VISITOR SPENDING ON PAR WITH AUGUST 2013 AT $1.3 BILLION

Total Arrivals Declined 1.3 Percent for the Month

News Release from HTA September 29, 2014

HONOLULU – Visitors who came to the Hawaiian Islands in August 2014 spent a total of $1.3 billion1 (-0.5%), according to preliminary statistics released today by the Hawai‘i Tourism Authority (HTA). A 1.3 percent decline in total arrivals to 730,707 visitors and a shorter average length of stay (-1.6% to 8.74 days) led to a 3 percent decrease in visitor days.

Arrivals by air from U.S. West rose 1.9 percent to 304,526 visitors in August 2014. Increased daily spending (+2.8% to $163 per person) also contributed to a 2.4 percent growth in U.S. West visitor expenditures to $444.9 million. For the U.S. East market, decreases in arrivals (-2.9% to 143,444 visitors) and average length of stay (-1.8% to 9.95 days) resulted in a 2.3 percent loss in visitor expenditures to $296 million.

Expenditures by Japanese visitors dropped 9.2 percent to $235.4 million in August 2014 as a result of an 8.2 percent decline in arrivals to 150,568 visitors and a shorter length of stay.

June to September are typically slower months for Canadian visitors to the islands. In August 2014, total expenditures by Canadian visitors fell 1.5 percent to $50.8 million and arrivals decreased 7.6 percent to 26,065 visitors. Arrivals from All Other markets totaled 106,105 visitors (+6.1%) with combined expenditures of $236.8 million (+7.3%).

No out-of-state cruise ships visited Hawai‘i in August 2014 while one cruise ship came last August with 1,885 visitors.

There was relatively flat growth in visitor arrivals to O‘ahu (-0.8%) and decreases in arrivals to Maui (-1.7%), Hawai‘i Island (-1.4%) and Kaua‘i (-1.1%) compared to August 2013. Visitor expenditures increased on Maui (+14.3% to $351 million) and Kaua‘i (+2.8% to $124 million) but declined on O‘ahu (-7.8% to $618.7 million). Visitor expenditures on Hawai‘i Island were $161.6 million (+0.8%).

Air capacity to the Hawaiian Islands was up 3.6 percent to 1,019,825 total air seats in August 2014.

There were more scheduled seats from Other Asia (+18.2%), U.S. West (+8.4%), Oceania (+3.3%) and U.S. East (+1.8%), offsetting fewer seats from Japan (-11.5%).

Year-to-Date 2014:

Boosted by higher average daily spending (+2.5% to $195 per person), total expenditures by all visitors (by air and by cruise ship) rose 2.1 percent to $10 billion. Total arrivals of 5,597,764 visitors (+0.1%) were virtually unchanged from the first eight months of 2013. Growth in arrivals by air from Other Asia (+22.3%), Europe (+6.8%), Oceania (+5.4%) and Canada (+1.5%) offset declines from Latin America (-7.6%) and U.S. West (-1.3%). Arrivals from U.S. East (-0.5%) and Japan (+0.3%) were about the same compared to a year ago.

Visitor expenditures from U.S. West (+1.4% to $3.4 billion), U.S. East (+2.6% to $2.6 billion) and Canada (+3.8% to $739.4 million) were higher, but Japanese visitor spending decreased 2.8 percent to $1.6 billion.

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