The sowing of the department store booths was less, with more than 300 booths, and the average daily turnover of the most popular department store booth was less than 20,000 yuan. Some booths sold different things at the beginning and middle of the temple fair. In recent years, grilled skewers might be profitable, so merchants are willing to sell them. The manufacturing process of some traditional Beijing snacks is complex, and merchants do not consider it.
According to the organizers, there were a total of 244 booths at the Longtan Temple Fair, including 102 food booths, which increased by 20 compared to last year. Among the 850,000 visitors, more than half concentrated in the snack area.
In the folk area of the Changdian Temple Fair set up in Taoranting Park, a similar situation also occurred. Besides lacking the New Year atmosphere, ordinary people have pointed out new problems. No matter which temple fair you visit, you can see crowded meat skewer booths. This overshadows the traditional Beijing snacks. "If more authentic old Beijing snacks could be introduced into the temple fair, it could also enhance the cultural quality of the temple fair," said Zhang Wei.
At the Ditan Temple Fair, meat skewers were the most popular. Although only one-tenth of the 400 booths were food booths, they attracted the most visitors. The performances on the Folk Square had fewer audiences.
When people reflected, they found that the temple fair seemed to let the snacks take center stage. Nearly half of the booths at the Longtan Temple Fair were snacks, but it was hard to find a single candy skewer, instead filled with all kinds of meat skewers. A similar scene also happened at the Ditan Temple Fair and Taoranting Park, where folk items were ignored, and the snack booths were crowded.
Having too many snack booths isn't necessarily bad; Beijing has many traditional snacks worth recommending, such as tea soup. However, the variety of snacks at the Dragon Year Temple Fair was too monotonous, mainly consisting of meat skewers, lacking the old Beijing flavor.
Regarding the "overwhelming" situation of snacks, we interviewed Zhang Jinsong, the spokesperson for the Ditan and Longtan Temple Fairs.
Despite having many snacks, Ms. Ding from Caqiao couldn't find a single candy skewer after circling the temple fair. "Is this still a temple fair?! Everywhere is filled with grilled skewers, with no sense of the New Year at all," complained Ms. Ding.
Zhang: Considering the convenience for visitors entering from various entrances to find snacks within a short distance, Longtan set up 102 catering booths. Ditan's booths were more concentrated, so there were only 40.
Old brands themselves don't participate much; all six old brands at Longtan were invited by us with discounted booth fees.
For the phenomenon of temple fairs lacking the "New Year atmosphere" and basically becoming "snack bazaars," Zhang Wei, the founder of Old Beijing Network, expressed agreement. He said that generally speaking, a temple fair usually has 100 to 200 booths, and some large temple fairs have even more. Snack booths typically account for about 10% to 30%, which is normal.
We learned that the most stable vendors in the temple fair are those selling snacks, with one-third being regular customers, while the turnover of department store booths is relatively higher, with approximately 3-4 new customers.
Grilled skewers indeed earned the most. Mr. Guo, the old bid king of the Longtan Temple Fair, had four grilled skewer booths this year, with an average daily turnover of over 100,000 yuan per booth, making the total daily turnover of the four booths exceed 400,000 yuan. Mr. Guo said the main reason for doing grilled skewers was their ease of operation.
The most popular Beijing snack had a daily average turnover of only 20,000 to 30,000 yuan.
Meanwhile, Zhang Wei believed that even if old Beijing traditional snacks were introduced, it would be best to maintain the original "flavor." Zhang Wei gave an example: "For instance, fried intestine cakes sold at the temple fair are often pre-fried and then simply reheated on the pan, naturally losing the authentic taste. This greatly diminishes the image of Beijing's traditional snacks."
The layout currently belongs to a reasonable state, and Beijing snacks are difficult to recruit.
Traditional temple fairs should have a New Year flavor and shouldn't let meat skewers overshadow everything.