Reinvention in the time of coronavirus

Pan Rongda, the owner of a bed-and-breakfast establishment in Shanghai, agrees with this sentiment, noting that business should improve by June at the latest.

In the meantime, Pan has halved the number of rooms for rent on listing platform Airbnb and started to offer a traditional shikumen-style guesthouse, for photo shoots.

Pan, who is a cocktail enthusiast-turned-professional bartender, has also doubled the number of her two-hour cocktail courses.

"Although I don't have as many guests booking rooms as before, my cocktail classes for May are nearly fully booked," she says.

Offline retailers have also been hit hard by the epidemic. For Xu Ni, who runs a business selling baby products in Zhoushan, Zhejiang province, sales for the Spring Festival holiday period were only a third of last year's.

Even after the store reopened on Feb 17, few customers were walking in to buy products. In fact, Xu closed the store that day after just three hours, seeing how there was only one customer. Having made less than 1,000 yuan over the next few days, Xu decided to take her business online.

In preparation for her online debut, Xu wrote scripts to introduce her products, watched popular livestreams, including those of stars such as Li Jiaqi and Viya, and held several rehearsals at home.