About 4,500 attendees turned out for the sold-out Hawai‘i Hotel &Restaurant Show on Wednesday and Thursday — a positive sign that large gatherings, an important part of the state’s tourism recovery, are coming back.

Exhibitors from Hawaii, the mainland and Japan filled about 200 booths for the trade show, which was so successful that Maui is now making plans to host a similar event, said Mufi Hannemann, Hawaii Lodging &Tourism Association president and CEO.

The trade show, which was among the first major Honolulu public events since the lifting of mask requirements and other COVID-19 mandates, was made possible through partnerships between HLTA, the Hawaii Restaurant Association and Star Events, a division of Oahu Publications Inc., which publishes the Honolulu Star-Advertiser.

Hannemann said the show demonstrated that large gatherings can return, enhanced Hawaii’s reputation as a hospitality mecca and signaled that the visitor industry is coming back.

“I’ve always said two thing have to happen on the road to full recovery, and that is international travel and having large structured gatherings again,” Hannemann said.

Both of these groups are important to Hawaii’s overall tourism performance because they typically generate higher visitor spending than leisure travel. Business travelers also bolster the industry by creating a base for future business that helps spread recovery further out and builds demand to fetch higher prices. Their absence has been felt.

Overall, February visitor arrivals to Hawaii were still about 24% lower than in the same month in pre-pandemic times, according to preliminary statistics released Thursday by the state Department of Business, Economic Development and Tourism.

Domestic visitor arrivals continued to outpace February 2020, days before Hawaii detected its first case of COVID-19 in early March of that year. However, a lack of international visitor arrivals and group business continued to keep the market from rising to pre-pandemic levels.

Some 23,033 visitors in February came for meetings, incentives and conventions, an 824% increase over 2021. But it was still less than half of the 57,227 visitors from that category who came to Hawaii in February 2020.

February visitor spending, which reached $1.31 billion, was nearly 230% above the $397.1 million attained in February 2021, but it was still 10.4% below the $1.46 billion generated in February 2020.

In February, 630,647 visitors arrived by air to the islands. February arrivals were up significantly from the 235,283 visitors who came to Hawaii in February 2021. However, the results were down from the 823,910 who traveled to Hawaii in February 2020.

“We expect Hawaii to continue with this forward momentum, especially into Spring then into Summer, because of the arrival of Japanese visitors and other international markets,” said DBEDT Director Mike Mc­Cartney in a statement.

With the ending of the state’s Safe Travels program on March 25, McCartney said Hawaii now needs to prepare for hosting a different mix of visitors.

“There will be demand by local businesses, from restaurants, transportation, retail, activities and lodging, to attract and retain a quality workforce for Hawaii which will bring more certainty to the economy,” he said. “There is now an opportunity for Hawaii’s small businesses to attract and retain quality workers and employees.”

There was a sense of excitement among attendees and exhibitors on the closing day of the Hawai‘i Hotel &Restaurant Show. Most had high hopes for the future of Hawaii tourism and their businesses, which have more opportunities to grow as COVID-19-related restrictions disappear across the state.

Robert Brantley, Hawaii Robotics sales manager, said the trade show provided the company with its first opportunity to spotlight its robotic solutions in Hawaii, a market it has wanted to break into for about a year.

“We are rolling out this week in Hawaii,” Brantley said Thursday. “We’re piloting some of our robots like the ACE, which stands for automatic cooking equipment, and ADAM, a dual-arm robotic system that often serves as a bartender.”

Brantley said the service and restaurant robots are custom-designed for clients’ needs and space and are meant to enhance employee performance and satisfaction rather than to replace workers.

“If your worker did eight tables before, maybe they could serve 15 now. It’s more efficient, and the worker is happier because their pay goes up,” he said.

Richard Xie, CEO of Hawaii Robotics, said the technology business has boomed as the pandemic and the “Great Resignation” of employees leaving their jobs have altered the labor market.

“The pandemic created the whole U.S. robotic market,” Xie said. “Before April 2020 there were zero restaurant robots sold in the U.S. But between April 2020 and December of 2021, there were 8,000 restaurant robots sold. In 2021, 39,091 service robots were sold in the U.S.”

Xie said he got into robotics as an outgrowth of his beef-export business, which suffered after 2018 when the government began to restrict visas for foreign workers.

“The new generation, nobody wants to be a cowboy,” Xie said. “My cattle partners told me to find an ‘iron cowboy’ from the Far East — that was the whole idea. Now I want to bring this technology to Hawaii.”

Trevor Hitch, founder and CEO of VEDGEco, also hoped to expand business by leveraging the show and Hawaii’s improving tourism picture.

“The last 24 months have been really challenging for everyone,” Hitch said. “We’re so excited that the Hawai‘i Hotel &Restaurant Show is giving us an opportunity to reconnect.”

Hitch, whose business aims to help restaurants go vegan, said there was strong crowd response at the show to plant-based food samples from Omni, Alpha Food, Good Catch and VFC.

People were lined up to try items like plant-based “Spam” musubi, “crab” cakes and spicy “chicken” fingers.

“The show is changing hearts and minds,” Hitch said. “Plant-based innovation is constantly improving. I’ve been a vegan for 20 years, and the food has never tasted as good as this. As tourism demand builds, so will demand for more vegan options. It’s a growing market.”