The third edition of Seatrade Winter Cruise Forum took place in Cartagena, Spain, on 21st and 22nd of January. Cruise Business Review was again present. Alan Lam reports.
The main theme discussed in this forum was how to change the perception of winter cruise into a “winterless” year-round cruise. As from year to year the industry is stretching the cruise season out for as long as possible, the only way to promote an even wider awareness of and achieve a bigger yield from the so-called off-season cruise operation is for the industry itself to change its own stubborn image of cruise being a sunny weather activity, stop regarding these colder months of the year as a collective handicap of the industry and begin to see the opportunities while recognising the limitation of the colder season, such as smaller markets and cooler climate.
Cruising is much more than just about sun, sea and beaches. Unlike the Northern Europeans and North Americans, the Asians, for example, do not go on cruises in search of warm weather and beaches. The demand for winter cruise products is growing stronger all the time. The industry has gone a long way to prepare itself for the market, such as building ice class ships with retractable roofs over the swimming pools. The Quantum class ships are built with more “inside” features and AIDA’s first newbuilding will be based in Hamburg year-round.
But there are various obstacles and challenges in need ofaddressing, such as issues concerning profitability, appropriate staffing levels, the readiness of ports & destinations, and a demographically smaller source market for bigger ships, etc.
A full report will be published in the next edition of Cruise Business Review.