Beijing Review - 29.08.2019

(Greg DeLong) #1
38 BEIJING REVIEW AUGUST 29, 2019 http://www.bjreview.com

A


t Joy City, one of the most bustling
malls in Beijing, there is a profusion of
telephone kiosk-like glass booths, each
occupying 2 square meters. Curtains hang in
front of them and once you push them aside
and enter, you find they are fun-packed mini
karaoke television (KTV) booths, the interactive
musical entertainment that is the rage in China
and many Southeast Asian countries.
Inside one of these mini KTVs that can
accommodate two people in a pinch, Duan
Haoran, a 28-year-old overseas-studies
consultant, is jiving and singing heartily.
Wearing a headset, he moves his head and
feet to the beat, so absorbed that he for-
gets he is actually at the mall to meet his
girlfriend.
At mini KTVs, you can choose a music
video which will be played on the screen,
you can even record your personal album
and share it on social media. These kiosks
offer a flexible payment scheme. You can
pay for the number of songs you listen to
or the time you spend, and it becomes an
artistic refuge for people who have bits of

time to kill.
A frequent visitor, Duan loves the magic
black booths for two reasons. “When I go
to an actual KTV with my friends, I can’t
enjoy myself fully,” he told Beijing Review.
“I am a songaholic and I have to share the
microphone with friends. But in the mini
KTV, I can sing as much as I want. Also, it
gives me something to do while waiting for
my girlfriend, who is always late.”
Like Duan, today’s young Chinese have
no patience for waiting, even for short
spans, doing nothing. They need some
consumer activity to keep them occupied
and shrewd investors are joyfully tapping
into this pristine market with potential.

Key catalyst
Duan’s girlfriend Lu Ran, a 26-year-old yoga
instructor, said waiting has become part of
their dating. “If we go to a popular restau-
rant during rush hour, sometimes we have
to wait for one or two hours before we get
a table,” she said. “We also have to wait
when we arrive early for a movie or when

one of us is late.”
Unlike Duan with his karaoke craze, Lu
prefers the claw crane, an arcade game
where players have to feed coins into the
machine and manipulate a claw-like arm to
catch the plush toys packed inside, and the
lipstick machine, where the winners get to
take home big brand lipsticks.
“Now the claw crane machines are ev-
erywhere, not just in arcades, which means
you can play them more. Besides, QR code
payment has replaced the traditional coins
needed to play, making it so much more
convenient,” Lu told Beijing Review.
Industry insiders say mobile payment is
the most important catalyst for the rise of
the waiting economy. “If the QR code pay-
ment was not available, my interest would
drop since buying game coins or changing
money would mean a new round of wait-
ing,” Duan said.
Mobile payment also helps to cut labor
and management costs, enhancing the
SURĶW
While the mobile payment method is
a common factor, the waiting economy
has different consumption scenarios as
the merchants think wherever there is a
possibility of someone waiting, there is
fertile ground for the waiting economy.
Apart from malls, their businesses are also
distributed in movie theaters, subway sta-
tions, airports, railway stations and office
buildings.
The services vary from massage
armchairs to self-service health exam ma-
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machines and sleep capsules, a tiny bed-
room-like cubicle in airports where people
pay to nap with wake-up calls thrown in.
“I’ve tried almost all those services and
machines since they don’t cost much,” Lu
said. For example, it takes 15 yuan ($2.1)
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orange squeezed into a cup; a 10-minute
armchair massage charges 12-15 yuan
($1.7-2.1); and it costs 60 yuan ($8.5) to
sing in a mini KTV for half an hour.

A consumer makes noodles at a self-service
noodle machine at an industrial community
in Shanghai on May 29, 2018

XINHUA

Power of Piecemeal


Entrepreneurs use short waiting periods to unleash a new consumption economy


By Zhang Shasha


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