Go figure the visitor market
Maui News
Maui as a destination is hardly a secret. We’ve been named “Best Island in the World” by readers of Conde Nast Traveler magazine for the 11th year in a row.
Curiously, the world has not beaten a path to our door as a result. The number of tourists visiting Maui is just about the same as it was 15 years ago.
One idea that has been around for nearly as long is how to define the “carrying capacity” of the island. The Hawaii Tourism Authority is now putting some research money into this question.
Yet, it seems the market – or something – has already decided on the answer. Maui County gets somewhere around 2.4 million visitors a year, an average of, very roughly, one for every three residents on any particular day.
Nothing seems able to nudge this number very far either up or down.
When Hurricane Iniki wiped out tourism on Kauai, driving something like 30,000 visitors a month somewhere else, Maui’s tourism count did not go up by 30,000 or anything like it.
Yet, the bereft Kauai visitors could have afforded us, and we were easier to reach by plane. So why didn’t they come?
The opposite side of the same coin is the effect – or virtual non-effect – of the terrorist attacks on America in 2001. Tourism numbers dropped everywhere, and even here for a few months. They still are down in many important destinations, but there’s no evidence in the Hawaii Visitors and Convention Bureau numbers that it had any real effect on our traffic.
Tourists obviously didn’t avoid Maui – occupancy rates prove that – but speculation that they would flock here because Maui would be perceived as safe (or “safer”) didn’t pan out, either. The safety issue, in fact, seems to be a notion that doesn’t influence travelers one way or the other; at least, not for long.
The only island that really competes with Maui for travelers’ esteem in the upscale travel magazine polls is Bali. After terrorists bombed Bali in 2002, tourists did flee the island – for a while. But in the other magazine poll, conducted by Travel??, Bali has finished at the top of the best island category for the past three years.
In tourist destinations that are not blessed with the equable climate that we have, there’s a saying about visitors: Summer people, and summer not.
Whichever, they’re hard to figure.
Go figure the visitor market
Maui as a destination is hardly a secret. We’ve been named “Best Island in the World” by readers of Conde Nast Traveler magazine for the 11th year in a row.
Curiously, the world has not beaten a path to our door as a result. The number of tourists visiting Maui is just about the same as it was 15 years ago.
One idea that has been around for nearly as long is how to define the “carrying capacity” of the island. The Hawaii Tourism Authority is now putting some research money into this question.
Yet, it seems the market – or something – has already decided on the answer. Maui County gets somewhere around 2.4 million visitors a year, an average of, very roughly, one for every three residents on any particular day.
Nothing seems able to nudge this number very far either up or down.
When Hurricane Iniki wiped out tourism on Kauai, driving something like 30,000 visitors a month somewhere else, Maui’s tourism count did not go up by 30,000 or anything like it.
Yet, the bereft Kauai visitors could have afforded us, and we were easier to reach by plane. So why didn’t they come?
The opposite side of the same coin is the effect – or virtual non-effect – of the terrorist attacks on America in 2001. Tourism numbers dropped everywhere, and even here for a few months. They still are down in many important destinations, but there’s no evidence in the Hawaii Visitors and Convention Bureau numbers that it had any real effect on our traffic.
Tourists obviously didn’t avoid Maui – occupancy rates prove that – but speculation that they would flock here because Maui would be perceived as safe (or “safer”) didn’t pan out, either. The safety issue, in fact, seems to be a notion that doesn’t influence travelers one way or the other; at least, not for long.
The only island that really competes with Maui for travelers’ esteem in the upscale travel magazine polls is Bali. After terrorists bombed Bali in 2002, tourists did flee the island – for a while. But in the other magazine poll, conducted by Travel??, Bali has finished at the top of the best island category for the past three years.
In tourist destinations that are not blessed with the equable climate that we have, there’s a saying about visitors: Summer people, and summer not.
Whichever, they’re hard to figure.
posted by DP at 5:24 PM
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