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The hotel industry has taken a battering globally as the economic downturn keeps travellers at home, but for one group of hotels on the mainland, business has never been better.
'Job hotels' have sprouted up in major cities in recent years, and a glut of graduates and shortage of jobs have seen occupancy rates soar.
The job hotels, modelled on backpacker hotels, target  job seekers, providing information on the nearest job centres, part-time vacancies and data-sharing services with prospective employers. Most guests are graduates who are looking for jobs, gaining work experience or attending short training courses. 
The hotels are more popular than ever this year, as the economic slowdown has exacerbated an already poor job market for the mainland's growing number of graduates. 
A huge expansion of universities in the late 1990s saw student admissions jump from 1.08 million in 1998 to 6.29 million this year. 
According to the  Chinese Academy of Social Sciences' 2009 Social Development Blue Book, 5.6 million college students graduated this year and, together with 1.5 million graduates who failed to land jobs last year, there are 7.1 million  looking for work.
Only 40 per cent of fresh graduates had secured jobs by June 25, according to the findings of a survey by independent job-market researcher  Mycos HR Digital Information.  
Zhida Job Hotel, a Shanghai-based chain, opened its first hotel in  that city in October 2006 and its first Beijing hotel six months later. It now has 12 premises and competes against dozens of other job hotels. 
The manager of Zhida's Beijing hotel, Shen Juan, said bookings had been especially strong this year - particularly in the past two months as fresh graduates flooded the job market - and occupancy rates were now close to 100 per cent.
In contrast, China Hotel Association figures show the occupancy rate of upmarket hotels in Beijing and Shanghai is below 30 per cent.
Ms Shen said up to 70 per cent of Zhida's guests were recent graduates and on average job seekers would stay  for about two months until they landed work.  
'But job seekers, particularly fresh graduates, are staying longer this year and a few actually stayed for up to six months before they could find a job or went somewhere else to look.'  
In Ms Shen's hotel, up to 12 guests share a room of bunk beds, paying between 20  and 50 yuan  (HK$23-$57) a day. The hotel is open only to job seekers aged 35 or under.  
Li Hui, who majored in micro-electronics, came to Beijing to look for a job because there were hardly any vacancies for people with his major in his home province of Shanxi .
Mr Li, who has stayed in the Beijing Zhida Job Hotel for nearly a month, said he heard about the hotel through word of mouth.  He said it felt like a college dormitory, as many people had similar backgrounds.
'It's about solidarity with like-minded peers and sharing job- hunting tips,' he said.
Another Shanxi graduate, who found a job after three weeks at the hotel, said he would stay there until he had finished his probation period in three months' time before looking for a permanent place to live.
Zhao Yongjian, 26, from Anhui, came to Beijing a month ago after he quit his job at a Shenzhen travel agency.
Mr Zhao said the past six months had been particularly hard for the travel industry in Guangdong as the financial crisis  and swine flu had delivered a double blow.
Like many job seekers, Mr Zhao said he would not tell his family he was unemployed. But he could only afford another month in the hotel. 
He said he was looking for a job that would offer career development, but added: 'I might eventually have to take whatever job  comes along.'




Lack of vacancies for graduates means full house for 'job hotels'