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Has implementation of Club Class Dining created longer wait times for the rest of us?


jsiegel
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I'm interested in the experience of those of you that have cruised pre- and post-implementation of club class dining. My travel agent warned me to be prepared for even longer wait times for popular dinner times. Has that been your experience? Was the wait time still satisfactory or ridiculously long?

 

I've cruised Princess many times in the past (now Elite, woo hoo laundry) but my upcoming cruise will be the first with the introduction of Club Class Dining. I do prefer eating in the MDR. I've never had dinner in the buffet nor do I plan on dining in any of the specialty restaurants this cruise.

 

Thanks, Jackie

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I have read every post so far about CC and dining. I am doing it for the first time this March and can't wait. Anything I have read shows that a small section of one of the three dining rooms is reserved for Suite and CC guests. I have read nowhere where it has affected Anytime Dining. In fact, several times stated they didn't wait at all for a table. These people, though, ate dinner at around 7:30-8pm. If you go at 5:30-6:30 I found there was always somewhat of a wait. So from what I have read, the effect of CC is negligible. So I think you will need to time your dining time to avoid waits and not be concerned about CC dining. I did a lot of waiting for Anytime Dining on my past couple cruises and hate the concept, but don't want to eat traditional at 5:30 nor anytime at 7:30 or later. So I am excited about CC which does seem to present the better dining experience these days with the best of traditional and Anytime.

 

Have a great cruise!

 

Pooh

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Logically, it has to have affected AT IF (Big IF) the allocated real estate and tables were set aside from the AT inventory. IDK for sure, but I do know on ships with two mid-ship DR's and one aft DR, that one of the mid-ship DR's has additional early TD. CC dining is mid-ship also. Did they take the inventory from TD or AT to satisfy the space reserved for CC? Perhaps the impact is almost unnoticeable, but has to be something.

 

Also, CC is totally reserved to accommodate eligible cruisers. If TD people don't show, then they will seat AT's at those tables. They will send AT to other DR if there is a back-up. But, it doesn't sound like they would seat any AT folks in the CC area if very few CC'ers are showing up.

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The answer is yes. We are also elite cruisers on Princess and I find the Club Class particularly grating. On our last cruise, one side of the anytime MDR entrance was reserved exclusively for Club class entry. A relatively small group of diners were seated in the alcove area just inside the entrance. Meanwhile, the line on the other side of "anytimers" extended well into the atrium area. I'm always in awe of businesses that go out of their way to irk their customers.

The issue of Princess changes has been well-documented on these boards, but do many off the points of differentiation that made Princess our choice years ago have become only available as premium items. Why upgrade on Princess when you can just upgrade to another cruiseline?

 

Sent from my SM-G920V using Forums mobile app

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The answer is yes. We are also elite cruisers on Princess and I find the Club Class particularly grating. On our last cruise, one side of the anytime MDR entrance was reserved exclusively for Club class entry. A relatively small group of diners were seated in the alcove area just inside the entrance. Meanwhile, the line on the other side of "anytimers" extended well into the atrium area. I'm always in awe of businesses that go out of their way to irk their customers.

The issue of Princess changes has been well-documented on these boards, but do many off the points of differentiation that made Princess our choice years ago have become only available as premium items. Why upgrade on Princess when you can just upgrade to another cruiseline?

 

Sent from my SM-G920V using Forums mobile app

 

Agreed, you should go to another cruiseline with your "elite(st) attitude. You have out cruised Princess

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My experience from our Regal Princess New England/Canada cruise in October is that there is no wait for Anytime dining. We went at various times and never saw any difference in service levels related to CC. There was one night when things were going a bit slow but I don't think it had anything to do with the CC dining - it was just that our waitstaff team had a huge table of women - at least 12 and they were asking the waiter and assistant waiter lots and lots and lots of questions about the menu at great length. They didn't seem to realize there were monopolizing the waitstaff's time.

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We like to dine before 7:30 so I cannot comment about any wait time problem after that time. From my experience the deck 6 amidships dining room has been used for the early seating of traditional dining until 7:30 when it becomes anytime dining. On my cruises since Club Class dining has be available, it is held in the deck 6 amidships dining room. That would indicate that Club Class would displace traditional dining until 7:30.

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We like to dine before 7:30 so I cannot comment about any wait time problem after that time. From my experience the deck 6 amidships dining room has been used for the early seating of traditional dining until 7:30 when it becomes anytime dining. On my cruises since Club Class dining has be available, it is held in the deck 6 amidships dining room. That would indicate that Club Class would displace traditional dining until 7:30.
I had thought that Club Class was going to be cut out of the Plaza deck 5 full time Anytime DR, but from your post and others it appears that it has actually been cut out of the Fiesta deck 6 DR that starts out as early TD and switches to late ATD. If those displaced Early TD shift to Late TD then there should be minimal impact to ATD. We will be on the Ruby next week but in Club Class so won't be able to judge the impact of Club Class on Anytime diners.
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Logically, it has to have affected AT IF (Big IF) the allocated real estate and tables were set aside from the AT inventory. IDK for sure, but I do know on ships with two mid-ship DR's and one aft DR, that one of the mid-ship DR's has additional early TD. CC dining is mid-ship also. Did they take the inventory from TD or AT to satisfy the space reserved for CC? Perhaps the impact is almost unnoticeable, but has to be something.

 

Also, CC is totally reserved to accommodate eligible cruisers. If TD people don't show, then they will seat AT's at those tables. They will send AT to other DR if there is a back-up. But, it doesn't sound like they would seat any AT folks in the CC area if very few CC'ers are showing up.

 

Not necessarily. Keep in mind that the crunch for anytime is early dining. The dining room used for CC is TD early, usually starting around 5:30) and then is converted to AT after the early dining is finished.

 

So the biggest impact of CC is to reduce slightly the number of early TD dining slots in the mid ship dining room. The early AT dining room is not impacted. By the time the TD dining room converts to AT the crunch is usually gone.

 

Sometimes after the first few days of the cruise, they will send a few AT to the early TD dining if they know that some tables will be empty. Usually not that many.

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The answer is yes. We are also elite cruisers on Princess and I find the Club Class particularly grating. On our last cruise, one side of the anytime MDR entrance was reserved exclusively for Club class entry. A relatively small group of diners were seated in the alcove area just inside the entrance. Meanwhile, the line on the other side of "anytimers" extended well into the atrium area. I'm always in awe of businesses that go out of their way to irk their customers.

The issue of Princess changes has been well-documented on these boards, but do many off the points of differentiation that made Princess our choice years ago have become only available as premium items. Why upgrade on Princess when you can just upgrade to another cruiseline?

 

Sent from my SM-G920V using Forums mobile app

It's been our experience on many sailings that although there are two entrance ways to the main dining rooms only one has been opened in the past. The opening of the other entrance for CC doesn't affect that situation. Pays your money get to choose.

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Not necessarily. Keep in mind that the crunch for anytime is early dining. The dining room used for CC is TD early, usually starting around 5:30) and then is converted to AT after the early dining is finished.

 

So the biggest impact of CC is to reduce slightly the number of early TD dining slots in the mid ship dining room. The early AT dining room is not impacted. By the time the TD dining room converts to AT the crunch is usually gone.

 

Sometimes after the first few days of the cruise, they will send a few AT to the early TD dining if they know that some tables will be empty. Usually not that many.

 

Yes, it might be true that most passengers booking into CC were former TD diners, but no way to know that. Could be just as many, or more, former AT diners. In fact many have posted that they like the idea that CC is like AT but they don't have to wait anymore.

 

Also, CC lasts the entire night, so there are CC late diners as well.

 

I have also seen that a small number of AT diners can be sent to the aft DR to fill empty table(s).

 

If CC real estate is taken from former TD allocation, then no impact to AT. In fact, to the extent that some CC passengers would otherwise have selected AT, there is reduced demand for AT. Some CCer's have reported preferring TD, but maybe that was before they understood they can show up to CC at a regular time - just like TD - and be seated in the same spot.

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The answer is yes. We are also elite cruisers on Princess and I find the Club Class particularly grating. On our last cruise, one side of the anytime MDR entrance was reserved exclusively for Club class entry. A relatively small group of diners were seated in the alcove area just inside the entrance. Meanwhile, the line on the other side of "anytimers" extended well into the atrium area. I'm always in awe of businesses that go out of their way to irk their customers.

The issue of Princess changes has been well-documented on these boards, but do many off the points of differentiation that made Princess our choice years ago have become only available as premium items. Why upgrade on Princess when you can just upgrade to another cruiseline?

 

Sent from my SM-G920V using Forums mobile app

 

Club Class is more then just getting to eat whenever you want to and if people are willing to pay for upgrades in service while cruising then more power to them.....we have friends who always book the Sanctuary when they cruise and we prefer to use the public areas of the ship for lounging and it does not ruffle our feathers that Princess charges extra for the Sanctuary....:halo:

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One way to look at is the numbers, out of 2600 there could be 84 in suites and 56 in club class so about 140 out of 2600 or about 5%.

So overall I can't see it making much of a difference in wait time, as there is always people whom like the buffet or specialty dining.

 

Plus there is the timing, some times everybody go to the MDR at once.

 

Cheers Don

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Yes, it might be true that most passengers booking into CC were former TD diners, but no way to know that. Could be just as many, or more, former AT diners. In fact many have posted that they like the idea that CC is like AT but they don't have to wait anymore.

 

Also, CC lasts the entire night, so there are CC late diners as well.

 

I have also seen that a small number of AT diners can be sent to the aft DR to fill empty table(s).

 

If CC real estate is taken from former TD allocation, then no impact to AT. In fact, to the extent that some CC passengers would otherwise have selected AT, there is reduced demand for AT. Some CCer's have reported preferring TD, but maybe that was before they understood they can show up to CC at a regular time - just like TD - and be seated in the same spot.

 

 

Not following your post. I did not say anything about where the CC diners came from. Only that the space for CC came from the dining room that is early TD and late AT,

 

Does not make any difference if CC diners were TD or AT. The space taken for CC is out of early TD, as such early AT (when the mosts waits occur for AT) is not really impacted, so it should not impact AT waits. By the time that dining room converts to AT, there is usually not a problem getting a table (after 7 pm).

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We were upsold to a Club Class minisuite this past February and I didn’t notice anything different about the wait for Anytime Dining. We were right next to everyone else in the main dining room. It was bascially like we were just over to one side. I did like that the chef prepared one special meal every night. But for the price of Club Class without the upsell, we can survive without it. Heck, we’re even splurging on another mini suite. Just not CC. I figure for 15 nights, it’s worth it to have a bathtub. And the Balcony cabins on the Grand have smaller closets, unlike the Mini suites.

 

 

I'm interested in the experience of those of you that have cruised pre- and post-implementation of club class dining. My travel agent warned me to be prepared for even longer wait times for popular dinner times. Has that been your experience? Was the wait time still satisfactory or ridiculously long?

 

I've cruised Princess many times in the past (now Elite, woo hoo laundry) but my upcoming cruise will be the first with the introduction of Club Class Dining. I do prefer eating in the MDR. I've never had dinner in the buffet nor do I plan on dining in any of the specialty restaurants this cruise.

 

Thanks, Jackie

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Club Class on the Star is an area carved out of anytime dining space, so we could easily see the whole dining room. Maybe earlier in the evening there's a backup, but when we ate at around 7:30 each night, anytime dining was less than half full. Having tried Club Class once, it would be very hard to go back to anytime or traditional dining.

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Not following your post. I did not say anything about where the CC diners came from. Only that the space for CC came from the dining room that is early TD and late AT,

 

Does not make any difference if CC diners were TD or AT. The space taken for CC is out of early TD, as such early AT (when the mosts waits occur for AT) is not really impacted, so it should not impact AT waits. By the time that dining room converts to AT, there is usually not a problem getting a table (after 7 pm).

 

Didn't say you did. :cool: Until you made the statement about where the space came from (tables and seats so to speak), I wasn't sure (but would have placed my bet on TD). But the other aspect of it is the passengers with CC - prior to CC, were they more typically TD diners or AT diners? I think it could make a difference as it removes demand and need for tables and seats from those dining room zones. You have said they reduced the TD space to accommodate CC diners. If the majority of those CC diners used to be TD, NBD. If they were predominately AT diners if no CC existed, then there is a shift of former AT into former TD space which might squeeze out some non-CC who would like to choose TD and it alleviates the load on AT space with a bunch of folks shifting to CC. So, it's a lot of writing and thinking for what seems to be little impact in the end.

 

My other point was that the CC space lopped off continues for the entire evening, so when the early TD in mid-ship DR is turned into AT as those diners finish their meals, it isn't the entire space because CC is still running. That said, I do agree that there isn't near the demand for tables as the night gets later (after 7:30 to 8:00), so the "real estate" allocated to CC doesn't have the same impact - to the extent that impact exists at all.

 

Bottom line, I think we are in the same place. I was just trying to bring in the aspect of what CC diners used to be. It's kind of an academic/math exercise which is variable as it is also quite possible that the mix of CC cruisers on each trip could be comprised of a different mix of passengers who would otherwise choose TD or AT.

Sorry if I am making eyes roll in back of head. ;) I am happy/relieved to hear that there is no significanct impact from having a CC section on non-CC diners.

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I'm interested in the experience of those of you that have cruised pre- and post-implementation of club class dining. My travel agent warned me to be prepared for even longer wait times for popular dinner times. Has that been your experience? Was the wait time still satisfactory or ridiculously long?

 

I've cruised Princess many times in the past (now Elite, woo hoo laundry) but my upcoming cruise will be the first with the introduction of Club Class Dining. I do prefer eating in the MDR. I've never had dinner in the buffet nor do I plan on dining in any of the specialty restaurants this cruise.

 

Thanks, Jackie

Oh my gosh! You're right. I hadn't thought of it that way but we've never experienced 30min -1.5hr waits before for anytime dining. We ended up doing the unthinkable and booking!

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Not necessarily. Keep in mind that the crunch for anytime is early dining. The dining room used for CC is TD early, usually starting around 5:30) and then is converted to AT after the early dining is finished.

 

So the biggest impact of CC is to reduce slightly the number of early TD dining slots in the mid ship dining room. The early AT dining room is not impacted. By the time the TD dining room converts to AT the crunch is usually gone.

 

Sometimes after the first few days of the cruise, they will send a few AT to the early TD dining if they know that some tables will be empty. Usually not that many.

 

That is exactly how it worked on our recent Emerald cruise. There were only 64 seats dedicated to Club Class dining, (50% of the eligible diners). We never waited, but sometimes it was almost full.

I would guess that the number of empty seats at any time in Club Dining is far less than the number of empty seats in the TD area where people decide to dine at a different time and location. For our cruise Princess had almost two full dining rooms allocated to early TD as a result people often waited for early anytime Dining.

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Sorry if I am making eyes roll in back of head. ;)

Yeah, had a little of a hard time following. Bottom line (to me): I think I understand that the cc tables are in the AT/TD dining room, not the AT only, correct??:confused:

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I don't think I am too concerned about the CC being too much of an issue.

 

I do think that it can be confusing about how dining can be set up!

And, the seating times can end up being whatever is decided onboard.

 

if... IF... we decide to do the earliest TD (Regal) I am thinking that this will be in the Dining Room off the Piazza.

The Traditional Dining room that is aft, isn't that always for regular (not earliest) Traditional Dining, right?

I can see how they might mix the earliest dining by following with Anytime, but don't think they would mix the earliest and the early Traditional Dining in the main AFT dining room. Just logistically.

 

Since our next cruise will be a winter cruise, and it will be dark so early, we are considering booking the earliest dining, so we will be dining mid-ship, and make the earlier show or activities.

 

I don't know which to choose!

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