How much revenue do cruise ships generate per hour when at sea?

[mosstraveltv]

Hello all,

 

I am trying to find a reliable statistic that can answer the question in the subject. This could be for a particular ship, or a cruise line, or even an industry average. I realise this depends on many variables, but if anyone can offer an answer with a reference to the source of information I would be eternally grateful. I did once see a documentary about a Cunard Ship which gave this info, but alas I have lost it. It is to help make a point in a book chapter that I'm currently writing, but I need to reference the source of the information.

 

If anyone can help with this I will be eternally grateful.

 

Many thanks

 

Stu.

[paul929207]

Not sure it would work, but take the annual revenue for one of the cruise companies (CCL & RCCL are publicly traded.). Divide that by the number of ships. divide the result by the number of hours in a year.

 

This would assume that all revenue is from cruising. If the have signaifcant non-cruise revenue it would throw off the calculation. It also does not allow for Dry Dock, but that should not distort the number too much. Finally, do you literally mean "At Sea"

[calliopecruiser]

Do you mean revenues actually earned at sea (such as for drinks or "alternative" dining), or do you mean revenue per hour of operation?

[sail7seas]

Wouldn't that number differ widely cruise line to cruise line and size of ship etc

 

Seabourn includes wine with all meals. If you want wine with dinner on most other lines, you buy it. But Seabourn has a considerably higher per diem than many other lines.

HAL permits guests to bring wine aboard and charges a corkage fee if it is consumed in a public lounge or MDR but not if consumed in private cabin. Some cruise lines charge for ice skating and other cruise lines don't have ice rinks.

 

The number has to be very variable. IMO

 

You have a much better chance of getting a number that makes any sense if you name a cruise line/name a size of ship by how many guests it carries. IMO

 

Bruce Muzz probably can answer this close to off the top of his head. :)

[mosstraveltv]

Ok thanks for your replies.

 

I literally mean while 'out at sea' from customer spend on retail, leisure, gambling etc.

 

Any major cruise line would do Royal Caribbean, MSC etc that have a good and varied on board offering to tempt customers to part with their money when they are afloat.

 

Thanks again.

[Underwatr]

Carnival's annual report is available, and includes ticket revenue, onboard revenue, and a count of ships by line. You could do the math with some assumptions about length of a cruise (so as not to count turnaround days).

 

Ticket sales are about 75% of revenue, and onboard sales is most of the rest (about 23%), with the rest being tours.

 

for 2012:

$11.7 Billion in ticket sales

$3.5 billion in onboard sales

100 cruise ships

 

Simple math:

$35 million in onboard sales per ship

Average 52 turnaround days => 366-52 = 314 sailing days

$111,465 sales/day

$4,644/hour

 

What's an average ship size? 2500?

$1.85 per passenger per hour (more or less...)

[mosstraveltv]

Ok thanks for your replies.

 

I literally mean while 'out at sea' from customer spend on retail, leisure, gambling etc.

 

Any major cruise line would do Royal Caribbean, MSC etc that have a good and varied on board offering to tempt customers to part with their money when they are afloat.

 

Thanks again.

[mosstraveltv]

Apologies for the double post, having iPad, wifi and app issues.

 

Underwatr that is great to be going on many thanks, although it works out much less than I expected, I'm almost certain on the Cunard documentary I saw (a while ago) that they made 30k per hour from on board spend.

 

Do you think it could vary so much? I realise Cunard are a premium brand.

 

Cheers

[Underwatr]

Note that my analysis doesn't include the ticket revenue (which definitely adds to the bottom line and almost but not quite covers expenses by irself). If you include the ticket revenue and run the numbers the same way it comes to a little over $20,000 per hour.

 

I think Cunard ships are a little smaller in capacity than average (even QM2 is mid-sized when it comes to passenger capacity at about 2600) so while the price per ticket may be higher the average revenue per ship is probably close to the middle.

 

Hard to tell in more detail since Carnival doesn't break their expenses and revenues down to individual lines within the company.

[Underwatr]

But look at it another way. If a 2500 passenger ship generated $30000 per hour that would be $12/hour per passenger or almost $288/day per person. This may be close to the average ticket plus onboard spending on Cunard ($2000/week including onboard) but is probably too high to be an average of just onboard spending per person.

 

Based on my personal experience $288/day/person is in the ballpark for everything including the ticket and onboard spending. Typically I think I come in closer to $200/person in a mid-tier balcony stateroom

[Gail & Marty sailing away]

I think it is higher guys ..

[Underwatr]

I think it is higher guys ..

That's OK, but what's your rationale?

 

Everything above "simple math" in post #6 comes straight from Carnival. So is your issue with the number of sailing days per ship?

 

Granted these are averages across the corporation. If you want to do some math, the annual report also splits the numbers between the North American and Europe, Australia & Asia lines. But the numbers are the numbers.

[calliopecruiser]

Statistics say that on board revenue is 30-45 percent of total revenue for Carnival, RCCL, and NCL - I find that pretty astounding. At least, that's what these numbers from 2010 say http://www.latecruisenews.com/2011/06/06/a-big-issue-on-board-revenue-other-cruise-news-a-revival-in-two-funnelled-ships-royal-caribbean-shareholder-sammy-ofer-dies-at-89/

[Underwatr]

You're misreading the data (which is presented in a confusing way). The 2010 Carnival numbers in the article - $11.1 billion ticket sales, $3.4 billion onboard sales - are consistent with the 2012 numbers I posted above.

 

Onboard sales for Carnival was 30% of the ticket revenue, but only about 23% of the total of $14.5 billion (e.g., total revenue = ticket revenue plus onboard revenue).

 

Then divide that revenue by the number of ships in the company's fleet, divide again by the number of cruising days each ship sails per year...

 

Also note (the numbers are clear in the Carnival annual report) that onboard sales make the difference between a cruise line's profit or loss. Ticket sales don't cover their expenses. So maybe it's not that you end up spending so much onboard, but rather that you spend so little to get there.

[dodgetrucksrule]

I did a research paper a couple of years ago when working on my master’s.

I don’t know if this helps you or not – but the top three profitable areas on board are

1. Shore excursions

2. Photos and DVD’s

3. Drinks – both alcoholic and non – alcoholic. (I really thought this would be number 1)

The onboard shops, art auctions and the spa are outsourced; even the employees there are not Carnival employees.

I can get the citations for you BUT I will not be back up north until the middle of April.

Oh, my research was specifically for Carnival Cruise Lines.

[calliopecruiser]

Also note (the numbers are clear in the Carnival annual report) that onboard sales make the difference between a cruise line's profit or loss. Ticket sales don't cover their expenses. So maybe it's not that you end up spending so much onboard, but rather that you spend so little to get there.

 

I see what you mean about the numbers. It doesn't surprise me that onboard purchases make the difference between profit and loss......the cruise ticket itself is a loss leader to get people on board.

[Gail & Marty sailing away]

The numbers are hard to do ,Carnival/ Holland has 15 ships that holds a averge of 1566 people each ,and the everge cruise lengh is a lot more than the fun ships The on board spending is very different on a Holland ship .

[Colorado Kat]

Ticket sales are about 75% of revenue, and onboard sales is most of the rest (about 23%), with the rest being tours.

 

I would have expected ticket sales to be lower, and on-board sales higher.

[dorisis]

They generate enough to pay dividends to stockholders.

 

'~Doris~