Hawaii is welcoming additional arrivals, but average daily visitor spend is showing some significant shifts

Hawaii’s tourism performance was mixed through Oct-2019 as visitor arrivals grew, but tourist spend was varied. Through the 10M ending Oct-2019, total visitor spending notched up +0.2% to USD14.67 billion, but this fluctuated significantly by market.

By region, spending grew +5.3% from the US west coast to USD5.72 billion and 2.3% from the US east coast to USD3.90 billion. However, spending from Canada declined -2.8% to USD846.9 million and -12.3% from all other international markets to USD2.37 billion. On a statewide basis, average daily spend by visitor fell -2.6% year-on-year to USD195 per person.

The island of Oahu posted a +2.4% rise in visitor spending to USD6.79 billion on a +5.6% rise in arrivals to 5.2 million. However, daily spending fell -2.5%. Maui posted a slight gain in visitor spending of +0.8% to USD4.23 billion on an increase in visitor arrivals of +5.3% to 2.6 million.

The island of Hawaii recorded a -3.6% drop in visitor spending to USD1.9 billion as daily spending slid -3.9%. But, visitor arrivals grew +2.8% to 1.5 million. Kauai posted drops in both spending and arrivals. Spend decreased -5.0% to USD1.59 billion, daily spending fell -3% and visitor arrivals dropped by -1.6% to 1.1 million.

In total visitor arrivals to Hawaii by air grew +5.5% year-on-year for the first 10 months of the year to 8.7 million. Cruise ship arrivals jumped +16.4% year-on-year to 114,974.

Source: Blueswandaily