September tourism grows, up 9.6% from last year

By Lynda Arakawa
Advertiser Staff Writer

The flow of tourists to Hawai'i continued to grow last month, thanks to a record surge of Mainland visitors.

Tourism continued to rebound last month, with travel to Hawai'i from the Mainland in such demand that major airlines have increased capacity on those routes. Advertiser library photo

"As far as September is concerned, I can't help but feel anything but being very pleased with the rebound Hawai'i has enjoyed this year," said Kelvin Bloom, president of Aston Hotels & Resorts.

"The strength of the market, especially our domestic Mainland segment, has been encouraging and the international arrivals are at a double-digit percentage increase year-to-date.

"If it's not a record year, it certainly will be one of our best years ever."

The overall visitor growth resulted largely from an 11.8 percent increase in Mainland visitors to 350,326, a new September record.

International arrivals rose 5.4 percent to 170,276, although the number of Japanese visitors fell slightly, by 0.1 percent, to 130,328. Meanwhile, Hawai'i saw a 20.5 percent surge in Canadian visitor arrivals, which grew to 8,736.

The flattening of the Japanese market last month is partly because last year's downturn in Japanese visitors because of the Iraq war and SARS had already begun to reverse itself by September 2003, said Gilbert Kimura, director of sales and public relations for Japan Airlines. That means the comparison between last month and the previous September would not be as dramatic as the comparisons made in earlier months.

But Kimura also noted that more Japanese are looking at other destinations. "More and more we're getting news from Japan that Asia is getting to be the major attraction for the Japanese solely because they feel safer, it's closer ... (and) cheaper," he said.

Still, other measures showed growth in Hawai'i's tourism industry. Visitor spending last month rose 9.6 percent over the previous September to $783.3 million. Visitor days rose 7.2 percent, but the average length of stay fell 2.2 percent to 8.54 days.

Nearly 5.2 million visitors came to Hawai'i in the first nine months of the year, an 8.7 percent increase over the same period last year. Visitor spending this year through September totaled $7.7 billion, up 6.5 percent.

Bloom said industry officials "owe a great deal of the strength of the market to the Mainland." He said he doesn't expect the Japanese market numbers to be a trend.

Visitors from the western half of the United States in September grew by 13.7 percent, while visitors from the eastern half increased by 8.4 percent.

"To meet the strong travel demand from the U.S. domestic market, especially from the U.S. East, there has been an increase in air-sea capacity to the islands," said state tourism liaison Marsha Wienert. "Year-to-date statistics show a 5.9 percent growth in scheduled air seats from the

U.S. West and a 36.5 percent jump in scheduled air seats from non-stop direct flights from the U.S. East."

Data showed Japanese tourists spent the most per day at an average of $251.60, up 4.9 percent from the previous September. But visitors from the eastern half of the United States spent the most per trip, averaging $1,727.30.

O'ahu had the largest growth last month in visitor arrivals at 10.6 percent.

The Big Island was a close second with a 10.5 percent increase, followed by Kaua'i at 8.8 percent and Maui at 7.6 percent. Lana'i and Moloka'i saw declines of 7.9 percent and 11.2 percent, respectively.

A total of 21,180 out-of-state cruise passengers also toured the Islands last month on two Hawai'i-based ships, the Norwegian Wind and the Pride of Aloha, and three out-of-state cruise ships. The passenger number is up 34.9 percent over September last year, when there was one Hawai'i-based ship, the Norwegian Star, and four out-of-state ships.

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

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