Super-sizing a fast-food meal won't improve the flavour of the French fries. But will super-sizing a cruise ship improve the quality of the vacation?
While spending holidays on the equivalent of floating towns is not everyone's idea of a dream holiday, industry trends point to ever larger and more elaborate vessels to come.
On board Carnival Cruises' new 3,100-passenger Carnival Valor, simulated “town squares” are home to the kinds of shops you might find in an affluent urban neighbourhood. On one corner, well-dressed passengers sip martinis in a lounge, while others stop for a coffee at a café next door. Across the street, club-goers dance to hip-hop, and down the way, people stop at a sushi bar on their way to the casino.
Royal Caribbean International's Freedom of the Seas, meanwhile, will become the undisputed champ of heavyweight cruise ships when it begins sailing in April, 2006. It will be longer than three football fields and 15 storeys tall, and one of its many pool areas will feature a stationary “wave” big enough to surf on.
The ship will be so large that most Caribbean islands won't have docks vast enough to accommodate it. On stops in the Caymans and Jamaica, it will anchor offshore and passengers will motor in on smaller boats. Another day, it will stop at an uninhabited private island the company has set up specifically for its big ships, and the rest of the time will be spent at sea. The ports of call are touted as highlights, but the ship itself is the main attraction.
So sure is Royal Caribbean that as many as 4,370 passengers a week will sign up for Freedom of the Seas cruises that it has already ordered two more ships — slated for delivery in 2007 and 2008 — that are just as massive.
Such scale is not what people would choose intuitively, says Joe Farcus, chief ship architect for Carnival Cruises. “If you gave people who have never been on a ship a choice and asked them whether they'd like to sail with 3,000 passengers, 2,000 passengers or 500 passengers, most people would say 500,” he says. “But if you show them that by going on a 3,000-passenger ship you get an exponential number of features and entertainment options, it changes the whole equation.
“People don't want to feel forced to either do one thing or nothing. They want to be able to choose between column A, B and C, and big is the only way to do that.”
Adam Goldstein, Royal Caribbean's executive vice-president of brand operations, agrees. Guests “want a wide array of options and choices, and that's something that is not special to cruising,” he says. “This is a response to a trend in society.”
The main purpose of the largest cruise ships isn't to transport people from one port to the next, just as Las Vegas isn't often touted as a base for desert exploration and most beach resorts aren't geared toward local sightseeing, Goldstein says.
Bigger ships are also about improving company profits, since economies of scale in purchasing and operating expenses reduce overhead costs. Cruise lines that run mega-ships can offer all-inclusive fares for about $100 a person a day, less than half the cost on most small ships and comparable to resorts on shore.
Another advantage that turns many mega-ship passengers into repeat cruisers is the smooth ride. Big ships cut through waves better than smaller ships, so you don't feel the motion of the ocean to the same extent.
