Domestic visitors who stayed on average a week on the island, and surprising strength in arrivals from east of the Rocky Mountains, pushed Kaua’i to an increase in overall arrivals last month. Total Kaua’i visitors last month were 84,294, an
Domestic visitors who stayed on average a week on the island, and surprising strength in arrivals from east of the Rocky Mountains, pushed Kaua’i to an increase in overall arrivals last month.
Total Kaua’i visitors last month were 84,294, an increase of 1.5 percent compared to March of last year. Only Kaua’i and Maui among the counties experienced increases in arrival numbers last month compared to March 2002 results.
Kaua’i domestic visitors numbered 74,146, or nearly 88 percent of all visitors last month.
While total arrivals for the first quarter of this year are off slightly, 1.1 percent to 233,303 this year compared to last year’s first quarter, the number of domestic arrivals, 196,346, increased by 2.7 percent over the same period last year, according to statistics from the state Department of Business, Economic Development & Tourism (DBEDT).
For the first quarter, nearly 85 percent of all Kaua’i visitors came from the United States.
Hefty increases in numbers of U.S. East visitors who chose to stay only on Kaua’i helped the domestic total. Over 10,000 U.S. East visitors chose Kaua’i as their only island vacation destination last month, up 16.1 percent compared to the same month last year.
For the quarter, 26,940 U.S. East visitors stayed only on Kaua’i, up 13 percent compared to the year-earlier quarter. Numbers of U.S. East visitors were up for the month and quarter in both overall visitors and Kaua’i-only guests, compared to 2002 results.
Though visitor numbers from the U.S. West dropped slightly (0.7 percent) last month compared to the same month last year, numbers of visitors from that region who came to Kaua’i only were up for both the month and first quarter.
Kaua’i-only visitors from the U.S. West region were 21,245 last month, up 4.8 percent from the March 2002 figure of 20,285.
Domestic-visitor numbers for Kaua’i were up for both the month and first quarter this year, compared with similar periods last year, both in total-arrival numbers and Kaua’i-only visitors.
Still, the number of Kaua’i visitors for the first quarter this year was the lowest total since 1996, when the island was still in recovery mode after Hurricane ‘Iniki in September 1992.
Considering the country was at war and world citizens were concerned with SARS (Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome), the Hawai’i March results aren’t too depressing, according to top tourism officials.
International visitors to Kaua’i made up a mixed bag for both last month and the first quarter, with Canadian-visitor numbers up for the month in both total arrivals and Kaua’i-only visits, but off for the first quarter in both categories.
Total international visitors were off for both the month and quarter except in Kaua’i-only visitors, mirroring numbers of Japanese visitors. The number of Japanese visitors who chose to stay only on Kaua’i last month was up, 9.1 percent, to 72 from 66.
The number of nonstop flights from the West Coast into Lihu’e, which is scheduled to increase even more this summer, bodes well for the island during the peak summer season, said Margy Parker, executive director of the Po’ipu Beach Resort Association.
“It’s been proven in the past that the more direct service, the more likely an island is to have that-island-only visitors, and a longer length of stay, and that is shown in the statistics,” she said.
Summer should bring even greater increases in Kaua’i-only visitors and lengths of stay, “which often translates to stronger economic numbers (spending),” Parker said.
There were 541,156 visitors to Hawai’i last month, down 4.7 percent from the March 2002 figure. For the first quarter, Hawai’i welcomed 1,559,557 visitors, up 1.7 percent compared to the same quarter last year.
“The domestic sector was less impacted by Operation Iraqi Freedom, which began on March 19th,” said Theodore E. Liu, DBEDT director.
“U.S. East arrivals actually rose during the month, while total domestic visitor counts were off by only 1.3 percent. However, Japanese arrivals fell 16 percent due to the war with Iraq, weak economy, and travel scare caused by the SARS illness,” he said.
“Fortunately, the average length of stay increased to offset the decline in arrivals. If past trends are an indication, we would expect that international visitor arrivals will continue to be slow over the next few months, but we believe that the visitor arrivals from the U.S. Mainland will remain steady,” Liu said.
Business Editor Paul C. Curtis can be reached at mailto:pcurtis@pulitzer.net or 245-3681 (ext. 224).
