Visitors to the Hawaiian Islands spent a total of $1.50 billion in August 2019, an increase of 6.3 percent compared to August 2018, according to preliminary statistics released today by the Hawaii Tourism Authority (HTA). It should be noted that August 2018’s results were partially impacted by concerns related to Hurricane Lane and the Kilauea eruption.
Tourism dollars from the Transient Accommodations Tax (TAT) helped to fund numerous community events and initiatives across the state in August, including the Okinawan Festival, Duke’s OceanFest, the AVPFirst youth volleyball clinics on six islands, the Kauai Marathon & Half Marathon, and the Emma Farden Sharpe Hula Festival.
On a statewide level, average daily visitor spending declined (-1.2% to $191 per person) in August
year-over-year. Visitors from Canada (+6.0% to $178 per person), U.S. East (+4.1% to $206 per person) and U.S. West (+2.9% to $167) spent more per person, while visitors from All Other International Markets (-12.4% to $212) spent less. Average daily spending by Japanese visitors
(-0.3% to $224 per person) was similar to last year.
Total visitor arrivals increased 9.8 percent to 928,178 visitors in August. All visitor arrivals were via air service as no out-of-state cruise ships visited Hawaii this month. Total visitor days1 increased 7.6 percent. The statewide average daily census2, or the number of visitors on any given day in August, was 253,855, up 7.6 percent from last year.
Visitor arrivals by air service increased in August from U.S. West (+17.1% to 421,229), U.S. East (+16.5% to 202,223) and Canada (+2.0% to 28,716), but declined from Japan (-2.3% to 155,779) and All Other International Markets (-3.2% to 120,230) compared to a year ago.
In August, visitor spending increased from U.S. West (+17.1% to $578.6 million), U.S. East (+15.8% to $383.5 million) and Canada (+8.2% to $57.3 million), but declined from Japan (-1.2% to $225.4 million) and All Other International Markets (-16.0% to $256.8 million) compared to a year ago.
Among the four larger islands, Oahu saw increased visitor spending (+1.0% to $730.5 million) in August, boosted by growth in visitor arrivals (+7.7% to 577,384), which offset lower daily spending (-4.4%). On Maui, visitor spending grew (+14.0% to $404.8 million) with daily spending (+4.1%) and visitor arrivals also increasing (+11.3% to 273,786). The island of Hawaii recorded increases in visitor spending (+16.5% to $193.4 million), daily spending (+1.8%) and visitor arrivals (+18.4% to 158,972). Visitor spending on Kauai (+0.4% to $158.4 million) was comparable to the same period from a year ago, with growth in visitor arrivals (+4.7% to 120,679) offsetting a drop in daily spending (-3.5%).
A total of 1,212,926 trans-Pacific air seats serviced the Hawaiian Islands in August, up 4.3 percent from a year ago. Growth in air seats from U.S. East (+11.5%) and U.S. West (+8.1%) offset decreases from Canada (-11.0%), Other Asia (-9.5%), Oceania (-9.4%) and Japan (-6.0%).
