Zhuhai, Friday, 24 October 2025.
Chimelong Ocean Kingdom reported notable attendance growth in 2024, rising to roughly 12.6 million visitors and holding sixth place in the global rankings—a reminder that large domestic destination parks can rival established foreign-branded resorts. The most intriguing fact: China’s integrated resort model—heavy spend on marine exhibits, high-throughput attractions and targeted regional marketing—helped a non-Disney/Universal park secure a top global position. For retail and park operators, this signals shifting footfall patterns and growing local discretionary spending that demand rethought capacity planning, dynamic pricing and merch assortments tuned to longer-stay, family and regional travelers. Investors should factor in lower sensitivity to international travel cycles for well-positioned domestic resorts. Competitive responses may include product differentiation, tighter day-part pricing, and expanded F&B and retail bundles tailored to domestic travel flows to capture incremental per-capita spend in second-tier coastal hubs such as Zhuhai/Hengqin.