Beezo

Interesting. I had heard Seabourn and/or Cunard in that mix as well. All while reading yesterday the Saudi Wealth Fund holds $600B in assets today. I'm thinking they will swoop in on Seabourn at a minimum sooner than later.

And to clarify - I'm meaning on a per brand profitability perspective. They each are obviously responsible for their own P&L.

Saw this in Cruise Industry News: “According to a press release, given Costa Cruises' significant presence in Asia, particularly China, which remains closed to cruising, the brand continues to evaluate deployment options and fleet optimization alternatives beyond the previously announced transfers of Costa Luminosa to Carnival Cruise Line as well as Costa Venezia and Costa Firenze to the COSTA by CARNIVAL concept.” Fleet optimization is key here (look at Viking and RCL/Celebrity). HAL has 4 Classes (R, Vista, Signature, Pinnacle). If they remove the last remaining R-Class ships, Volendam and Zaandam, they will have 9 ships in 3 classes. AIDA has 4 classes (V, Sphinx, Hyperion, and Excellence/Helios). If they remove the last V-Class, AIDAaura, they will have 11 ships in 3 classes. PRINCESS has 3 Classes if you blend the Grand variants of Gem and Crown in to Grand-Class (Grand, Coral, and Royal) with 15 ships. Brands with too many variants: P&O, Carnival, and Costa: Costa (TODAY) has 5 Classes (Destiny, Concordia, Spirit, Dream, Excellence, Vista). This is currently 12 ships across 6 classes. Even with the two and only two Vista ships leaving to Carnival, that's still 10 ships across 5 Classes. They will also have two single class ships (Costa Diadema Dream Class and Costa Deliziosa Spirit Class). I somewhat think you may see Diadema and Deliziosa follow Luminosa to Carnival as they exit Elation and Paradise. This adds two ships to existing classes. Just my two cents 🙂

Didn’t think I’d see the day this soon where RCL’s market cap is higher than Carnivals.

I've stated it before and been shot down, but I've wondered what NCL's appetite has been for acquiring Explorer Dream, Genting Dream and/or World Dream. Even if it were the smaller Explorer Dream, the ship recently went thru a significant refit like the Norwegian Spirit.

I agree - I was reading an article and it also stated the RCL listed Celebrity Cruises as collateral. It will be interesting to hear from Carnival this week during their business update. I still foresee additional fleet/brand sales for CCL, with my guess of AIDAaura, Volendam, Zaandam, Aurora, and possibly the Elation and Paradise shortlisted. If not the two carnivals, my guess they will be removed once Venezia and Firenze join the fleet in 2023/2024.

I believe they at one point (up until acquisition by Star in 2000/2001?) had headquarters in Oslo, Norway and Miami as a secondary HQ.

I’ve wondered about Australia/South Pacific as well. They tested the waters a bit with Norwegian Jewel a couple years back out of Melbourne, I believe. Carnival Corp’s brands consistently send older tonnage there, while it is also one of the fastest growing cruise markets (pre-Covid). Royal Caribbean did have some old and newer tonnage in region as well (Ovation, Solstice, etc). Always been the old princess ships and P&O Australia hand-me- downs. With NCLs efforts to push upmarket, it may make sense to enter that market with the latest ship and segment.

This angle and lighting… looks like they went with the light blue on the whole funnel! Never noticed how much it really popped like that over the past few weeks.

Thanks for sharing! That’s really cool!

Interesting - Thank you for your viewpoint! I was initially in the same camp but my opinion changed: 1.) When you look at the Norwegian Dawn - When was the last time the ship was based FULL TIME out of NYC? The ship had the Statue of Liberty on one side and (I believe) removed the decal. The name of the ship does not have any reference to the name of the ship itself. 2.) Norwegian Sun - Yes, has a huge sun on both sides of the ship, but for some reason, it looks just so out of place when you look at the ship sailing thru Alaska this season. 3.) Norwegian Spirit - I'm curious if this was the reason they changed the hull art from the Sea Nymph to current design. So looping back to topic, if NCL does continue with the design of the hull-art, I hope we do see other color variants (Prima:-Blue/Gray, Viva:Blue/Purple, P3: Blue/Green, etc). However, with P3 and beyond essentially Prima-Plus class they could easily go in another direction. Not trying to convince you to change your opinion - just wanted to say that I was originally in the same place :).

With regards to Prima 3 - There is about an additional six month gap between Prima 2 and 3 than there is with Prima and Viva. P3 is expected Q4 2023, meaning they can squeeze in Queen Anne, which is due 2024-Q1. Below is the ORIGINAL dates, not taking into consideration of the current Prima & Viva delays. Prima - 2022-Q3 Viva - 2023-Q2 P3 - 2024-Q4 P4 - 2025-Q3 P5 - 2026-Q3 P6 - 2027-Q2

Me too. I like the color, approach, and simplicity. I'm not opposed to change either, I'm just trying to decipher what/where they are going.

With my earlier comment regarding using the same purple funnel with the old gold logo - you can see it here on the S/S Norway as a point of reference. While it is a very nice contrast with the light blue/dark purple like it is today (even with the purple on the background of "NORWEGIAN STAR" above). I always wondered what it would've looked like with the whole funnel the light blue color - even a mix like the Norway before going purple gold:

Also - Can see the last two logos in the example below. On the Star, you can still see the shaping of the previous logo painted over in before/after:

Completely agree! Current logo is my favorite out of the NCL's logos. Didn't realize how many "waves" have been a theme within the logos/branding throughout the variants and decades. One I never really liked was the one right above the current. Didn't look that great on a funnel and always thought it looked like it belonged on a bar of soap, lol.

What I do find interesting as well is how they’ve maintained the dark purple funnels with light blue logo on top, even though most of the ships (excl Sky, Sun, maybe Star) today were not in service with the old purple and gold branding. Nothing against it - Just always figured they’d paint all the funnels the light blue color. For those interested, here are some logos of past. Any favorites?

Great point. Thank you for sharing!

I think like others have said, it’s the short cruise market - those looking for a quick getaway to blow off some steam and could care less where the ship goes as long as there is food and booze. I’m sure the crew doesn’t love it either - can only handle so many voyages with those kind of passengers and a twice per week turnover. Nothing against those looking for that kind of trip (guilty!) but it’s a different experience and I wouldn’t anticipate yours being like that. Hope you enjoy your trip and let us know how it goes!

Interesting to hear - but given the short cruise, yes, completely makes sense to fall under the Booze Cruise category. My guess given the direction NCL is going they don't want to be in that category but there is clearly a market for it, especially with the ship at near capacity. Hopefully the onboard experience improves over the coming months.

Hello! I was curious on everyone’s thoughts here - I’ve noticed an adaptation/evolution of NCL’s logo. You may notice on the Prima that the funnel simply has “NCL” and the wave, but does not have the formal NCL logo (blue) like all the other ships in the fleet. I’ve also noticed this is the same at their new terminal in Miami. Yes, they do have the primary logo blasted on the parking garage, but on the building itself and within you only see the actual letters. I’m wondering if they are slowly moving away from the current logo? Not saying I love the current logo, but it’s significantly better than the bland-looking letters on their own….

Thanks for sharing your experience! What would you say the capacity was on this sailing?

Q3 only has 3 weeks left for them - So they are pretty much aware of what that outlook is, and have said it won't be profitable. Q4 will be interesting - MAYBE they will have a surprise profit? Curious how they will truly get out of this. Part of me wonders if that the order to Fincantieri was NCLH (minimal deposit) wanting to avoid the questions of "why are you ordering ships while you are turning profits?" etc. They were rumored to have an order announcement three months ago and clearly have built a preferred relationship with them over the past couple years with 6 NCL, 4 for Oceania, and 3 with Regent. Brian

I agree! Original funnel always felt too small. When the Breakaway launched I always thought that the deck area below could easily get a down draft from the exhaust. Obviously it was engineered to not but always thought it was half the size it should be. The update so the Norwegian Spirit's sister ship at Dream Cruises/Star Cruises is quite interesting as well - I'm assuming the additional size funnels have scrubbers within. SuperStar Virgo vs Explorer Dream

Interesting! Does anyone have a before/after? I know they installed the scrubber but wasn't aware the overall funnel was adjusted.