Relationship between Hong Kong Disneyland attractions and Hong Kong urban tourism
[1]The Economy of Hong Kong shifted to a service sector model in the late 10980’s and early 1990’s and the tourism industry has been its important part. With the introduction of the Individual Visit Scheme (IVS), there has been a sharp increase of tourists from Mainland China. The IVS was introduced on 28 July 2003. The Scheme has been gradually extended and now covers various places in China such as Guangdong province, Shanghai, Beijing, Chongqing, Tianjin and nine cities in Fujian, Jiangsu and Zhejiang.
With the tough growth in the number of the Mainland visitors, most other long and short-haul markets are also performing healthily with double-digit growth over 2006. The long-haul markets of Europe Africa and the Middle East brought almost 2 Million of visitors and made Hong Kong as the best-performing market region in 2006.
With the tight competition with China’s Macau, the Hong Kong Tourism Board (HKTB) worked hand in hand with the authorities and trade makers to make Hong Kong an indispensable part in every combo and multi-destination route.
Tourism, along with international trade and financial services are the three main sources of income for Hong Kong. Hong Kong has established herself as a business hub for the some of the richest people in the world. And Hong Kong has produced so many great actors and actresses that placed Hong Kong in the mainstream of popularity even before Hong Kong Disneyland rose in its ground.
Throughout the years of promoting Hong Kong as a tourist destination, there were 612 hotels and tourist guest house within the area to accommodate the visitors. During 2006, 62.7% of all visitors stayed one night or longer, which is a style showing Hong Kong’s growing significance as a regional transport hub. With this rapid growth of visitors each year, HKTB has developed various ways to cope with the demands of their visitors.
In May 1999 Hong Kong established the Tourism Commission to promote itself as Asia’s premiere international city for all visitors. A Tourism Strategy Group, comprising representatives from the Government, the HKTB and various sectors of the tourism industry has been established to advise the Government on tourism development from a strategic perspective. This just makes Hong Kong Tourism as one of the main aspects that gives boost in the economy of Hong Kong.
Almost any of the districts of Hong Kong can be considered a tourist destination. As a result, they were expecting more visitors each year. Different measure was introduced, from accommodations to security. Even the number of Mainland China’s authorized travel agents to organize different tours has increased radically.
The HKTB promotes the destination to business and leisure travelers through its worldwide campaign “Hong Kong –Live It, Love It!”. With the new opening of several attractions from 2005, the HKTB has designated 2006 as “Discover Hong Kong Year”. As a global marketing campaign strategy, the HKTB displayed Hong Kong and promoted it as a “must-visit” destination in 2006. In late 2005, The HKTB has already started promotions to the travel trade in May 2005 and will roll out consumer promotions worldwide. Series of joint overseas marketing initiatives is being conducted with Macau and the nine provincial tourism bureaus. A continuous promotions has been done to commercialize the capability of Hong Kong to accommodate it’s expectators.
[2]Hong Kong Disneyland is one of the various attractions in Hong Kong. It is the first theme park located inside the Hong Kong Disneyland Resort and is owned and managed by the Hong Kong International Theme Parks. It is located in Penny Bay, Lantau Island. Disney attempted to avoid problems of cultural repercussion by attempting to incorporate Chinese culture, customs, and traditions when designing and building the resort, including adherence to the rules of Feng Shui. With this, although theme parks such as Disneyland promote modern ways of entertainment, still they abide to local customs and traditions. With it, Hong Kong’s genuine natural characteristics are maintained.
The park consists of four themed areas: Main Street, U.S.A., Fantasyland, Adventureland, and Tomorrowland. The theme park’s cast members speak in Cantonese, English, and Mandarin. Guide maps are printed in traditional and simplified Chinese as well as English, French, and Japanese.
The park has a daily capacity of 34,000 visitors— the least out of all Disneyland parks. It has so far fallen short of its targeted visitorship figures. The park attracted 5.2 million visitors in its first year, below its target of 5.6 million. Visitor numbers fell 20% in the second year to 4 million, inciting criticisms from local legislators.However, the park attendance slightly increased by 8% in the third year, attracting a total of 4.5 million visitors in 2007. In 2009, the park attendance again increased by 2% to 4.8 million visitors. The attendance continued to surge and received 5.23 million guests in the 2009/2010 fiscal year. Since the opening of Hong Kong Disneyland, the theme park has hosted over 25 million guests. The investments really paid off.
Just before the grand opening, the park was criticized for overestimating the daily capacity limit. The problem became apparent on the charity preview day on 4 September 2005, when 30,000 locals visited the park. The event turned out to be a disaster, as there were too many guests. Wait times at fast food outlets were at least 45 minutes, and wait times at rides went up to 2 hours.
Although the park’s shareholders and the Hong Kong Government set pressure upon the park to lower the capacity, the park insisted on keeping the limit, only agreeing to relieve the capacity problem by extending the opening time by one hour and introducing more discounts during weekdays. However, the park stated that local visitors tend to stay in the park for more than nine hours per visit, implying that the mentioned practices would do little to solve the problem.
During Chinese New Year 2006, many visitors arrived at the park in the morning bearing valid tickets, but were refused entry, because the park was already at full capacity. Disgruntled visitors attempted to force their way into the park and climbing over the barrier gates. As a result, Disneyland management was forced to revise their ticketing policy and designated future periods close to Chinese public holidays as ‘special days’ during which admission would only be allowed through a date-specific ticket.
As at other Disney theme parks, visitors to Hong Kong Disneyland have their finger biometrics scanned at the entry gate. Visitors are not warned of the policy beforehand. Fingerprinting is done to all visitors older than 11 years of age, and is used to associate ticket media with the person using it. The company claims that the surface of a guest’s finger does not contain sufficient information to recreate a fingerprint image. Nonetheless, forensic specialists note that the data collected are more than adequate to establish a positive identification.
Disney initially refused to release the attendance figures after media reports surfaced saying the park’s attendance numbers might be lower than expected. Disney finally declared on 24 November 2005, that Disney had over 1 million guests during its first two months of operation.
In response to negative publicity locally and to boost visitor numbers, Hong Kong Disneyland offered discounts for admission tickets to holders of Hong Kong I.D. cards in the period before 2005 Christmas. Also, from March to June 2006, the park offered Hong Kong I.D. card holders the opportunity to purchase a two-day admission ticket for the price of a single day ticket.
The Hong Kong Government has made it clear to the public and Disney that there is land next to the resort for a second theme park and several more hotels, but with a much higher price than what Disney paid for the land they already own, the government is liable to sell the land to one of Disney’s theme park industry rivals. Names rumored to be looking at the land feature NBC Universal, Six Flags and Anheuser Busch. Many view this move as a way of getting more money out of Disney, as the government does not actually want another company to build a separate theme park in the area.
Currently, a new shopping district and the third hotel are taken into discussions. For long-term construction, with the reclaimed land reserved for the Phase Two Extension and the Disneyland park being blocked by the Park Promenade, a pedestrian walkway which links the Disneyland Resort Station, Disneyland park, Hong Kong Disneyland Hotel, and Disneyland Resort Pier. It is expected that a second Disney theme park will be built on that site. A Phase Three Extension is also being considered by the Walt Disney Company and the Hong Kong Government.
Hong Kong is a great place to invest when it comes to tourism. The place is strategically located and has established itself as an itinerary route to various places in Asia, U.S., Europe and the Middle East. With this, the HKTB should improve their weak point and maintain their strong points.
Promotion campaigns nowadays is easy, with the power of the internet, and the knowledge base of the people that has access to different types of communications, All that is left for the HKTB is the improvement of it’s tourism sector. With continuous marketing and promotions strategy the HKTB will have to improve the sustainability of what the Hong Kong tourism is offering to the expectations.
[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tourism_in_Hong_Kong
[2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hong_Kong_Disneyland
Credit:ivythesis.typepad.com
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