Visitor Counts

November 2023

November visitation increased year-over-year by 14.7% or 10,260 visitors totaling 80,067 arrivals.  November 2023 total arrivals set a record for the month beating 2017’s high of 76,132.

Previous tracking (below) for the month of November offers a comparison with and without COVID-19 impacts (2020-2022).

November’s total in-bound passenger count was above the three, five and ten-year averages for the month by 14.2%, 26.2% and 19.2% respectively. 

Arrivals by Sea

Passengers arriving by sea, totaled 77,709, up for the month by 15.6% from last year. 

Cross Channel Passenger counts were up slightly year-over-year @ 0.7%; an increase of 286 people

• 2014 had the highest volume for the month @ 50,949 passengers
• 2009 had the lowest volume for the month @ 24,262 passengers
• November Cross Channel Passenger counts were below the three, five and ten-year averages by 6.6%, 1.8% and 5.4% respectively
• Cross Channel Passengers made up 49.57% of total monthly arrivals

Cruise passenger counts totaled 35,263, up by 37.3% from 2022 or by 9,587 visitors

• 2023 had the highest Cruise Passenger volume for the month @ 35,263  
• 2020 had the lowest Cruise Passenger volume for the month @ 0
• November Cruise Passenger counts were above the three, five and ten-year averages by 56.8%, 98.3% and 77.8% respectively.  Note multi-year averages are greatly impacted by the lack of cruise ships calling during COVID-19’s suspension of operations
• Cruise Passengers made up 44.04% of total monthly arrivals
• The number of Cruise Ships calling on Avalon in November was 14
   
• In 2022, the number of cruise ships slated to visit was 14, however 6 ships cancelled due to weather, resulting in only 8 ships visiting and fewer passengers accordingly
• 2023 had the highest number of ships calling @ 14
• 2020 had 0 ships calling
• November typically has 10 ships call on us

Private Boater Passenger counts totaled 2,760, up from last year by 29.7% or 632 visitors

• 2019 had the highest passenger volume for the month @ 3,669
• 2012 had the lowest passenger volume month @ 2,448
• November Private Boater Passenger counts were above the three-year average by 2.9% but below the five and ten-year averages by 3.5% and 5.7% respectively
• Private Boaters Made up 3.45% of total monthly arrivals
   
• November’s number of Vessels Anchored was up by 98.7% from last year or by 78 boats
• 2018 had the highest number of Vessels Anchored @ 171
• 2011 had the lowest number of Vessels Anchored @ 4
• November was above the three, five and ten-year averages by 40.6%, 60.9% and 75.2% respectively
   
• November’s number of Vessels on Moorings was up 29.7% from last year or by 158 boats
• 2019 had the highest number of Vessels on Moorings @ 856
• 2015 had the lowest number of Vessels on Moorings @ 578
• November was above the three-year average by 2.9% but below the five and ten-year averages by 1.8% and 3.2% respectively

 Arrivals by Air

Combined in-bound air passenger counts for November totaled 2,398, down 8.9% or 234 Arrivals from 2022.

Private Aircraft Passengers (Airport in the Sky) totaled 1,647, down 6.9% or by 123 passengers vs last year

• 2015 had the highest volume for the month @ 1,773
• 2007 the lowest volume for the month @ 1,079
• November’s Private Aircraft Passenger count was below the three-year average by 1.4% but above the five and ten-year averages by 0.7%, and 6.0% respectively
• Private Aircraft Passengers made up 2.06% of total monthly arrivals

Helicopter Passenger counts totaled 711, down year-over-year by 14.6% or 122 arrivals

• 2015 had the highest volume for the month @ 1,335
• 2018 the lowest volume for the month @ 623
• November Helicopter Passenger counts were below the three, five and ten-year averages by 8.2%, 4.3% and 23.8% respectively
• Helicopter Passengers made up .89% of total monthly arrivals

Lodging

Hotel and Short-Term Rental Occupancy from Smith Travel and AIRDNA

• Hotel Occupancy for November was down by 2.4% @ 60.2% vs. 61.7% in 2022
• Hotel Occupancy was below three, five and ten-year averages by 2.8%, 1.2% and 5.6% respectively
• Visit California has not yet published statewide Hotel Occupancy for the month
• Short-Term Rental Occupancy for November was down 5.1% @ 37% vs 39% in 2022
• Short-term rental occupancy was below the three and five-year averages by 11.9% and 4.4% respectively, but above the ten-year average by 0.8%
• Among our competitive set, Hotels ranked 6th and Short-Term Rental rated 10th in Occupancy (high to low)

Competing Destination Occupancies

• November Hotel Occupancy was higher than Catalina’s in Monterey, Newport Beach, Palm Springs and Santa Barbara.  San Francisco was equal to Catalina with all other destinations being lower
• November Short-Term Rental Occupancy was higher than Catalina’s in all competing markets

Hotel and Short-Term Rental Average Daily Rate from Smith Travel and AIRDNA

• November Hotel Average Daily Rate was up 3.7% @ $202.49 vs. $195.27 in 2022
• November Short-Term Rental Average Daily Rate was up by 13.4% @ $550.00 vs. $485.00 in 2022
• Among our competitive set, Catalina ranked 9th in Average Daily Rate for Hotels and 2nd for STRs (high to low)

Hotel and Short-Term Rental Revenue Per Available Room from Smith Travel and AIRDNA

• November Hotel Revenue Per Available Room was up 1.2% @ $121.94 vs. $120.52 in 2022
• November Short-Term Rental Revenue Per Available Room was $205.00, up 3.5% from $198.00 in 2022
• Among our competitive set, Catalina ranked 9th for hotels and 5th for STRs in Revenue Per Available Room (high to low)

Visitors Services

Catalina Island Visitor Center

• Walk-ins for the month were down year-over-year by 10.3% @ 2,024 vs. 2,257 in 2022
• 2007 has the highest volume for the month @ 1,108
• 2020 had the lowest volume for the month @ 261
• November walk-in counts were below the three-year average by 5.1% and above the five-year average by 12.6%

• The number of Phone Calls for the month was down by 13.8% year-over-year @ 287 vs 333
• 2007 had the highest volume of calls for the month @ 1,108
• 2020 had the lowest volume of calls for the month @ 261
• November calls were below the three, five and ten-year averages by 29.2%, 40.3% and 55.7% respectively
• Increased use of online and mobile self-help tools for reservations and research are being seen as the main reason for declining calls.  Inquiries on social media and via email are often taking the place of calls as well.

LoveCatalina.com

• November LoveCatalina.com total website traffic was up year-over-year by 35.1% @ 77,000 vs 57,000 in 2022
• November total website users were above the three and five-year averages by 17.9% and 20.2% respectively
• Book Direct referrals were up year-over-year by 25.6% @ 5,701 vs. 4,538 in 2022 
• Book Direct lodging searches were up 49.5% @ 10,021 vs. 6,702 in 2022

Note changes to Book Direct in 2021 resulted in shifting traffic between referrals and searches

Visitor Guides & Newsletters

Note measures now include source tracking for months and years in which distributions were made by subset

• Certified racks were filled from prior months’ deliveries
• Go California Print Guide orders totaled 90, down from 106 in 2022
• Online Guide downloads were up @ 199 vs. 108 in 2022
• Printed Visitor Guide orders on LoveCatalina.com @ 395, were up from 254 last year
• 780 Visitor Guides were delivered to the Visitor Center

• New E-newsletter subscribers in November were up year-over-year @ 147 vs 80 in 2022
• New subscribers for the month were above the three and five-year averages

Social Media

Cumulative totals by platform as of November below

• Facebook followers are up year-over-year by 5.4%
• Instagram followers are up year-over-year by 26.3%
• LinkedIn followers are up year-over-year by 28.3%
• TikTok is up year-over-year by 16.2%. 
• X followers are up year-over-year by 1.0%

Year-to-date—Historical Arrivals

COVID-19 and pre-Covid-19 comparrison data is illustrated in the snapshot above (January – November)

Below is a graph of year-to-date and mutli-year comparissons of all arrivals by sector

• 2023 total year-to-date visitation is 1,026,472
• 2022 had the highest total visitation year-to-date @ 1,031,457, a difference of 4,985 visitors vs 2023
• 2020 had the lowest year-to-date total visitation @ 490,851

To view historical data for total arrivals by sector, year and month in a spreadsheet form click here.

Year-to-date Lodging

Hotel and Short-Term Rental Occupancy from Smith Travel and AirDNA

• Hotel Occupancy January through November 2023 was down 4.6% @ 67.2 vs.70.5% tracked for the same time period in 2022
• Short-Term Rental Occupancy was 56.8%, down 5.3% from 60.0% in 2022
• According to Smith Travel, Catalina’s average YTD Hotel Occupancy of 67.2% was below the YTD occupancy for all of our competing destinations except for Palm Springs and San Francisco
• According to AirDNA, Catalina’s average Short-Term Rental YTD Occupancy of 53% was below all destinations in our competitive set except for Palm Springs

Year-to-date Visitor Services

Catalina Island Visitor Center

• The number of Phone Calls year-to-date are down by 18.9% @ 5,896 vs. 7,267 in 2022
• Year-to-date Phone Calls were below the three, five and ten-year averages by 14.0%, 20.8% and 41.4% respectively
• Number of Walk-Ins year-to-date are up @ 26,561 vs. 24,590 or 8.0%   
• Year-to-date Walk-In counts were above the three and five-year averages by 7.4% and 22.1% respectively

Year-to-date LoveCatalina.com

• Book Direct Package referrals are again active on our site tracking 275 year-to-date
• Book Direct referrals are down by 28.1% @ 105,829 vs. 147,231 in 2022 
• Book Direct lodging searches are down by 15.6% @ 141,725 vs. 167,971 in 2022 
• LoveCatalina.com website users are down year-to-date by 12.7% @ 944,000 vs.1,081,799 in 2022

Note changes to Book Direct on member links has resulted in shifting some traffic to referrals vs. searches and Google website traffic reporting has moved to G4 effective July 2022

Weather

Data for recent highs, lows and precipitation are not currently available due to broken feed from the Harbor weather station. Multi-year rain days data is also displayed by year and month since 2012, likewise excluding recent months of this year.  Measures are taken at Avalon Harbor.