Remove ImagesMaui County
The Maui 10
Who’s the county’s most powerful player?
August 16, 2007
| RANK | PREVIOUS | COMPANY |
| 1 | 2 | Monsanto Hawai`i |
| 2 | 1 | Dowling Co. |
| 3 | 3 | Alexander & Baldwin |
| 4 | 4 | Tesoro Hawai`i |
| 5 | 5 | Weinberg Foundation |
| 6 | 6 | Goodfellow Brothers |
| 7 | 8 | Maui Land & Pineapple Co. |
| 8 | 7 | Maui Electric Co. |
| 9 | 9 | Hawaiian Telcom |
| 10 | 10 | Wailuku Water Co. |
HONOLUA RIDGE PHASE BOO-YEAH!
Great news for Maui Land & Pine—their Honolua Ridge Phase II project in west West Maui has really been selling like gangbusters, according to an Aug. 3 online Pacific Business News story. The neighborhood's roads, vegetation and flood basins may leave much to be desired (see our story "The Battle of Honolua Ridge,"May 3, 2007), but you know how those rich people love their Kapalua living. In fact, so much of the luxury lots have sold that the company brought in $38.7 million in revenue during the second quarter of this year, which was $5.1 million more than the same time the year before. Normally, news like this would vault the company to the top of the chart, but we have to temper our enthusiasm with the news that ML&P also lost $3.5 million in the second quarter—$900,000 more than the company lost in the second quarter of 2006. The reason for such losses, according the company CEO David C. Cole, stems from charges incurred from the decision to shutter the company's Kahului pineapple cannery. But land comes before pine—in name as well as practice—so there's probably no cause for alarm.
HOTELS BECOME NOTELS
Bad news for super-developer Everett Dowling, the now part owner of Makena Resort who plans to expand the place as dramatically as possible. The Aug. 6 Honolulu Advertiser reported that in the first half of this year, hotel room revenue dropped two percent across the entire state. That's right, folks: hotel owners have so far brought in a mere $1.5 billion. And with timeshare construction seemingly on a rampage, it's unlikely this will change anytime soon. "The bloom has gone out of the blossom," Aqua Hotels & Resorts owner Mike Paulin told the Advertiser. It's a brutal epitaph for an industry that's long dominated Hawai`i. MTW