Macau’s mascot strategy

Nadia Shaw

As summer approaches and school holidays begin, Macau is turning its focus to tourism, the lifeblood of its economy. The Macau Government Tourism Office’s launch of the Mak Mak Experience Hub, built around a homegrown mascot, reflects a familiar ambition: to move beyond gaming and cultivate a more experiential tourism model.

Yet the central question remains whether such projects truly change how visitors spend their time and money, or merely add another attraction in a city already full of underused spaces.

Across the world, tourism planners increasingly speak the language of “experience,” “storytelling” and “cultural depth.” Spain promotes slow tourism to encourage longer stays in smaller cities. Dubai invests in spectacle-driven districts such as Expo City. Egypt has repositioned heritage through curated museum experiences like the Grand Egyptian Museum, while London blends cultural institutions with commercial areas anchored by recognizable narratives. Each approach seeks the same result: to keep visitors engaged beyond one stop.

Macau has been trying to do something similar, but the city’s daily reality suggests a more complicated picture. Districts such as ZAPE, areas near the border and streets close to major thoroughfares still see limited consumer spending. These are exactly the places where spillover effects should be strongest.

Instead, they remain subdued, and even local residents often find little reason to linger.

Mak Mak itself is not the problem. The mascot, inspired by the black-faced spoonbill and designed by local illustrator Tou Chon Wai, has some symbolic value. The bird is an endangered migratory species found in East Asia, and Macau’s seasonal connection to it gives the character a local identity rather than a borrowed one. The design also draws on familiar cultural references, including a hat modeled on the Guia Lighthouse.

The broader challenge is that a mascot alone cannot create an economy.

In other cities, intellectual property works because it is embedded in a larger commercial ecosystem. Tokyo and Seoul have turned characters such as Hello Kitty, Pokémon and Kakao Friends into retail, dining and entertainment networks. Disney has done the same in the United States, while Harry Potter has helped sustain tourism across London and beyond. Pop Mart’s Labubu craze in mainland China shows how collectible characters can also generate repeat spending when they are tied to physical retail and strong brand momentum.

The common thread is not novelty but integration. Successful IP is not treated as a stand-alone attraction. It appears across shops, food outlets, streets and transport nodes, becoming part of the city rather than a separate stop on a map.

That is where Macau’s approach still looks uncertain. A standalone experience hub risks becoming a contained site that visitors enter, photograph and leave. Without surrounding density, such as boutique retail, independent cafés and walkable streets, the economic effect remains limited. The visitor journey begins and ends in one place, with little reason to extend spending elsewhere.

There is also a strategic question about what Macau wants to become. Experiential tourism emphasizes narrative cohesion and authenticity. Boutique tourism depends on clusters of small, differentiated businesses. Both require coordination, investment and time. Neither can be built through isolated projects alone.

Macau already has assets that are distinctive and difficult to replicate. Its Portuguese-Chinese heritage, culinary variety and compact geography give it a natural advantage. Yet the risk is not that Mak Mak lacks appeal. It is that the city may be investing in symbols before building the experiences that make symbols matter.