People pose for a picture at LEGOLAND Shanghai Resort in Shanghai on May 26, 2025. Photo: Courtesy of LEGOLAND Shanghai Resort

With Shanghai LEGOLAND Resort set to open on Saturday, online searches for the resort have surged recently, driving a rise in hotel bookings in Jinshan district where it is located, a Chinese online travel agency said in a statement sent to the Global Times on Friday.

Searches since June have increased fivefold compared with May, and summer hotel reservations in Jinshan district have risen 3.5 times year-on-year as of Friday, Qunar said.

Since May 31, the resort has been undergoing internal testing and trial operations, with comprehensive evaluation of the facilities, including attractions, dining venues, entertainment shows and accommodation, the Global Times learned from the resort.

According to the online travel agency, only 30 percent of the summer hotel bookings in Jinshan district have been made by Shanghai residents, with 70 percent made by visitors from other areas of the country, mainly from Beijing, Qingdao, Chengdu and Nanjing. 

Chen Jining, secretary of the Shanghai Municipal Committee of the Communist Party of China, met with Niels B. Christiansen, CEO of the LEGO Group, and Fiona Eastwood, CEO of Merlin Entertainments on Friday, extending his best wishes for the successful opening of the Shanghai LEGOLAND Resort, according to Shanghai Fabu, the official WeChat account of the Shanghai municipal government.

Chen noted that the continuous restructuring of the Chinese consumer market and the growing diversity of consumer demands bring new opportunities and space for enterprise development.

Christiansen and Eastwood said that Shanghai LEGOLAND Resort is the largest of its kind in the world, and during the project's construction and trial operations, they fully experienced the immense potential of the Chinese market and Shanghai's exceptional business environment. The LEGO Group will continue to provide high-quality cultural and entertainment experiences for diverse consumer groups in China.

Shanghai LEGOLAND Resort is just the latest example of a theme park boosting the local economy. Theme parks, particularly those based on well-known intellectual property (IP), have consistently been engines driving the economy of nearby areas, according to Qunar.

As of October 2024, there were 385 theme parks nationwide, of which 87 are classified as mega or large-scale theme parks, a recent theme park development report showed. According to China Insights Consultancy, the scale of China's amusement park economy reached nearly 60 billion yuan ($8.37 billion) in 2023 and is expected to exceed 110 billion yuan by 2028. 

"Theme parks play an increasingly vital role in national economic consumption," Wang Peng, an associate research fellow at the Beijing Academy of Social Sciences, told the Global Times on Friday. The development of theme parks directly drives growth in tourism and related industries, such as transportation, accommodation, and catering, while also boosting sales of goods and services, further stimulating domestic demand, Wang noted.

Combined with support policies to boost consumption, demand created by theme park trips will continue to play a key role in driving economic growth, Wang said.

The Ministry of Culture and Tourism will launch a nationwide campaign from July to August, with local governments set to offer incentives such as consumption vouchers, ticket discounts, spend-and-save offers, and discounted packages, with total subsidies exceeding 570 million yuan, Xinhua News Agency reported.