angelwifey

From what I have read, the price of the drink package is between $55-$105/pppd. That’s quite a fluctuating price difference. For this particular cruise, I’m not sure $1,000 for the drink package is worth it. And like I said, it will potentially bring the cost to $4500 which, again, for this particular sailing and ship I’m not sure it’s worth the cost.

Thanks for the replies everyone. It's definitely a different business model than we are used to, but obviously its working for them. The majority of our cruising is on higher end lines (river cruises or Windstar in Europe), but when we stay within the US it's 90% Carnival because we mostly do short Mexico or Caribbean weekend cruises. In all instances we know what we are paying (all in) at the time of booking and if a cruise price drops, that's great- more shopping money! 🙂 The concept of not really knowing the "all-in" price prior to booking just seems kind of odd. If I go according to the $99/per day rate that means I'm going to potentially spend $4,500 on this cruise (5 night cruise on the Mariner, suite, drink package, dining extras). If I under estimate, we can still pay it but it may mean going over the allotted vacation budget which we dislike doing. Certainly gives us something to think about! We may end up at an all inclusive instead.

We are considering switching over to RCCL from Carnival, but Royal is not making things easy. I called reservations to find out what the cost will be for the Deluxe drink package so I can get an idea, but the agent said they can only give the cost of what it is to purchase on board ($99 per day + gratuity) but after deposit it may be different. She refused to say if it could/would be more or less after deposit. I understand the concepts of costs changing and its not a matter of being affordable, but before I put (nonrefundable) money down on something, I want to fully know what to expect as it could be a decision maker. Plus my husband is a numbers guy and looks at everything to make sure we are getting the most bang for our buck. Any advice?