（Photo/Xinhua）

The early snow in northeast China is creating a new business. Now, some clever people are making a fortune by writing wishes in the snow for those living in the south – where snow rarely hits.

The orders are usually placed on e-commerce platforms where buyers note their request, and the service providers take pictures of their message minutes after.

Usually, the service costs around 2 yuan ($0.28) per Chinese character, which makes the typical confession in Chinese “Wo Ai Ni” or “I love you” around 5 or 6 yuan.

“I think it’s fun. So I decided to try it,” said a service provider surnamed Cui, who is currently studying in Harbin, northeast China’s Heilongjiang province.

Cui told Beijing Youth Daily that it wasn’t the profit that drove her to run the business, she said she cared more about the pleasure she got from it. According to her, she has received over 20 orders in less than three days.

“Most of my customers are in love and want to send wishes to their significant others,” Cui introduced. To make her services more competitive, she added other elements in her snow writing, such as heart and flower patterns.

This business relies highly on the weather, as snows don’t last long, and that’s why many of the service providers say “snow is coming, book now” in their introduction.

“The buyers want clean snow and beautiful writing, so the hardest part of this business is to find the perfect location,” Cui said. Sometimes the snow is covered with footprints, so she has to remove them before writing.

This type of new business indicated the transfer from the pre-industrial consumption philosophy to the post-industrial one, said Xiao Yaozhong, a professor with the social and cultural department of the Party School of Sichuan Provincial Committee of C.P.C for Provincial Authorities.

He explained that the younger generation is paying attention to both their actual demands and the expression of their individuality through their consumption practices, and “long-distance” services reflect such mentality.