Relying on the city's rich peony resources, Shandong has been guiding Heze to develop peony culture and industry over recent years. Thanks to these efforts, Heze has successfully upgraded the peony industry from merely producing ornamentals to pursuing the integrated development of producing ornamentals, intensive processing and cultural creativity and carved out a reputation for the brand of "Heze Peony".

Revolving around peony resources, Heze has established the concept of "relying on peony resources, extending the industrial chain, and reaching beyond peony development" and adhered to a systematic, chain-based, and market-oriented approach. Guided by this, Heze has worked hard to maximize the value of peony resources and accelerate the pace of the primary industry to increase output and efficiency, the secondary industry to move up to the high end of the market, and the primary, secondary, and tertiary industries to develop in an integrated manner. At present, Heze is home to more than 120 peony production, processing, and export enterprises which can produce over 260 kinds of products in 11 categories.

In Heze, the peony cultural creative industry enjoys robust development, and many cultural creative products have been very popular. Relying on the famous "Juye peony-themed traditional Chinese realistic painting", Juye County has established a calligraphy and painting industrial chain. People working in the industry exceed more than 20,000 and over 1.2 million calligraphy and painting works are created annually. Notably, its products have been sold to 40 countries and regions worldwide.