What’s your reaction to thie controversy started about where the best Hawaii visitors come from?
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220 thoughts on “How Hawaii Marketing Just Dissed Almost All Visitors”
What’s your reaction to thie controversy started about where the best Hawaii visitors come from?
Aloha BOH Bro’s
Couldn’t start the week with an amazing historic story about Poi or who has the best donuts, I mean malasada, on Hawaii.
No went right for the red meat insulting 93.3 percent of the country.
Way to wakeup BOH’s fan base.
Hi Richard.
Good morning. We spent the past couple of days thinking about this, so least we didn’t upend your hopefully good weekend.
Aloha.
Reference: How Hawaii Marketing Just Dissed Almost All Visitors
The HVCB position makes complete sense to me. They are wanting financially well to do to visit. You are more likely to get that by targeting the SF Bay Area. Less visitors, spending more money and not offending the locals as much. It maximizes all of the metrics HVCB is probably looking to optimize for.
Well….looks like the people in charge of Hawaii’s marketing campaign haven’t been paying attention to the consequences of a bad marketing campaign and the lasting effect it can have on a company, or in this case a state. Does the name Bud Light ring a bell?
I am embarrassed for the islands, as a multiple property owner in Maui and visitor several times a year, watching the state try and make up for lost revenue from Covid is sad. They cannot do business as usual and their arrogance of trying to draw only bay area residents tourists is laughable and actually a form of bigotry and will only hurt the locals and business owners and is very short-sighted. We have henceforth sold all properties on Maui and will miss our trips over to scuba dive and eat at previously fun places and spend too much money and sad to see what is taking place over there. It’s heartbreaking. I think they hired the same city council from Seattle and Portland.
👍
Slap in the face to people in other states. We’ve been traveling from the Midwest yearly to HI for almost 40 years. We stay for 5 wks. In my experience, the wealthy visitors are used to being treated royally & are often rude &, demanding. Is that what HI really wants?
Shari:
Right those fees you talk about. help fund the Hawaii Tourist Authority … so that would be throwing good money after bad.
Pat G: To you point and comment … and they are waisting millions of dollars in the process. Marketing Hawaii is a waste of dollars, they don’t want people to come and the people who want to come know where to find them anyway.
Right, I actually heard them say as much. They said “We don’t have to market Hawaii, everyone already knows about it”.
The HVCB has morphed into an organization that is trying to bring back the Hawaii of old. That doesn’t include tourism.
I am incredibly disappointed to read this article. As a frequent visitor to Hawaii 1-2x a year, I wonder what they wish to accomplish with this message. I am from Washington state. I especially love Hawaii for its culture , history and people. So disappointed with whoever is making these marketing decisions!
Are the people who tun HTA & HVBC originally from California? Here in much of the northwest, Californian’s are often perceived as being well off (fitting with Hawaii’s recent apparent interest in only wealthy, free spending tourists). However they are sometimes felt to not to be very sensitive to locals and their ways, seeming to want to make everybody and everything here like it is in California. They may have succeeded in Seattle and Portland.
Have members of HVCB been to San Francisco recently? A once beautiful city is degenerating into something you’d find in a 3rd world country. It certainly doesn’t reflect a belief in “culture”, and “environment”. It’s sad. Thanks for keeping us up to date.
Hi Lee.
Thanks for all our input. We do acknowledge that this was done for a San Francisco publication, which as another comment pointed out, could have had a lot to do with the direction it took. That did not, in our minds, change how inappropriate it seemed, however.
Aloha.
Be nice to write an apology and welcome folks with the Aloha spirit.
Aloha….Been returning to Hawaii multiple times each year since I was stationed at Schofield Barracks in the mid-70’s. It’s how I came across my affliction for the islands. In spite of the high price, ever expanding fees to get into parks that used to be free and less than grateful residents who make us feel unwelcome at times, we persevere in our love of Hawaii…..Maui in particular. Mahalo. And BTW, I’m not from SF.
Hi Tom.
Thanks for that and your other comments. A returning visitor for 50 years, not from San Francisco. Wow!
Aloha.
“Affliction for the islands”. That’s a good way to put it.😂
BOH I’m sure they are getting from that info we fill out on the plan each time before we land.
We are done! My wife and I were annual visitors but have since switched gears on Hawaii. Watch what you wish for. We will spend our travel dollars where we are wanted! With out tourism, Hawaii will starve. Good luck!
When the govt of Hawaii doesn’t want SoCal visitors it’s time to look elsewhere. My first short visit to Hawaii was in 1965 courtesy of the USMC. Since the mid-1970s we’ve come at least 30 times.
We are in our late 70’s so what we do doesn’t matter much – our years are numbered. I’d like to convince my wife that it is time to visit places where the people and officials are more than happy to see us. But, I doubt that will happen – she loves the weather and the Hawaiian music (we do miss Bill who was a parking attendant at the Outrigger Reef – he hasn’t been there for years.
I’d like to visit a few different places before the final bell rings.
Hi Rod.
Based on your reports of so many times here and almost 500 comments on Beat of Hawaii, you’re about as regular a return visitor as there is. Mahalo.
Aloha.
Thank you Jeff and Rob!
Aloha
Aloha editors, I want to report that while I was around and about, from Hanalei to the Kalalau lookout near the Waimea Canyon, that 1. There were the usual summer crowds, finally, but 2. I must have heard 5 or 6 different languages as I got out of my van at various locations. The Europeans are here! It was really a joy to hear.
Hi Kauaidoug.
Thanks for the update. We have noticed that at the island’s largest farmers market too.
Aloha.
They better be careful! San Fran and the Bay Areas may just start sending their homeless and mentally disabled.
No worries….Mayor London Breed can’t afford the time away from her SF duties.
No worries….Mayor London Breed can’t afford the time away from her SF office.
My only reaction is: You have Got to be kidding me… As a Oahu native who tries to make it home to visit ohana at least twice a year for 2-3 weeks at a time, I’m really starting to question the fiscal (in)? sanity of continuing to do so. the sticker shock I get every 6 months or so is getting to be the definition of mental defect (continuing to repeat an action expecting to get a different result). This latest comment from the HVCB management just reinforces my belief that the agency (and state government in general) is starting to resemble a bad episode of “Monty Python”. Longtime lurker but just Had to post on this.
Thanks for keeping us informed guys!
Hi Jay.
Thanks for being a “longtime lurker” and your first comment. Hope to see you again.
Aloha.
Funny I wanted to move back to the bay area but I coudn’t afford it,
so I bought in Kailua-Kona. I read the review and didn’t find it insulting at all.
Hawaii should really encourage longer stays, people who will spend a few days in a handful of place, not people who just weekend and don’t really have to relax. The tourist authority should consider the high environmental impact of short stays, but encourage longer stays, which becomes a big ask as prices in Hawaii make it too expensive.
If this tension isn’t resolved, all the property will be owned by rich
people who don’t visit often. its sad to see so much economic angst in Hawaii. We already have a spiral where working families leave making services that much more expensive..
“ If this tension isn’t resolved, all the property will be owned by rich
people who don’t visit often.”
And your point is….?
Just kidding, but this is exactly the goal. “Quality, not quantity”.
Well we at least know where some of those “bazillions” of dollars are going…
“HVCB received $38 million for US marketing, while the Council for Native Hawaiian Advancement got $27 million”
$65 million for what? To tell the Mainland that Hawaii is a nice place to visit? Me thinks it’s ending up in someones pockets.
65 million is a drop in the bucket. In Maui alone, this year’s budget is more than 1 Billion, and last year’s budget was also more than 1 billion. This is for 165K people.
And….they are not telling the Mainland that Hawaii is a nice place to visit. On the contrary. They are doing everything to alienate most visitors and dissuade them from coming, as evidenced by this article.
I just returned from Hawaii and do not agree with this article. I have been traveling to Hawaii for 50 years and I am from Southern California. Regardless of the airport the flights are always full.
This trip I did experience some some sad things. At the beach some locals were beating up a tourist and the lifeguards had to come to his rescue. A local girl got angry with my young grandson and grabbed the bracelet off his wrist and threw it in the water, one he had worn for several years but not found. Other then that everyone was friendly.
Your post reminds me of an old joke:
“Other than that” Mrs. Lincoln, how did you enjoy the play?
That’s plain crazy. Many people come from all over the mainland. SF people are not the only great people coming to Hawaii. Infact SF people think they’re better than most.
And No $50 fee. What if Hawaii residents had to pay a fee to leave the Island? Unconstitutional.