August visitor volume climbs 2.8 percent

BY LAURA EMERSON
LAS VEGAS REVIEW-JOURNAL

Posted: Oct. 11, 2011 | 3:07 p.m.

Las Vegas' August visitor volume climbed 2.8 percent when compared with August 2010.

In total, 3.29 million tourists visited Las Vegas in August compared with 3.2 million visitors a year ago, a monthly report released by the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority shows. This marks the 18th consecutive month of visitation increases when compared year-over-year.

Those numbers are down, however, from July, which saw 3.47 million tourists.

Year-to-date, 26.2 million visitors have come to Las Vegas, a 4.7 percent increase over 2010's numbers.

Citywide room occupancy was up 2.1 percent from 82 percent in August 2010 to 84.1 percent this year with the average daily room rate rising 11.1 percent to $97.11 a night from $87.40 per night in August 2010.

Las Vegas had 3.89 million hotel room nights occupied in August -- 3.4 percent more than it did a year ago.

Convention attendance during August was 412,902, up 19.6 percent. The increase may have been helped out by the Cosmoprof Beauty Show, which came to Las Vegas in July last year and boasted an attendance of 23,000. The number of conventions and meetings held in Las Vegas in August was up 13.9 percent.

The average daily number of vehicles coming into Las Vegas showed a 2.4 percent decrease in August, from 110,302 vehicles a year ago to 107,602 this year. But the number of vehicles coming from Southern California along Interstate 15 was down 1.3 percent.

In other markets of Clark County during August, the number of Laughlin visitors fell 6.7 percent while Mesquite visitation was down 2.6 percent.