May Day food and beverage consumption “hot” state is significant. Securities Times reporters came to the popular tourist city of Wuhan, found Hankou food Street Wansong Garden area restaurants are queuing hot, an Internet celebrity crayfish brand shop, starting at 4 p.m., within 30 minutes has been issued more than 200 queue number. As of April 29, online reservations of Wuyi restaurants in China have increased by 250% compared with the same period in 2019. Cities with the highest popularity of advance reservations are Chongqing, Chengdu, Guangzhou, Shanghai, Changsha and Wuhan. Catering industry ushered in May Day “golden” week This May Day, food and beverage consumption ushered in a strong recovery, unleashing strong economic growth potential. Restaurants located in Wansong Garden Food Street, Hankou District, Wuhan, have opened the long queue mode. The owner of a casserole shop told the Securities Times reporter, “this year May Day turn over the table rate is very high, 8-9 round, from 10 o ‘clock in the morning to release numbers, 11 o ‘clock later take the number basically no position; The number allocation starts at 4 p.m., so if you come late, you have to wait for a long time.” More than 6 o ‘clock in the evening on April 29, the reporter randomly went to several restaurants to take the number line, found that the front line to take the number more than 200 tables. According to Meituan’s data, the search volume of keywords related to holiday consumption travel, such as “food” and “vacation”, increased 313 percent compared with the same period in 2019. The relevant person in charge of Haidilao said, “this year’s May Day meal reservation began a week in advance, the booking peak is also earlier than in previous years.” Haidilao received bookings on April 24 increased nearly five times year-on-year last Monday, more than 70% more than the same period last year. Haidilao scenic spot stores are particularly popular in booking. In order to meet customers’ dining needs as much as possible, some stores open multiple rounds of booking mode in the evening. Zhang Yang, marketing director of a well-known crayfish brand in Wuhan, said, “May is the peak season for crayfish consumption, and the May Day holiday effect will surely usher in a wave of outbreaks. During May Day, Wuhan crawfish restaurants will continue to be full, and the overall customer flow doubled!” An official of the Hong Kong-listed company 9999 Group told the reporter that all brands of “May Day” are ready to welcome customers. At present, Taier Hewei Chongqing Hot Pot Factory has prepared a brand activity, and the booking rate of Chongqing Hot Pot factory has reached 90%. In addition, during the May Day holiday, many brands under Xiabu Group, such as Xiabu Xiabu, Jukuyousai Hot pot, Braised meat and Tea Rice Tea, launched relevant preferential themed activities, which helped the overall recovery of catering consumption. Securities analysts said, as the first small holiday after the Spring Festival, “May Day” tourism business circle, specialty food related sales will have a greater growth, under the premise of stimulating domestic demand, the rapid release of consumer demand to become a catalyst for the market, related industries strong recovery, business performance is expected to further recovery. A number of listed catering enterprises said the consumption scene is orderly recovery Retail sales of consumer goods totaled 7.706.7 billion yuan in the first two months of this year, up 3.5 percent year on year, according to the National Bureau of Statistics. Among them, the revenue of catering industry reached 842.9 billion yuan, up 9.2%, accounting for 10.94% of the total retail sales of consumer goods. The revenue of catering industry of units above designated size reached 2000.2 billion yuan, up 10.2% year on year. China Cuisine Association President Yang Liu believes that the catering market still maintains long-term good fundamentals. For ten consecutive years, the income of the catering industry accounted for more than 10% of the total retail sales of consumer goods. With the promotion of expanded consumption policies and the recovery of the tourism market, the catering market will continue to pick up. A number of listed catering companies in Hong Kong disclosed their 2022 annual report. Nai Xuecha said at the 2022 annual report performance meeting that with the gradual optimization of epidemic control measures, the operation situation and financial indicators improved rapidly. For example, the proportion of take-out orders fell as consumers returned to offline consumption, and same-store revenue and profitability began to recover, all of which released strong positive signals. The performance of Nai Xue stores in January and February 2023 further consolidated the confidence of the group. Data show that in 2022, Nai Xue’s tea achieved operating revenue of 4.092 billion yuan, decreasing 0.1% year on year, and the loss attributable to equity shareholders of the company was 469 million yuan, decreasing 89.63% year on year. According to the results of Haidilao, the company’s income from continuing operations was about 31.039 billion yuan, and the profit from continuing operations was about 1.637 billion yuan. Compared with the previous year’s loss of about 3.248 billion yuan, the company realized a loss. As of December 31, 2022, there are 1,349 Haidilao restaurants in mainland China and 22 in Hong Kong and Macao platforms. In the whole Greater China region, Haidilao restaurants serve more than 276 million customers and have more than 116 million registered members, making them the “leader” of Chinese cuisine. Haidilao said that offline consumption scenes such as on-site catering are recovering in an orderly way, and confidence in the catering industry is gradually recovering. Domestic consumption shows a trend of recovery, the demand for social gatherings is gradually released, and the customer flow of Haidilao stores continues to rebound. At the same time, expanding domestic demand has become the focus of economic work. The catering industry, which has been greatly affected by the epidemic, is expected to receive sustained support from the policy end, further boosting the temperature of catering consumption. In addition, Xiabu Xiabu 2022 annual report shows that the group achieved a comprehensive revenue of 4.725 billion yuan, down 23.14% year-on-year. But during the 2023 Spring Festival, the company’s overall revenue increased 126% over the 2022 Spring Festival, with the triple-digit growth reflected in the hot food and beverage consumption. Policy support in many places helped boost consumption In addition, in order to help the recovery of the catering industry, many places in Beijing, Shenzhen, Wuhan issued food and beverage special consumption vouchers, the effect is obvious. Meituan’s data showed that cities such as Hangzhou, Ningbo, Shaoxing, Shenzhen, Zhuhai and Dongguan all saw double-digit year-on-year growth in in-room food consumption after issuing vouchers. In addition to issuing consumer vouchers, many local governments have also introduced policies to further optimize the business environment, including supporting waffle operations and launching “catering loan” financial products. Many local traffic management departments have been clear, during the holiday tourists to take education reminder of minor traffic violations, not punishment. For example, Jingzhou traffic police in Hubei Province announced on April 26 that from April 29 to May 3, Jingzhou traffic police will implement eight measures to serve the people: First, because of unfamiliar road conditions driving into the prohibited area, and other traffic illegal behavior, the circumstances of minor foreign vehicles, pointed out the illegal behavior, give a verbal warning, no fine, no demerit points, no confiscation of the car; Second, to scenic spots, hotels, hotels, business areas around the illegal parking did not interfere with traffic vehicles, pointed out the illegal behavior, give a verbal warning, no trailer, no penalty; Third, it is prudent to use administrative coercive measures and punishment such as revocation of driving license. For private cars and drivers, the law stipulates that administrative detention and revocation of driving license can be imposed, unless the circumstances are severe, in accordance with the law, while giving warnings, fines and other penalties, in principle, no detention, no revocation; Fourth, the law can detain the vehicle, but the scene has eliminated the safety of the vehicle, in principle, the car will not be confiscated. Industry insiders said that in order to accelerate the comprehensive and steady recovery of the catering industry, it is necessary to continue to improve policy support and guidance, introduce more in line with the needs of enterprises and market expectations of help, promote consumption policies, guide the cultivation of leading enterprises and leading talents, rationalize the industrial layout. At the same time, we need to promote development while also anti-waste, product innovation and food safety bottom line. (Securities Times)