US (HAWAII). The Japanese visitor market, so important to Hawaii’s travel retail industry, has continued its strong comeback from the negative impact of this year’s earthquake and tsunami.
October figures released by the Hawaii Tourism Authority (see tables below) show that higher average daily spending by Japanese visitors (US$317 per person, up from US$291 per person in October 2010) and a small growth in arrivals (+0.6%) contributed to a +13.4% increase in total Japanese visitor expenditures to US$189.2 million. This was the fifth consecutive month of positive growth in total Japanese visitor spending, even though overall arrival numbers have been soft.
Despite a -6.3% drop in total Japanese arrivals for the first 10 months of 2011, daily spending increased to US$286 per person from US$257 in the same period last year. Total expenditures by Japanese visitors was US$1.7 billion, up +7% year-on-year.
As has been the case throughout 2010, the category of “˜other visitors’ (led by Chinese and Koreans) showed strong growth, rising +13.8% to 78,789 for October and +16.8% for the first ten months.
Underlining the impact of high-spending North Asian visitors, the per person per day spend of US$263.20 among other visitors (which includes shopping) was the second highest of any group (behind the Japanese at US$316.50).
Another interesting indicator saw the +2.1% growth in total visitors to O”˜ahu in October boosted sharply by increased arrivals from other visitor markets (+16.1%), including Korea and China.
The numbers underline the rising diversification of Hawaii’s Asian tourism base, good news for the tourism and travel retail sectors.
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