HONOLULU — Visitors to the Hawaiian Islands spent a total of $1.66 billion in July, an increase of 4.8 percent compared to a year ago, according to preliminary statistics released Thursday by the Hawaii Tourism Authority.
“Hawaii’s tourism industry statewide realized another robust month in July, highlighted by establishing new record high monthly totals of 939,360 visitor arrivals and 1.2 million air seats serving the state on trans-Pacific flights,” said George D. Szigeti, HTA president and CEO.
Year-to-date, Hawaii has reached nearly $11 billion in visitor spending and attracted almost six million visitors through seven months, both of which are well ahead of last year’s record-setting pace, he said.
Visitors to Kauai spent $194.6 million in July, a 17.6 percent increase from July 2017. Through the first seven months of the year, Kauai’s visitors have spent $1.2 billion, a 10.5 percent increase from the same time frame in 2017.
Kauai had 137,641 visitors in July, a 7.3 percent increase over July 2017. For the year, through July, Kauai has welcomed 836,016 visitors, a 10.8 percent increase over the same time period in 2017.
Visitors stayed an average 7.3 days in July, spending an average $192 a day.
Government continues to benefit as well from tourism’s success, as $1.28 billion in state tax revenue has been generated, which is nearly 10 percent and $114 million more than last year at this time.
Among Hawaii’s four largest visitor markets, the U.S. West (plus 6.2 percent to $636.2 million), Japan (plus 7.2 percent to $206.4 million) and Canada (plus 18.8 percent to $55.3 million) reported gains in visitor spending, while growth from the U.S. East was flat (plus 0.4 percent to $454.3 million) compared to a year ago.
HTA also participated in a conference call with the Hawaii Emergency Management Agency to get an update on the aftermath of the storm system that brought unusually heavy rainfall to the state over the past week.
Hurricane Lane was approaching Hawaii last week until strong wind shear and tradewinds steadily weakened it from a Category 5 hurricane to a tropical storm over a three-day period before finally pushing it away from the islands last Friday.
Post-Tropical Cyclone Lane is continuing to move westward and away from the Hawaiian Islands and is no longer a threat to residents and visitors.
The remnants of the storm, however, brought excessive rainfall and flash flooding around the state, most notably on the islands of Hawaii and Kauai.
Assessments are ongoing on each island to determine any recovery efforts that are still needed to address the impacts of this rare weather system.
“But, to be clear, the state of Hawaii is fully open for business and travelers should not be dissuaded at all from making or planning trips to our beautiful island home,” HTA said.
