The viral "13-day holiday by taking only 3 days of leave" trend has sparked widespread online revelry, yet scenic spots can barely force a smile.

In the past two days, the news that many universities across China have announced the implementation of a "13-day consecutive holiday spanning Mid-Autumn Festival and National Day" has topped the trending search lists. Coupled with the widely discussed "3 days of leave for 13 days of holiday" leave strategy for working people that sparked public debate earlier.

These two pieces of news point to the same fact: After the peak summer tourism season, China's domestic tourism industry has once again ushered in a "super long small holiday" with a huge surge in visitor flow.

However, while social media is abuzz with excitement, domestic scenic spots are far from being able to crack a smile. Why is that?

01

Because for scenic spots, "Holidays do not equal profit."

In the past, domestic scenic spots strongly believed in the "traffic logic" — as long as visitor flow is boosted, there are countless ways to monetize it. So over the years, scenic spots have long been looking forward to holidays: the 3-day short holidays of Qingming Festival, May Day, Dragon Boat Festival and Mid-Autumn Festival, the 7-day long holidays of National Day and Spring Festival, the emerging 2.5-day weekend holiday, the spring and autumn school breaks for primary and secondary students, the snow holidays in Jilin and Xinjiang... More holidays mean higher travel frequency for the public; longer holidays mean more tourism consumption from the public.

Scenic spots used to welcome every holiday without exception. But starting from last year, more and more operators of scenic spots have found that the "traffic logic" they relied on for survival no longer works.

Mr. A operates an agricultural and cultural tourism scenic spot in South China, which is dominated by thousands of acres of flower fields, supported by popular online facilities such as sightseeing mini trains, petting zoos, and glass plank roads. "The '3 days of leave for 13 days of holiday' policy has greatly stimulated people's willingness to travel. The popularity of our scenic spot's Mid-Autumn and National Day related products booked more than 30 days in advance has increased by more than 20% year on year."

He told Travel Daily that based on the data currently available, it is inevitable that the number of tourist arrivals at the scenic spot during this year's Mid-Autumn Festival and National Day will increase significantly, and may even hit a new high in the past two years.

"But there is great uncertainty about the revenue growth of scenic spots." Mr. A sighed. A major headache for scenic spots in the past two years is "large passenger flow but low conversion rate" — every day seems to be crowded with people, but the per capita consumption is very low. Most tourists "only visit but do not spend money".

For scenic spots, the increase and extension of holidays only "lengthen" the length of stay of tourists, but do not "increase" the per capita consumption at the same time.

Thus a strange phenomenon has emerged: The longer the holiday and the more tourists there are, the thinner the profit of the scenic spot becomes, which is commonly known as "high visitor volume but low revenue".

Mr. B operates a cultural scenic spot in Central China, and has a more accurate calculation of this year's passenger flow and revenue: it is estimated that the passenger flow of the scenic spot during the Mid-Autumn Festival and National Day will increase by more than 20%, but the revenue growth will be less than 10%. "The amount of money tourists are willing to spend at the scenic spot is limited. The longer the holiday, the lower the per capita consumption." he said helplessly.

Official data also shows that in the first half of 2026, the number of domestic tourist arrivals reached 3.463 billion, a year-on-year increase of 5.4%; the total tourism spending reached 3.21 trillion yuan, a year-on-year increase of only 2.0%; the per capita consumption was about 927 yuan, a year-on-year decrease of 3.3%.

When holidays no longer equal profit, even an extra-long holiday like the 13-day break with 3 days of leave makes little sense for scenic spots. How can their operators possibly smile?

02

The super long 13-day holiday also brings another unspeakable pain point to scenic spots: Not only can it not make scenic spots profitable, but it also forces them to bear soaring operating costs.

"During Mid-Autumn Festival and National Day, if scenic spots want to improve traffic conversion, any planned marketing activities will inevitably lead to a sharp rise in operating costs." Mr. B revealed. According to his calculation, the operating cost of scenic spots during holidays is 40-50% higher than that on weekdays, but the revenue may not fully cover it.

This puts scenic spots in a dilemma: If they do not carry out activities, passenger flow will be intercepted by competitors; if they carry out activities, the input-output ratio may not be favorable. "The operating cost of our scenic spot during Mid-Autumn Festival and National Day is also expected to increase by 30-50%."

Mr. A revealed that the 13-day holiday extended by 3 days of leave means the operation cycle of the scenic spot is extended from the traditional 7 days to half a month. In terms of labor costs, a large number of temporary workers need to be added; in terms of resource consumption, the high-load operation of various equipment leads to a sharp increase in maintenance costs; in terms of material reserve, the stocking volume of catering and cultural and creative products increases, and the costs of warehousing, logistics, security and other links rise simultaneously, which greatly raises the requirement for capital reserves.

"We are now afraid of being busy for nothing, ending up with increased revenue but no increased profit." Mr. A said. In order to control the operating costs during the Mid-Autumn Festival and National Day, the scenic spot has adopted a series of measures to reduce costs and increase efficiency: cooperate with local universities and surrounding villages to build a temporary labor pool to avoid long-term full-time staff costs; dynamically adjust the stocking volume of catering and cultural and creative products based on booking data; guide tourists to enter the park at staggered times through differentiated ticket prices and activity schedules to reduce peak operating costs. "Anyway, all controllable costs have been controlled. Now we just pray that there will be no awkward situation of overcrowding but declining consumption." Mr. A said frankly.

On the one hand, the cost is 40% higher than on weekdays, on the other hand, the revenue increases by less than 10%. No matter how the operators of scenic spots calculate this arithmetic problem, they can't get a happy result.

03

The troubles brought by the 13-day holiday have made domestic scenic spot operators reach a new consensus: Simply "creating more holidays" can no longer effectively stimulate mass tourism consumption.

At this stage, tourists are experiencing a "three-abandonment movement" — abandoning travel agencies, abandoning star-rated hotels, and abandoning A-level scenic spots. It is not that tourists do not want to consume, but that they have developed serious aesthetic fatigue towards traditional tourism products and are more sensitive to prices.

The so-called "budget travel with no extra spending" of tourists is not essentially about being poor, but that they refuse to pay a premium for homogeneous products.

Under this premise, the more, longer and more frequent the holidays are, the more serious the "holiday fatigue syndrome" of tourists will be, and the more they will resist paying for low-value products and experiences. "Scenic spot operators must realize that holidays are only a necessary condition to stimulate tourism consumption, not a sufficient condition."

Mr. B emphasized that in the past, tourists would "travel whenever there is a holiday", but now, "on the premise of having a holiday, they will only travel when there are good attractions, good experiences and good prices". If the supply of high-quality products in scenic spots cannot keep up, more holidays will not generate more revenue.

Mr. A reminded that what scenic spots need to do now is not to focus on the small amount of traffic during holidays, but to seize the time to upgrade and iterate themselves.

Holidays are just an amplifier: good products will be exploded under the amplifier, gaining both fame and fortune; bad products will have a breakdown under the amplifier, leading to total failure. Numerous cases of scenic spots in the past two years have fully proved this point.

04

Travel Daily judges that the 13-day holiday will bring three potential changes to China's domestic scenic spot industry:

First, there will be a wave of "high visitor volume but loss-making" across domestic scenic spots. Especially a large number of small and medium-sized scenic spots, constrained by difficulties such as homogeneous products, may get the traffic dividend of holidays and hit a new high in tourist volume, but their revenue growth rate is extremely low, and even dragged into loss by high operating costs.

Second, there will be a round of "holiday reflection wave" in the tourism industry. Practitioners will begin to reflect on the model of "stimulating consumption by creating more holidays", and instead call for the implementation of paid annual leave and the promotion of staggered holiday systems, returning the right to choose holidays to tourists, which is more effective than simply piling up the number of holiday days.

Third, a number of scenic spots with outstanding performance during the super long holiday will stand out and be learned and imitated by the whole industry. Their common feature is strong product power, with unique, trend-leading new products or new experience gameplay. Just like the once-popular Wanshan Mountain Wuxia City regained popularity with its immersive martial arts performances, and Tangshan Hetou Old Street became a hit with its recreated night tour scenes.

The 13-day holiday gives domestic scenic spots a stage to show themselves. If they perform well, it is an opportunity for transformation; if they perform poorly, it is the beginning of decline. Facing the upcoming super long holiday, operators can't smile, not just because they can't make money in the short term, but more because they are well aware that the "high visitor volume but loss-making wave" is very likely to hit them, bringing huge pressure.

After all, when "holidays" are no longer a problem, the only thing operators need to consider is: Are the products of the scenic spot good enough to make tourists willing to stay one more day? This is the fundamental point.

This article is from WeChat Official Account "Travel Daily", author: Chen Jie tigereat, published with authorization from 36Kr.