Rejecting the “three-piece package of injustice”, young people say no to the homogenization of cultural and creative industries in scenic spots

This year’s Mid-Autumn Festival and National Day holiday are extremely long, and major scenic spots across the country are as usual crowded and lively.

But according to Southern Weekend, a new phenomenon has emerged behind the bustle of scenic spots this year: the “unjust three-piece set” of hand cream, refrigerator magnets, and cultural and creative ice cream, which were once regarded as “standard rituals” in tourism, have now become “check-in backgrounds” that young people only visit but do not buy. After trying the incense and taking photos at the counter, many tourists turned around and took out their mobile phones to compare prices, finally fulfilling their impulse to spend.

The “three-piece set of wrongdoers” fell out of favor, directly bursting the “information gap premium” bubble that the scenic spot had long relied on. This new trend of “just shopping, not buying” is a new generation of tourists using rational choices to force the cultural and creative industries in scenic spots to return to the value standard and promote the upgrade of tourism consumption.

In the past, scenic spots relied on geographical isolation and city-limited labels to get tourists to pay for the sense of scarcity that cannot be found elsewhere. However, when young tourists discovered that the price of the same hand cream in urban sales was less than half that of the scenic spot, the refrigerator sticker with the same pattern was only 9 yuan with free shipping online, and the cultural and creative ice cream worth 20 or 30 yuan did not even taste as good as the ordinary ice cream that cost 5 yuan. The marketing rhetoric of “no more missing out” was exposed, and the premium price barrier that the scenic spot had maintained for many years was completely ineffective.

What is more fundamental than the falsely high prices is the rampant “assembly line homogeneity” in the cultural and creative industries in scenic spots. In the report, some practitioners said frankly that from the creation of a product to the time it is put on the shelves, the layers of review and approval will filter out all the ingenuity with local characteristics, and what is left in the end is always the most reliable and easiest to mass-produce universal template of “landmark building + large characters in regular script”.

For example, by changing the pattern of Xi’an’s lady hairpin refrigerator magnet, it can become Changsha’s Xiang women’s hydrangea model, and with a few adjustments it can be put on the shelves in Harbin; most of the so-called city-limited hand creams just change the packaging stickers, and the fragrance ingredients are the same.

When specialty shops in ancient towns in different cities sell exactly the same souvenirs, when tourists change cities, it is like entering the same chain store. The unique memory of travel has long been smoothed away. Young people are unwilling to pay for the “three-piece package of injustice”. They are essentially rejecting this insincere “emotional tax” and directly rewriting the evaluation standards for consumption in scenic spots.

When older generations of tourists buy souvenirs, they seek to “bring back” their travel memories, while young people want to “bring their experiences out”—bringing them into daily use scenarios, sharing on social platforms, and talking about gatherings with friends.

The scenic-themed T-shirts that have not faded after being washed four times can be worn by children to school; the old clay pots containing hand-brewed coffee can touch the temperature of the ancient town’s fire pit every time they are opened; the specialty snacks made with local ingredients will remind you of the fireworks in the night market long after eating. These products that truly integrate creativity into daily life make young people feel that it is worth spending money.

Also during this golden week, cultural and creative products such as notebooks, postcards and flower cultivation substrates made from elephant dung at the Wild Elephant Valley Scenic Area in Xishuangbanna, Yunnan, sold well. This also proves that today’s young people do not reject commemoration, but reject false commemoration; they do not want to give up the sense of ritual, but rewrite the rules of the sense of ritual with their own hands.

事實上， The rational choices of young people are forcing the cultural and creative industries of scenic spots to complete a quiet upgrade. More and more scenic spots are beginning to break away from the “three-piece set of injustice” path dependence, no longer obsessed with selling ornaments and stickers, and instead invest resources in immersive experiences.

For example, learning from non-genetic people to make a local handicraft, carving out a unique inscription, or participating in an on-site event at a traditional festival. The repurchase rate and reputation of these experiential projects far exceed those of standardized souvenirs on the assembly line.

From paying for limited premiums to paying only for unique experiences that cannot be found in the same style, young people reject the “unjust three-piece package” in scenic spots, which hides the upgrading direction of the entire tourism consumption market. Also remind the scenic spots, A real souvenir is never a logo printed on a landmark, but a careful effort to create an exclusive connection between tourists and a city.

Only when scenic spots truly integrate local culture, craftsmanship and stories into creative products can young tourists stop comparing prices and be willing to spend money to treasure that unique local experience. (Yu Minghui)