incomes and fares

[ALWAYS GOING]

They are seeking the $300,000-500,000 annual income couple. Anyone in this category can buy whatever they want and will drink the wine of their choice, not the house wine that they will get for free. And definately not do their own laundry in a hot laundry room on a trip.

 

It is my belief that they are making a big mistake in raising their prices so that we retirees can not go on them perhaps more than once a year, if that. For myself, with the pricing as it now stands, we will not be on them in 2010 (and we were looking at an Aug. Europe cruise). We take 3-4 cruises a year and hope to continue doing that. We were very fortunate to experience the true luxury cruises on Seabourn and if I made $300-500,000 a year, that is were I would be - not on Azamara.

 

Hopefully, if the ships don't fill up, they will have to reconsider their pricing. Sometimes I wonder if the long hot summers in Miami have fried some of their brains!

[meow!]

There are ways and ways to increase prices. We read somewhere about how a good chef cooks a lobster. Put it in a bowl of lukewarm water, feed it some wine, turn the heat up just a little, repeat and repeat, until the lobster is cooked without "feeling" it in a shock, so you end up with tender meat. The unskilled cook throws the lobster into boiling water, it jumps and he pushes it down with a lid. The lobster dies alright but its muscles are all tensed up, ending with chewy meat.

 

Oceania started with low fares, go up may be 5% every six months bit by bit, and continues to do so when the bookings continue to be full, and only back off at the economic tsunami at the end of last year. Azamara also starts with low fare, but it seems to want to "at one go" change the structure of its product and increase by as much as 50%. Of course, if few will book in the next six months, the experiment will have failed and prices will go down again. By changing prices up and down, customers will be bewildered and likely will wait and see and won't book, so it becomes self-defeating.

 

Oceania's main catch is in its fares only going one way, up for years, which get people to want to book. So whether Azamara's imitation tactic will work depends on whether it can also keep its prices only up and no down. To achieve this, it may not be practical to suddenly increase by too large a step. Any comment?

[gosport11]

Are two 5% increases not better than one 10%???:):):)

[wripro]

The bottom line to me is people need to start thinking of Azamara Club as a different cruise line with new prices instead of the same one with higher prices. Clearly, that is what Azamara is aiming for, an different brand that is positioned between what it was before and the luxury lines.

[mom&me_cruising]

Are two 5% increases not better than one 10%???:):):)

 

Yes, indeed for the cruise line -- the law of compounding interests. ;)

[tommui987]

I keep thinking "what is in a name"? A rose by any other name would smell as fair.

 

I look first at where is the ship going? Is it an itinerary that I would like? What is the cost?

 

I am not concerned about its loyalty club, whether dancing girls proceed me to the cabin tossing flowers in my path, whether Chateau Latour is poured into my glass, whether the beds are decked out with 200% Egyptian sheets.

 

Creature comforts are all well and good but as long as the food is decent and the ship is clean and (forgive me) shipshape, and the crew and passengers are OK, that's the transportation I want to travel where I want and at a cost I am willing to pay.

 

'nuff said.

[wripro]

If the quality of the food, the service, the ambience of a ship are not important to you than there are much cheaper options than Azamara Club.