For me (and looks like many others here) a resort luau (name another type that's not a private or school or church affair)is "a mediocre canned experience". But many people enjoy those.

Hotel luaus are pig roasts with a show... suze can have fun at a funeral breakfast...

Many years ago, we went to the luau at the Royal Hawaiian. We went with low expectations, yet enjoyed the evening. Met and chatted with other tourists during dinner. I have a goofy smiling picture of me from that night. The caption reads: Me, after 3 maitais and a lei.

because suze sees the glass as half filled!

Glass half filled.... With the deceased 's ashes????

Speaking of funerals... Our DIL took a photo with leis they give when you enter a luau, and sent to a co-worker who happened to be Hawaiian.

The co-worker replied, Hawaiians are using different flowers to make leis for different events. The locals use flowers in our leis for funerals only. :)

<is "a mediocre canned experience". But many people enjoy those>

No sylvia3, I do not enjoy a mediocre canned experience. The difference between our comments is only that I do not necessarily consider every commercial luau to be one.

All you nay-sayers, fine... don't go.

Or if you are lucky enough to have relatives in Hawaii to get you into private parties or you ind a local church hosting a public events, definitely GO! Of course that is more "authentic".

For a first timer to Hawaii who is *interested* as this OP must be or they wouldn't have started a thread about it... I think one of the luaus is a great way to spend an evening. Not the PCC.

"is it worth the money" was the question.
The answer was, from many, "not really," especially at $100 or more per head.
YRMV, as may your opinion.

I have no idea how much the other luaus are, but at the Hale Koa it is only $60, FWIW. As for the "canned" experience, you could say that about any show any where. Same show, time and time again, that could be construed as "canned".

As I already said, our family enjoyed the luau when we went.

<<not the PCC>> how would you know? You have never been.

Here we go again...

It's called *opinions* and everyone is entitled to their own.

That's kinda the entire point of this forum.

This was on the Hawaii.com website:

https://www.hawaii.com/things-to-do/luau/

If your travel fees are low enough and you have a unique vacation experience with your family, the luau should be worth the price.

That's a nonsensical platitude.

My sister lives in Oahu and this may sound weird but she found a local church that had a big yearly luau event. There was no show but the food was authentic, and very good if that is what you are interested in. It of course was not touristy nor expensive and gave us a chance to meet locals.

Our family went to the one Kai mentioned on Kauai - our group of. 8 ranged from 75 to 6 years and we all loved it . Dancing and story telling was superb- food meh .

That doesn't sound weird, nanabee. I think many people recommend seeking out local community events when they are available & if you can find them and get an invite. It's just those aren't always going to be happening in the particular time frame when most people just have a week or two for vacation in Hawaii.

We have been to 3 luaus, on 3 islands, with different groups of people, which is probably why we did it 3 times. Each experience was different, but overall I would agree that the food is less interesting than the music and dancing.

If you are a first time visitor I do highly recommend the luau experience.

Just FYI on the tourist luaus: All the commercial luau operations take great care to ensure the show is in some way educational for the attendees. It can be perceived as cheesy and canned (okay, it kind of is), but they all try to leave you with a better sense of the Polynesian culture. It's hard to teach that culture to a group of people in just one night, so the dinner and show gives you a super fast taste in a more engaging, fun atmosphere. That's my 2 cents on it.....I know they try to be as culturally correct as possible.