Occupancy at Maui County hotels dropped to 52.2% in August, which saw tourism plummet in the wake of deadly wildfires that destroyed Lahaina town, according to the Hawai‘i Hotel Performance Report published Tuesday by the Hawaii Tourism Authority.
Though August was the sixth month in a row that Maui’s occupancy had declined, the 16.4-percentage-point drop was the largest year-over-year monthly drop by far. Maui County
hotels also experienced a decline in average daily rate in August, which fell 8.6% to $564.
The decrease in occupancy and ADR resulted in a massive 30.4% decline in revenue per available room. The RevPAR drop was a threefold increase over July when Maui’s RevPAR fell 10.3% year over year. It indicates that Maui hotels have reduced ability to fill rooms at an average rate.
The Aug. 8 wildfires on Maui negatively affected
August hotel performance across all regions in Maui County, especially in the
Lahaina/Kaanapali/Kapalua region. Occupancy there fell to 45.4%, a 26.4-percentage-point drop from August 2022. ADR declined 4.2% to $515, and RevPAR dropped 39.4% to $234.
Occupancy for Maui’s luxury resort region of Wailea dropped 3.2 percentage points to 56.5%, while ADR fell 20.3% to $817 and RevPAR declined 24.5% to $461.
Keith Vieira, principal of KV &Associates, Hospitality Consulting, said Maui hotels have been hard-hit since government officials initially closed Maui to tourism immediately after the wildfires, and then invited visitors to come back but to avoid nonessential travel to West Maui.
Vieira said reservation activity is still slow even after Gov. Josh Green’s recent announcement that West Maui will reopen for tourism Oct. 8.
“We thought it would start booking better for the first quarter, but it’s slower than we thought,” he said. “Normally at this time you’d have about 45% on the books for first quarter; we only have 15%.”
Pleasant Holidays President and CEO Jack Richards said his company is getting ready to launch a marketing campaign to support the Oct. 8 reopening.
“Since the Oct. 8 reopening date was announced, we’ve seen bookings tick up for the first time since Aug. 8,” Richards said. “We are ready to support Maui’s recovery, but I hope government officials and hotels will hold to the date.”
Richards said not all West Maui hotels are reopening to visitors Oct. 8, and some are frequently changing reopening dates due to inventory issues. Such uncertainty could cause visitors who are considering November trips to switch to another Hawaiian Island or to Mexico or the Caribbean, he said.
Richards said it’s also
going to be important to make visitors feel welcome and to reopen enough West Maui businesses, especially luau, so that visitors have enough to do.
“Most people on vacation want to be out celebrating openly and without criticism,” he said.
Hotel performance on Maui dragged down statewide hotel performance in August, according to the
hotel performance report, which was compiled using data from STR. Statewide
occupancy dropped 2.8
percentage points to 74.2%, while RevPAR fell 7.7% to $275 and ADR fell 4.1% to $370.
Oahu hotels in August saw occupancy increase
2.8 percentage points to 84.4%, ADR grow 2.3% to $292 and RevPAR increase 5.8% to $246.
Kauai hotels in August also saw gains. Occupancy at Kauai hotels in August rose 2.1 percentage points to 80.4%, ADR increased 6.4% to $444 and RevPAR grew 9.2% t0 $357.
Hotels on Hawaii island, where there also was some August wildfire activity, saw occupancy fall 3.6 percentage points to 69.3%, ADR increase 2.8% to $436 and RevPAR drop 2.2% to $302.
