November arrivals increase

By Lynda Arakawa
Advertiser Staff Writer

A record number of Mainland visitors in November offset a slight decline in Japanese arrivals and kept the state's robust tourism industry on track.

A total of 526,661 visitors came to Hawai'i last month, a 5 percent increase over November 2003, according to data released yesterday by the state Department of Business, Economic Development and Tourism. The total number of arrivals in the first 11 months of the year was 6.29 million, up 8.5 percent from the same period last year.

The growth of the visitor industry means more jobs and more dollars flowing into local businesses, such as Bike Hawaii Tours, whose customer base is largely tourists.

Bike Hawaii Tours — which offers hiking, biking, sailing and snorkeling tours — has seen steady growth this year, said founder and president John Alford.

"It's been definitely good for us," he said, noting that the company has added a new tour to its schedule. "It was slower this time last year, but it picked up. ... Even more Japanese, too, this year. And we love our Japanese guests."

The state would need to see more than 660,000 visitors this month to match the best year in Hawai'i tourism: 2000, when 6.95 million came to the state. That appears unlikely now, but tourism officials expect next year will set a new visitor arrival record.

"We'll end up 2004 with a high single-digit percentage improvement over last year in terms of visitor arrivals and right on the doorstep of a record year," said Kelvin Bloom, president of Aston Hotels & Resorts. "How could one complain about that?"

Mainland visitor arrivals totaled 365,495 last month, the best November on record and up 7.6 percent over the previous year. Domestic arrivals have set monthly records every month since March this year.

International arrivals, totaling 161,166, were down 0.4 percent over the previous November. Japanese visitor arrivals declined by 0.8 percent last month.

Visitor spending overall grew 2.7 percent to $795.4 million last month. Tourists have spent about $9.3 billion so far this year, up 5.6 percent over the same period last year.

The average length of stay fell 1 percent, but the increase in tourists pushed total visitor days up 4 percent over last year.

"Overall we're very optimistic in regards to the successes we've had in November and the successes we are seeing in December," said Gov. Linda Lingle's tourism liaison, Marsha Wienert.

Wienert said the growth in the domestic market was "stimulated by strong arrival increases from all nine regions of the Mainland aided by greater air seat capacity to the Islands."

Every island except for Kaua'i (down 2.8 percent) and Moloka'i (down 10.4 percent) saw more tourists last month.

The Big Island saw the largest growth at 11.1 percent, followed by Lana'i (9.6 percent), O'ahu (6.2 percent) and Maui (2.7 percent).

Japanese visitors continued to spend the most per person per day at $274, followed by $166 by U.S. East visitors.

Cruise ships carried 30,502 out-of-state visitors through the Islands last month, nearly double the number of cruise ship passengers in November last year.

Reach Lynda Arakawa at larakawa@honoluluadvertiser.com or at 535-2470.

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