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Business benefits from Olympic performance When Li Ting and Sun Tiantian defeated Spanish players at women's tennis double final on Aug. 23, Beijing's Sanlitun bar street was flooded with joyful shouts at China's first Olympic tennis gold medal. With Chinese athletes winning medals at the 2004 Athens Olympic Games, bars are selling two or three times as much beer as normal. "People come here to share the hot atmosphere of watching world- class sports and our turnover doubles when China competes for medals," said Zhang, who owns a bar on Sanlitun. CCTV-1 and CCTV-5, two sports channels of China's biggest Central TV Station (CCTV), also benefited from the Olympic frenzy with a record high of 82 percent audience rating at broadcasting the opening ceremony of the summer Olympic Games, according to CVSC-Sofres Media (CSM), far exceeding previous projection of 50 percent. Li Ning, a sports-wear brand in China named after a leading Chinese gymnast, has seen sales jump of one of its suits since the beginning of the Olympics, which is worn by athletes on victory platforms. "Many come here to buy the suits after watching Chinese athletes' outstanding performance on TV," said a sales assistant in a Li Ning franchised store in Beijing, "We now sell 20 to 30 suits a day, about three or four times the sales of usual time." In south China's Guangzhou city, TV sales in some big department stores and electric appliance supermarkets have risen by 20 percent as more customers come to buy PDP or LCD TV for getting clearer pictures of sports competition. Book sellers also have seized the opportunity to boost sales. In east China's Qingdao city, bookshelves loaded with Olympics- related books. The major bookstores are packed with customers, who are eager to know more about the history and development of the grand event. Not only watching TV, some Chinese have come ever closer to the Olympic Games. Shanghai Maofeng Flag Co., Ltd., a ten-year-old private company, won over competitors to produce 32,000 decorative flags within two months for the Olympics. "We now understand the needs of international sports pageants for flags," said Pan Liguo, office director of the company, "I hope we can be part of the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games as we have got some experience." In addition to flags, "made-in-China" tags are seen on the Olympic mascots, Athena and Phevos, and seats in Athens' gymnasiums. Instead of for raising short-term revenue, these Chinese companies are getting prepared for the Beijing 2008 Olympics. But some sectors, like the movie industry, are affected by the Olympic coverage. Movie attendance has declined since the games began, as audience are staying at home to watch the Olympics on television. "Attendance of blockbusters such as Spiderman II is lower than what we expected. I think generally our revenue will be several million yuan less than last year's summer time," said Weng Li with the Chinese Film Group Corporation. But like all the others, Weng was happy to see Chinese players' strong performance in the Olympic Games. "Even for myself, I choose to watch our athletes to compete and it's proud to see our national flag hoisted," he smiled. |
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