Supporters of the Jiujiang Team practice cheering movements and slogans on the G9813/2 train, which departs from Lushan Station in Jiujiang, East China's Jiangxi Province, on August 2, 2025. It is a fan-only railway express, specially designed for football fans of the 2025 Jiangxi Provincial Urban Football Super League, or Gan Super League. Photo: VCG

Train G9813/2 departed Lushan Station in Jiujiang, East China's Jiangxi Province on Saturday, as more than 1,000 supporters of Jiujiang Team boarded China's first fan-only railway express, specially designed for football fans of the 2025 Jiangxi Provincial Urban Football Super League, or Gan Super League, an amateur football league in eastern China. 

At 3:31 pm on Saturday, the carriages were rolling toward Yingtan North, located in a prefecture-level city in the east of Jiangxi, where the latest round of the match would take place, according to a report by chinanews.com.cn on Sunday.

Operated by China Railway Nanchang Group, the 90-minute journey has become a latest example of how a single football fixture can ignite an entire value chain and fuel economic growth.

Yang Bin, head of the local railway bureau, said that the launch of the fan-only train would effectively promote cultural exchange and fan interaction between Jiujiang and Yingtan, with positive implications for boosting the event economy and stimulating cultural tourism consumption, according to chinanews.com.cn.

"We came for the football match," a Jiujiang passenger surnamed Chen told the Global Times on Sunday, "but we're staying for the weekend, and leaving with a suitcase full of goodies."

To better serve fans, the city of Nanchang has established a closed-loop consumption cycle of "watching games, dining, and buying cultural and creative products." Outside the stadiums, night markets stay open until midnight, offering consumers steaming squid, spicy noodles, club souvenirs and other creative merchandise. 

Analysts noted that since the Gan Super League sparked province-wide football fever, the new model of "cross-city match viewing combined with cultural tourism consumption" has gained momentum.

Excitement on the pitch is injecting new momentum into consumption and economic growth. From catering and accommodation to cultural and creative retail, from transportation to venue operations, and from "coming for the games" to "visiting because of the games," this wave of sports-related consumption - driven by spectators and participants alike - is turning popularity into profit, analysts said.

To stimulate diversified consumption through the integration of culture and tourism, many Chinese cities are rolling out innovative incentives.

As grassroots football matches like the Gan Super League, the Su Super League (Jiangsu City Football League) and Guizhou Village Super League went viral, Chinese cities have transformed weekend fixtures into full-blown urban festivals, turning every derby into a multimillion-yuan bonanza blending sports, tourism and local consumption.

A wave of popular sports events has recently swept across China, stimulating public enthusiasm for sports, and the accompanying "sports event economy" has also ignited a surge in consumer spending, Jiang Yiyi, a tourism and sports expert at Beijing Sport University, told the Global Times on Sunday.

The excitement of the events carried over into late-night food stalls, creating a new consumer scene that is boosting local consumption, Jiang said.

"It has transformed fleeting match-day excitement into a sustained economic engine, generating ripple effects of growth far beyond the stadium gates," Jiang added.

In major competition hubs such as Ganzhou and Ji'an in Jiangxi, match days have pushed airport and railway traffic to record highs, and the revenue of nearby restaurants has doubled compared with regular days. 

The match craze has not only ignited a passion for sports, but also driven the growth of sports-related consumption.

Data from online discount retailer Vipshop showed that in June, the Su Super League craze led to a 60 percent year-on-year surge in sales of footballs and boots across Jiangsu Province, while sales of polo shirts, skirts, vests, badminton and tennis shoes, and softshell pants all posted double-digit gains, demonstrating continued consumer enthusiasm, yicai.com reported.

According to the China Tourism Academy, major sporting events can generate eight to 12 times the ticket revenue in secondary spending.

With the rollout of various activities, sports events have extended the chains of viewing and participation, catalyzing the integration and mutual promotion of culture, sports, tourism, and commerce, Feng Jun, an associate professor at Beijing Sport University, told the Global Times on Sunday.

The event economy has already delivered impressive results.

In 2024, Shanghai garnered revenues of 11.38 billion yuan ($1.58 billion) from the 178 international sports events held in the city, while related services sectors generated 30.99 billion yuan, according to official data.

In North China's Hebei Province, 4,454 sports events held in the first 11 months of 2024 attracted 10.5 million spectators and athletes, generating 15.4 billion yuan in catering, accommodation, entertainment and shopping, local media outlets reported.