Convention
attendance down

War, economic fears are
blamed for low attendance

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By Tim Ruel
truel@starbulletin.com

Attendance at events in the $350 million Hawaii Convention Center is 20 percent to 30 percent below estimates last year by the Hawaii Visitors & Convention Bureau, according to new data.

A visitors bureau official said the drop in attendance is in line with weakness in visitor business caused by the war in Iraq and economic weakness in the United States and Japan. The bureau predicted as accurately as it could, knowing that hotels needed estimates of crowds to set aside the right number of rooms for guests, said Mike Murray, director of sales for meetings, conventions and incentives for the bureau.

"Things change, as you know," he said. "There's apprehension about travel, right?"

One event at the convention center, originating in Japan and scheduled for this month, was canceled because of the war. The cancellation cost the convention center approximately 1,000 visitors.

But the loss of convention attendees at other events raises the question of whether the bureau was overly optimistic in predicting attendance. Officials knew the war was brewing and the U.S. and Japanese economies have been on the slide for some time.

Last year, the American Society of Travel Agents predicted attendance of 6,000 at its World Travel Congress at the Hawaii Convention Center, but the November event drew about half that number. The congress had about the same attendance it had drawn the year earlier in New York.

The official who estimated this year's attendance figures left the bureau after it lost the state contract to market the convention center last year. The convention center is now marketed to conventioneers by SMG of Philadelphia, which won a $14 million contract because of a change in state law that forced out the visitors bureau.

This year, two February conventions of Japanese clothing companies had attendance that was 22 percent less than the bureau predicted, according to figures provided by SMG.

An annual meeting of neurologists, which finished Saturday at the convention center, had about 7,000 people attending, down 31 percent from the 10,100 forecast by the visitors bureau.

A May convention of orthodontists is expected to draw 15,000 people, down by nearly one-third from the predicted attendance of 22,000.

Randy Tanaka, director of marketing for the convention center, said he expects that the rest of this year's conventions will follow the pattern of being below bureau estimates by about 20 percent.

If that is the case, convention center attendance at visitor-driven events will be down from expectations by about 26,000 people, for the year.

"In the way to best manage our business, we're going to evaluate what seems to be an inconsistent drop-off" in attendance, said Tanaka. He added that he did not know whether the bureau's estimates were simply too high.

The bureau's attendance data was put together by Sandra Moreno, the bureau's former vice president of meetings, conventions, and incentives, Murray said. Moreno, who joined the bureau in 1997 after 14 years at the San Diego Convention and Visitors Bureau, could not be reached for comment.

Murray said it was likely that the bureau relied upon the expectations of the people directly responsible for planning the various meetings. The bureau also could tap a major database of information on meetings that have been held, which is maintained by the International Association of Convention & Visitor Bureaus.

That's the same information SMG is using, Tanaka said. "It's fairly solid," he said.

Visitor arrivals overall this year have been hit by war and economic jitters. In February, Hawaii visitor arrivals from the U.S. West dropped to their lowest level since 1999, while arrivals from the U.S. East fell to their lowest since 1998. And that was before the war started.

Japanese arrivals have been on the decline since the mid- to late 1990s, and fell 40 percent after the start of the Iraq war, by some estimates. There's also the impact of severe acute respiratory syndrome, or SARS, which has caused at least 46 deaths in China.

The Hawaii visitors bureau, which has a $2 million state contract to seek conventions and meetings held away from the convention center, has noticed that people are putting off decisions about holding events. Bookings were down 39 percent in January and February from last year, even while business inquiries are on the rise, Murray said. The bureau is getting lots of calls from U.S. companies that would rather hold a convention in Hawaii than Europe, Asia or South America, but the business isn't being sealed.

Hawaii is also battling a perception that it is a pricey locale for conventions, which would weigh down attendance.

"There is a perception that Hawaii's too expensive," said Frank Haas, tourism marketing director for the state Hawaii Tourism Authority.

SMG is aiming to counteract that perception by going after conventions of higher-income people who know they are getting their money's worth by coming to the islands. The recent convention of neurologists, booked by the Hawaii visitors bureau, is a perfect example, Tanaka said.

"You're sure as hell not going to go after the Arkansas automobile dealers association, because, God bless Arkansas, it's not going to happen," Tanaka said.