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In 2011 Celebrity Cruises CEO Dan Hanrahan said the line had no growth plans after the introduction of Celebrity Reflection.
"We've taken an awful lot (of new capacity) in a very, very short time," Hanrahan said. "At this point we don't have any plans for a new class of ship."
That was three years ago. If Celebrity ordered a ship today, given the order books at STX, Meyer Werft, and Fincanteri it's unlikely any new ship could be delivered to Celebrity before 2018. Is it wise for this very strong brand to add no new ships for 6+ years?
What do you think? Should Celebrity order new ships? How large should they be and what features should they incorporate?
Celebrity has chosen a very wise course to absorb the new Solstice ships while shedding the older tonnage. They're focusing raising occupancy levels and yields and once the ships are sailing full and earning the proper income, they will pull the trigger on new ships.
The heady days of a constant new flow of ships is over as almost all lines focus on filling the tonnage they have rather than rely on new tonnage to drive demand and then suffer a slump in yields.
Tim
quote:The heady days of a constant new flow of ships is over as almost...
Hi Tim, with new ships on the horizon form RCL, NCL, Princess, P&O, Carnival and MSC, we seem to be experiencing a bit of a building-boom again.
[ 03-31-2014: Message edited by: Malcolm @ cruisepage ]
Royal Caribbean and Celebrity for example are both shedding older tonnage to their other brands more or less timed to the intro of new ships. Pullmantur was upgraded with cast offs from its parent that permitted it to dispose of truly old tonnage while CDF and TUI were both created with old tonnage.
NCL is more of an exception as they are still expanding in their core markets and MSC is as well after having shed some old tonnage a while ago. P&O is attempting to re-invent itself as a younger, hipper product versus the likes of the Canberra days.
Carnival Corp. has slowed the growth rates at all of its brands but other than Costa has not yet started to shed old tonnage for the most part. However the brokers have listed some of the older ships (e.g. Fantasy, Statendam) and if there were a buyer they would be none too happy to off load ships from either of those classes. Problem is they killed off a lot of the traditional buyers of old ships and there simply is not a market (or at least a buyer at the prices they want) for those ships.
Some of these lines are simply taking advantage of deals from the shipyards. The builders are hungry for any work and especially in the past few years were willing to take deals at nearly any price simply to get the work or even creating the work by offing such good deals to the owners.
But the real indicator is still fares. Cruise fares remain depressed and hardly a week goes by without a few emails promoting discounted cruises. I regularly receive promotions offering a week's cruise for US$100 or less per day. That's what cruises cost 20 or 30 years ago ... and is an indication that the industry still has far too much capacity to achieve pricing on par with the value of its product.
Even if they place an order now, it is unlikely any delivery will happen until 2020. That is a very long time for no new ships in a rapidly growing industry. And we should not forget that Century is leaving the fleet next year.
I do hope all is well with Celebrity as they've now become my preferred line.
quote:However the brokers have listed some of the older ships (e.g. Fantasy, Statendam) and if there were a buyer they would be none too happy to off load ships from either of those classes.
Carnival is not selling Statendam. They have already announced it will be rebranded and transferred to P&O Australia.
jusy let me say there is no need for panic and that people appear to forget quickly
on may,12 2002 Constellation was deliveredand it took untill october 24, 2008 beforethe Solstice was handed over
that is a span of 6,5 years, obiously theyknow what they are doing at Celebrity
in times of economic crisis, bigger shipsmore beds to fill every night it makes goodsense that they take grow step by step(and i think they will)
so i'm convinced they will order new builds but will come in time....
best regards,Joe
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