Huanhe Village is on fire, and the originally "hollowed out" village suddenly becomes lively.
Starting in August, this Tujia village located deep in the mountains of Dejiang County, Tongren City, Guizhou Province, has been welcoming seven to eight hundred tourists every day. So far, it has received more than 50,000 tourists. Zhao Jintao, the first secretary of the village, said with emotion: "A few years ago our place was not open to traffic, but we didn't expect that there would be traffic jams now."
The change stems from two shackles run by Ding Lang, a young man born in 1985. Music accounts, "Qiandong Nongcang" and "Gucun Lele". Both were filmed in Huanhe Village and currently have a total of nearly 2 million fans. As the account became popular, more and more netizens noticed the beautiful mountain village in the video.
Two Douyin accounts bring "fire" to a village
"Boss, how much does a bowl of glutinous rice balls cost?" "Boss, give me two glasses of Baogu wine."... This summer , Huanhe Village, which was originally inaccessible, suddenly ushered in a tourism peak. In addition to the local residents of Tongren, tourists from Hunan and Chongqing come to the village from time to time to feel the charm of the ancient village. Hundreds of people come to the village almost every day, and the number often exceeds 1,000 on weekends. According to everyone’s feedback, they all know Huanhe Village from the same place: Douyin.
In the past two years, in this small mountain village with only 204 households, two Douyin accounts have been born due to the arrival of a young man. This person is Ding Lang.
In 2018, Ding Lang accidentally discovered that friends around him began to use Douyin. With many years of e-commerce experience, he keenly felt that short videos would become the next traffic portal. What to shoot became the first question he had to solve, and Huanhe Village in Dejiang County instantly came to Ding Lang's mind.
Huanhe Village is located in the mountains, more than 20 kilometers away from Dejiang County. Most of the villagers are Tujia people and they mainly rely on farming for their livelihood. Like many rural areas, almost all the young people in the village have gone out to work, leaving only a dozen old people and children. The scenery in the village is very good, and it still retains the characteristics of the ancient village such as blue-tiled houses and bluestone roads. Dozens of precious ancient trees add a simple and peaceful atmosphere to the whole village. There is also a very special ancient well in the village called "Minwei Well". The first time he saw the clear mountain spring water gurgling from the bottom of the well, Ding Lang had an intuition: Shooting videos here would definitely become popular.
In July 2019, Ding Lang rushed to Huanhe Village, preparing to create an IP with traditional villages and traditional food. Village director Zhao Hongjun supported his idea and introduced him to a suitable candidate: the family above the well lived in a grandmother named Zhang Jinxiu who was very good at cooking.
Ding Lang and Zhang Jinxiu
Grandma Zhang likes to wear a simple Tujia hat and has a gentle smile, which is exactly what everyone thinks of a kind grandma. What's even more rare is that she doesn't resist the camera. After getting the consent of the old man, Ding Lang began to film and record Zhang Jinxiu's daily cooking, "I will film whatever grandma does."
The account that posted these videos was named "Qiandong Nongcang" by him. , accumulated 300,000 fans in less than half a year. At the same time, "Qiandong Nongcang" has also begun to show its good ability to carry goods. In October 2019, Grandma Zhang made a purple sweet potato steamed rice dish in the video, which successfully helped the local area sell more than 5,000 purple sweet potato orders.
In July of the following year, Guo Xiaochun, the then deputy county magistrate of Dejiang County, walked into the "Qiandong Nongcang" live broadcast room and sold pepper, tea, honey and other specialties from his hometown with Ding Lang. In just two hours, they sold more than 4,000 orders, with a total sales volume of more than 200,000 yuan. According to Ding Lang, in 2020, the total online and offline sales of the "Qiandong Nongcang" account reached 2 million yuan. Most of them are sold through Grandma Zhang’s videos. The best-selling products are local agricultural products such as fern root powder and chili noodles.
Just when everything was moving in the direction he expected, Ding Lang discovered that after the number of fans reached about 600,000, it would be difficult for "Qiandong Nongcang" to make another breakthrough: he had to find a new way out.
Grandma Zhang (fourth from left in the front row), Lele (fifth from left in the front row) and other members of the Ding Lang team
In order to distinguish from the "Qiandong Nongcang" account, he The newly launched Douyin account with the team is named "Gucun Lele". The protagonist is a young empress, which is the collective name for female elders such as aunts and aunts in the local dialect. Soon, Lele, who worked quickly, was recognized by Douyin netizens. Up to now, "Gucun Lele" has accumulated 1.12 million fans.
The ancient villages deep in the mountains are beginning to be seen
Unlike the "Qiandong Farm Warehouse", the "Ancient Village Lele" can not only bring goods, but also promote tourism in Huanhe Village.
After the new account started to be updated, Ding Lang’s team intentionally placed the positioning of Huanhe Village under each short video of “Gucun Lele”. "Before, we were worried that the village was not prepared and that toilets, trash cans and other supporting facilities could not keep up, so we did not deliberately disclose the shooting location. Now that these are done, we have brought the positioning, hoping to attract more tourists to the village . ”
“The biggest change is that there was no traffic here before, but now there are traffic jams.” Zhao Jintao said that Huanhe Village only built its first cement road leading to the county in 2014, and there are usually few vehicles. Coming and going. But now, vehicles coming here for self-driving tours often line up in long queues at the entrance of the village, and staff need to be cleared and guided every day. "The village is considering further construction to improve the road conditions."
The well that often appears in the video It is not only an Internet celebrity attraction, but also the most common companion for the villagers
For those tourists who came from afar, the villagers were not used to it at first, and even rejected it. They complained that tourists disrupted their original rhythm of life, but after many meetings of the village committee, everyone changed their minds. Gradually, stalls selling cold noodles and rice noodles began to appear on the promenade in the village, and local snacks such as turtle dove tofu and Baogudou wine also had sales channels. 85-year-old Grandpa Zhao, who once hated the tourism economy, now sells wheat buns and eggs in the snack corridor.
The change lies not only in the number of people coming to the village, but also in the village itself. After Huanhe Village became popular, the local area increased investment in the village's infrastructure. According to Zhao Jintao, with the support of the local government, Huanhe Village not only added new fire protection facilities, but also built pedestrian trails and a cultural, leisure and fitness square. In order to give netizens who come to travel a better experience, the village has specially set up public toilets, street signs and other tourist facilities.
Zhao Jintao said that in the past, the per capita annual income in the village was only about 4,000 to 5,000 yuan. “Now people doing small business in our village earn hundreds of yuan every day. After excluding costs, they can earn one or two yuan a year.” Ten thousand, several times more."
"If every county had a million-dollar account"
Since this year, Ding Lang has often discussed with Zhao Jintao how to transform Huanhe Village into a more Excellent tourist village. Not only them, many young people in the village also saw the changes in their hometown and took the initiative to return to the village.
23-year-old Zhao Shuang used his old house to open the first canteen in the village’s history. The store does not have a complete range of products, but the business is very good. Zhao Shuang revealed that including the freezers, he invested more than 10,000 yuan in total to open this store, and "the cost was recovered in less than a month."
Zhang Xiaofen, who sells snacks on the promenade, said that she never expected to start a business at home. In the early years, when there was no access to the village, Zhang Xiaofen had to spend two or three hours over the mountains to get to the market town in order to buy two bags of salt. After the road to the village was repaired, young people in the village went out to work one after another. Zhang Xiaofen and her husband also walked out of the mountains and went to Guangdong. "After I injured my waist three years ago, no boss even accepted me to work." Now, Zhang Xiaofen is working as a village cadre Motivated by the people, a stall was set up to sell Tujia delicacy "Tofu Tangyuan".
Although the peak summer vacation period has passed, you can still earn hundreds of yuan a day.
Zhao Jiang, who is in his early 30s, has been driving an online ride-hailing service in other places for the past few years. Last week, the first farmhouse he runs in Huanhe Village officially opened for business.
According to the plan of First Secretary Zhao Jintao, after the farmhouse is opened, the village’s local eggs and bacon will have a sales channel, and special vegetables such as yellow flowers and peppers can also be digested on the spot. Nowadays, more and more young people are returning to the villages to start their own businesses, and the Tujia folk customs such as lanterns and "Da Liu Zi" that have been passed down by no one should be learned again.
The promenade in the village has now become a "snack street"
Ding Lang also has his own long-term plan - to "copy" the experience accumulated in Huanhe Village to more places in Guizhou rural area. "Our goal is to make a village famous in every county in Guizhou, so that the network can connect the mountains and outside the mountains, and promote rural revitalization."
During the recent period, he and his team members were in Shaxi, Dejiang County. Dazhai Village, Township created another Douyin account "Gucun 28 Crossing". The protagonist of the new account is the resident secretary of Dazhai Village. The reason why I chose to photograph him is because the two parties have a very consistent concept: to make the village famous through Douyin, and then develop tourism to increase the villagers’ income.
This time, Ding Lang positioned the "Gucun 28 Crossing" account to record the family feud in the village. "For example, if a villager's beans are eaten by a neighbor's chicken, please ask the secretary to deal with it. We will go there Film and record the whole process, and guide everyone in the video not to worry about things, but to focus on improving the economic situation of the village."
Ding Lang said that although on the surface these small things do not contribute to the development of the village's economy. It is obviously helpful, but if you persist for a long time, you can change the ideas of the villagers bit by bit. "Villagers working in other places may be infected when they see these contents and are willing to return to their hometown to start a business, bringing different changes to the village." . ”
In Ding Lang’s view, if each of the 88 counties in Guizhou had a Douyin account with one million fans, whether it was for live streaming or attracting young people to return home, it would be a great success. Rural development helps. "88 accounts, if each account has 1 million fans, the total will be 88 million fans, and the influence will be even greater if they are linked to each other. What we are doing now is to build the two villages in front of us first. When the time comes, Maybe other counties and cities will see us."
(Text/Xiao Zhi)