However, young people on Valentine s Day just want to make money to welcome the God of Wealth

Text|Fixed focus Su Qi.

Edit|Jin Yufan.

In the hearts of Chinese people, the Spring Festival is more important than Valentine's Day, and the marketing focus of many brands is also given priority to the Spring Festival; And many young couples have returned to their hometowns for the New Year, in a state of different places, and the consumption power of Valentine's Day is relatively tight.

But it is difficult for young people who want to make money on the holidays, and they will stretch the front line of Valentine's Day business, and see it as a link in the entire Spring Festival traffic.

Some young florist owners encourage users to order Valentine's Day bouquets before the Spring Festival while working on the Spring Festival flowers; Some stall owners set up stalls from the first day of the Lunar New Year to the Lantern Festival, and on the basis of the hot goods sold during the Spring Festival, they stock up on Valentine's Day-related goods in an appropriate amount; Some Disney photographers extended the benefits of Valentine's Day to the seventh or even eighth day of the Lunar New Year, because they observed that many couples only returned to Shanghai from their hometowns in those days.

Some young people's consumption during Valentine's Day has become more rational, compared to the more popular "renting themselves", even microphone sleeping, "lonely frogs" and other "profiteering" and "hunting" businesses, this year want to make money on Valentine's Day, more rely on the usual customer source and word-of-mouth accumulation.

The threshold for Valentine's Day business is rising, but what remains unchanged is the desire of young people to make money.

Florist owner: 80,000 yuan a day, 36 hours of continuous rotation This year's Valentine's Day coincides with the fifth day of the Lunar New Year to welcome the God of Wealth, on social platforms, the most asked question by young florist owners is not "how many goods are stocked this year", but "Have you had Valentine's Day this year?" ”

Especially in some big cities newly opened flower shops, there are not many old customers, plus many couples have returned to their hometowns for the New Year, some employees in the store have not come back on the fifth day of the new year, to catch up with the New Year's flowers become more expensive, double the price, some shopkeepers said "ready to celebrate the New Year, not to do Valentine's Day business".

Pan Pan, the manager of Colorful Collection, also had some headaches in early February, and some suppliers asked him one after another, do you want to stock up on some goods for this festival? Some friends also persuaded him that it was better to take a holiday and let himself and his employees have a good rest.

But after thinking about it repeatedly, Pan Pan still decided to book flowers normally, and launched 5 festival-limited bouquets + 3 flower barrels on this Valentine's Day, and each one has three sizes, priced at 380 yuan, 580 yuan and 880 yuan respectively.

Valentine's Day, 520 and Qixi Festival, Pan Pan has experienced seven or eight times, and the purchase price of each festival will rise very high, and he will control the gross profit margin of the festival at about 40%.

The reason why Pan Pan dares to stock up normally is that the store has accumulated a number of high-quality private domain customers, which can be the largest order volume to a certain extent. "In the past, there have been deviations based on pure experience, and if you buy more, you can't sell it, and if you buy less, you can't sell it enough. Now that we have a relatively stable source of customers, we only open limited orders on the mini program, and the quality is relatively controllable. Pan Pan said.

Until around Chinese New Year's Eve, the number of reservations in Panpan's store began to increase continuously, and his hanging heart finally relaxed. In order to avoid the peak of delivery on Valentine's Day, some customers placed their orders in advance on the 13th.

After receiving the reservation order, the florists in the store need to be busy for 36 hours from 7 a.m. on the 13th to 7 p.m. on the 14th.

Colorful set of festive bouquets to be delivered.

Finally, during the entire Valentine's Day, it is estimated that the total number of orders will be 100-200 orders, the average customer unit price will be about 800 yuan, and the holiday turnover will be 8-120,000 yuan. "Flowers rely on the flow of festivals, at present, compared with the previous festival, this Valentine's Day will be somewhat affected, but with the gradual maturity of store operations, the overall performance is still better than a festival. Pan Pan said.

Offline stalls: antique lanterns, rose photo frames, lanterns with a daily income of 1,500 yuan, Chinese knots, lion dancing ornaments, etc., are essential objects for the atmosphere of the Spring Festival. Every year before the Spring Festival, offline stalls to sell these New Year's items are the first choice for many people's side hustles. This year's Valentine's Day, in order to make more money, many stall owners have developed Valentine's Day exclusive items on the basis of selling the above items.

During last year's Lantern Festival, Mr. Chen tried his hand at setting up a stall and has since started his second career, where he is responsible for introducing products and attracting customers, and his wife is responsible for design and production.

The two have tried dropping glue, cream glue and other categories, the effect is average and the homogenization is serious, and finally found the relatively niche category of twisting sticks, twisting the raw materials into the shape of puppies, kittens, flowers, etc., and then trimming, modeling, coloring, and adding accessories. Although a complete set is time-consuming and laborious, because of the fine workmanship, they have accumulated a number of customers, and sold out several fixed selections, and established the brand "sweetgo handmade". Since the stall was set up for more than a year, 60% of the customers of Mr. Chen's stall are tourists.

During this year's Spring Festival, Mr. Chen prepared a lot of faucet pendants, lion hairpins, and a batch of rose bouquets, rose photo frames and various flower bouquets for Valentine's Day. About two weeks before the festival, the whole family began to prepare together, working overtime every night to make products, and even setting up stalls while rushing to make products on the spot.

The material cost of the twisting rod is not high, and the main cost is the booth fee and labor cost. According to Mr. Chen, their booth is usually located in the Dadou Road Historical and Cultural District in the north of Hangzhou, in the tourist area of the entire canal plate, next to the Xiangji Temple. During the Spring Festival, the flow of customers is large, and the booth fee for a day is more than 300 yuan, which is twice as much as usual. If you want to be in more popular neighborhoods such as West Lake and Hefang Street, the booth fee is higher, between 350 yuan and 400 yuan.

During the Spring Festival this year, Mr. Chen's booth was never deserted, and he estimated that the turnover in a single day would be about 1,500 yuan, and there would be more people on Valentine's Day, and such a hot situation would continue until the day of the Lantern Festival.

Mr. Chen's Spring Festival booth.

In 2024, Mr. Chan will continue to set up his stall on a regular basis, and hopes that this side hustle will slowly get back on track.

For those who set up stalls, the flow of customers in fixed stalls is relatively guaranteed, but the investment in booth fees is high, and some people prefer to set up mobile stalls, which have lower costs and more free stall hours, but in this way, sales are also more dependent on festivals.

Xiao Pearl has been trying to set up a stall since August 2023, mainly selling lanterns, and instead of buying finished products from the Internet, she buys parts to make them herself, which is more exquisite. "A lantern needs to be made for 20 to 40 minutes depending on the degree of difficulty, and the price is 15 yuan to 35 yuan. ”

However, the income of the mobile stall is relatively unstable, on weekdays, she earns tens to hundreds of yuan a night, and there have been cases where the cold wind blows for two hours without selling anything; But when it comes to festivals, the best one sold for more than 1,000 yuan in half an hour.

The best seller that time was an antique lantern that Xiao Pearl accidentally saw on the Internet, and she and her sister stayed up all night to research and process it for three nights. Because no one sold this lantern in the county at that time, there were many people watching and asking the price as soon as it was put out on the street, and the prepared goods were not enough to sell. But it wasn't long before the lamp appeared in other stalls, and sales at her stall declined.

During the Spring Festival this year, Little Pearl chose to go out to set up a stall on a day with good weather, and prepared hand-woven flowers for Valentine's Day. At the same time, she found that woven flowers could not be sold, at most 99 yuan, but the cost is not low, the majority of sales still rely on the usual lantern explosion, she is ready to do this festival off the shelves.

But she believes that doing many things is the same as setting up a stall, and there is no need to put too much pressure on herself, at least through setting up a stall, to a certain extent, she has soothed her anxiety about her career.

New service: park follow-up, cos commission, orders can not be received A few days after this year's Valentine's Day and Spring Festival holidays, many young people who are still on vacation have crowded Disney, Universal Studios and other amusement parks, and many photographers are especially popular during Valentine's Day because they are familiar with Internet celebrity shooting check-in points, and can provide bubble machines, headbands and other props.

On social platforms, there are hundreds of photographers and institutions in Universal Studios, Disney and other parks, and there is almost no off-season for this kind of appointment, winter and summer vacations, New Year's Day, and small long holidays are often full, and there will be many local guests on weekends.

Is there still a schedule for Valentine's Day? There is still a week before the Spring Festival, and the Disney Valentine's Day schedule of independent photographer "Pawpaw" has been fully booked, but invitations to shoot are still being sent one after another.

Many people pay attention to her because her shooting style is dominated by Japanese film, which is exactly the style that has been popular in the past two years. In the end, her Valentine's Day schedule (February 14 and February 15) was fully booked, and she worked 6 hours a day (11:00-17:00), calculated by the hour, and could receive up to 12 orders.

Her ** is 238 yuan per hour (218 yuan per hour on weekdays), and it is roughly estimated that she will earn more than 2,800 yuan in two days. "Some young people will deliberately avoid Valentine's Day on February 14, worrying that there will be too many people on that day, and the dates on the 15th are all couples. ”

Paw Paw for a couple photographed by a guest**.

After resigning last year, Paw Paw became a follow-up photographer, and at first found some models who encouraged each other (to take pictures for customers for free) to practice portrait photography, but the result was a big deal, and all the appointments were full in November and December.

Among the customers of Claw, there are some cos entrustment groups. Different from the previous "renting a boyfriend" and "renting a girlfriend" to go home for the New Year, this year, on social platforms, many young people have made an appointment with COS to entrust Valentine's Day. In this type of commission, most of the parties are women, and the single owner issues the commission, and the entrusted party dresses up as a male character in the game designated by the single owner to accompany him on a date.

During this year's Valentine's Day and Spring Festival, this business is still booming, and many cosers said that Valentine's Day has been fully booked, usually 50-100 yuan per hour, and a few hundred yuan to thousands of yuan per day (8 hours). At the appointed time, the single owner and coser will watch movies, go shopping, drink coffee, play script killing, etc., and many people will go to the amusement park, please follow the photo to record their one-day date.

A coser told Fixed Focus that because the service content is mainly dating, everyone is more willing to choose meaningful festivals, such as Valentine's Day, Tanabata or 520, etc., and the list will be very large, and the more famous the coser is, the more you need to make an appointment in advance. At the same time, because the circle is full of women, the empathy and communication and understanding skills between girls are better, whether it is filming a couple** or dating, even if some intimate actions are involved, they will not feel embarrassed, but will have a more atmospheric sense.

Conclusion: Making money on Valentine's Day is becoming more and more difficult This Valentine's Day, those enviable "profiteering" and "curious" businesses, such as lonely frogs, sleeping and playing, renting themselves, etc., seem to have disappeared. More obviously, businesses are increasingly looking for customers, skills and the help of the "holiday economy", making more hard-earned money.

For example, on social platforms, some people customize blessings on the beach and snow, and then shoot them into **or** sell them to buyers, ranging from a few yuan to dozens of yuan per order; There are also people who set off fireworks on their behalf, in addition to the purchase of fireworks**, plus 10% of the road fee and firecrackers** as a service fee, which can be broadcast live or recorded**.

However, even so, there are still many young people who give up rest, forget about "social fear", and don't want to miss any good opportunity to make money.

Behind such changes, it is not difficult to find two trends among young people about consumption and making money.

In terms of consumption, return to rationality and please yourself. Paw Paw found that in the past two years, people have begun to spend money on themselves and pay more attention to their feelings than giving gifts to others on Valentine's Day. For example, cos commission is to find someone to fall in love with yourself, park follow-up is to take pictures of yourself and dolls, fireworks are released for yourself, and someone buys flowers on Valentine's Day to give them to themselves.

In terms of making money, I want to make money more than festivals. Pan Pan noticed that some people have decreased enthusiasm for Valentine's Day and have a weak concept, and they may want to make money more than falling in love. It is difficult for a single income** to bring a sense of security to young people, those with skills rely on skills to make money, and those with few skills rely on ideas and physical strength to make money.

Of course, the pursuit of young people is not just for money. The most ideal state is "a double harvest of career and love", but nothing is simple, love is not, and making money is not.