Cute baby animals bring visitors to zoos and aquariums. What happens when they grow up?

One of the best things that can happen to a zoo or aquarium is for one of their resident animals to go viral.

Just look at the multi-hour-long lines to see Moo Deng, a pygmy hippo in Thailand who has become an internet sensation following her July 2024 birth. The sassy animal is now a full-on brand, with Khao Kheow Open Zoo selling Moo Deng merchandise and even releasing a single “by” the hippo in multiple languages.

Meanwhile, Pesto — a baby king penguin who was eating more fish than his parents by the time he was a few weeks old — is also an online celebrity, with human stars like Olivia Rodrigo and Katy Perry stopping by to meet him.

But what happens when these cute animals become, well, less cute? The Sea Life Melbourne aquarium has already been planning for the next phase of Pesto’s life — and answering questions from the public about his changing appearance.

It’s normal for king penguins to lose their feathers by the time they’re about a year old and become confident swimmers. As a result, a spokesperson for the aquarium says, guests have started asking why Pesto looks different — or why they can’t find him at all.

“We are getting a few guests thinking we have moved him off display completely,” says the spokesperson. “Most of the team’s time is spent pointing him out to guests because he looks so different now.”

The bottom line is that cute baby animals make money.

Admission tickets are only the beginning. Many zoos and aquariums offer special “behind the scenes” or “zookeeper for a day” packages at much higher prices. At Sea Life Melbourne, standard entry tickets for adults start at $51, while the Penguin Passport — which include a 45-minute tour of the birds’ area and a look at how their food is prepared — is $199.

The real jackpot, though, is merchandise. Stuffed animals, T-shirts, fridge magnets, keychains, kids’ books and other branded products are a major way for zoos and aquariums to make money.

The rep for Sea Life Melbourne confirms to CNN that the Pesto-driven demand for penguin plushies was so intense that the aquarium had to “pull stock from around the world” in order to keep up.

None of this surprises professor Neil Carr from the Department of Tourism at New Zealand’s University of Otago.

“Zoos are in the entertainment business,” he says. “Visitors are not the only [revenue] stream. To get out of just about any zoo or aquaria in the world now you have to go through the shop.”

Carr makes a distinction between what he calls “front of house” and “back of house” at zoos. Front of house is what guests are able to see, while back of house is everything the staff is doing behind the scenes, from caring for sick animals to cleaning up poop.

And while visitors who are interested in education and conservation may think they’re doing something good by purchasing a behind-the-scenes tour, Carr believes they’re just a different flavor of propaganda.

“As soon as you start having large numbers of people going through, you’re turning it into another performance,” he says.

“It’s just a way of earning more money. The real work of zoos that are into conservation and preservation is going on in places that they cannot allow the public into because they’re raising animals to be returned to the wild.”

When animals become brands

For many animal-centered tourist attractions, a single animal going viral can be a like a rising tide that lifts all boats.

And few things can bring more attention and revenue to a zoo, says Carr, than a baby panda.

Ocean Park, a theme park, zoo and aquarium in Hong Kong, knows this all too well. Ying Ying, the park’s oldest female panda, gave birth to twins in November 2024, throwing the city headlong into a case of panda fever.

The attraction embraced the panda obsession, sharing social media micro-updates about everything the twins (one male and one female) were doing and releasing photos taken by zookeepers. It helped keep people engaged and interested, since the babies won’t go on display at Ocean Park until February 16.

Franklin Law, Ocean Park’s head of marketing, referred to the pandas as IP — intellectual property — in a recent interview with CNN Travel.

The term, which is more commonly applied to pop culture figures like Marvel superheroes or “Star Wars” characters, has been adopted by zoos and aquariums in the social media age.

Law says that by educating guests more about the different personalities of the animals at Ocean Park, visitors can “associate themselves with individual pandas,” the same way they might have a favorite member of a band.

“The emotional connection is actually deeper because the guests are knowing the pandas since they’re young and then they have time to develop the emotional tie,” says Law.

The souvenir shops at Ocean Park bear — pun intended — that out. While there has always been panda merchandise, it’s now more tailored to mention specific names of pandas, both babies and adult.

Tote bags and pillowcases branded with “Big Sister” — delicate, with softer eyes and shown holding a ball — are next to ones branded with “Little Brother,” who is depicted with more alert ears and a lollipop.

Animals, though, can be unpredictable. No parent wants to have to explain to a crying toddler why the panda isn’t feeling very playful today.

To hedge its bets, Ocean Park has built additional panda-themed attractions ahead of the twins’ public debut, including a place where guests can have their photos taken with an augmented-reality panda.

Born Free, an animal rights group based in the UK, has spoken out against what it says are the dangers of animals going viral.

“The amount of merchandise sold, increase in ticket sales, number of views on social media and interest from celebrities significantly benefits the zoo, while the individual animal remains in an unnatural captive environment with little or no chance of being reintroduced into the wild. Whilst attention may move onto the next ‘viral’ attraction, these animals will most likely remain where they are for the rest of their lives, long after their short-term fame fades away,” the organization wrote in an October 2024 press release.

“Rather than visiting a zoo to see a ‘famous’ wild animal, Born Free encourages anyone who is interested in these animals to learn about and support the conservation of their habitats in the wild and advocate for improving individual captive animal welfare, so that one day there will be no more wild animals kept in zoos.”

The domino effect

Both Ocean Park and Sea Life Melbourne tell CNN they are hopeful that visitors who come to see just one animal will stay longer, engaging with other animals, exploring other exhibits and hopefully learning something.

Carr, the tourism professor, points out that it is much harder to sell the public on “the brown jobs” –— aka, the less cute animals that also need conservation resources.

Using the conventionally adorable animals is a good way to get people in the door of zoos and aquariums, but the money generated by panda merchandise can also pay for the habitats of many other species.

“Our focus isn’t on promoting individual animals but on sharing the incredible stories that highlight the important work we do as an aquarium,” says the representative for Sea Life.

“Pesto’s story resonated deeply with people worldwide, but it’s just one example of the many heartwarming and impactful tales we have to share.”

In the meantime, though, they’re still sharing videos from Pesto’s first birthday party on Instagram.

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