China’s holiday season is big business for kid entertainment

Global Business

This year Chinese New Year coincides with school holidays. That leaves a lot of parents looking for ways to occupy their children and a lot of businesses are looking to serve those families.
CCTV’s Cheng Lei looks at the growing business of entertaining kids.

China's holiday season is big business for entertaining kids

This year Chinese New Year coincides with school holidays. That leaves a lot of parents looking for ways to occupy their children, and a lot of businesses looking to serve those families. CCTV's Cheng Lei looks at the growing business of entertaining kids.

For kids not going away for the holiday, there are a plethora of winter camps to choose from. Twelve-year-old student Tiffany Chen is spending her time at tennis camp.

“It’s really cool, because there are lots of people and friends. I can get muscle, because I’m a bit short, at school I have to get taller,” he said.

The Meerkats Tennis School has only been around for seven months. “Tennis is popular because of Li Na, we started in July. Now we have 80 to 90 players and expect to have 300 kids in two years,” Julien Chacatte from Meerkats Tennis School said.

Winter sport camps like this can help kids get fit, burn off excess energy and if they become the next Li Na, that’s just a bonus.

The way to market activities to parents is now, more often than not, through mobile internet. Fumubang runs an app to help parents plan fun times with kids. It’s seeing user growth of over 100 percent.

China’s two trillion yuan ($320 billion) baby and kids market is outpacing other parts of the economy by far. Whether it’s sport, travel or handicrafts, keeping kids entertained during the Chinese New Year holidays is important for parents.