How far has Celebrity fallen??

[AliRob]

Just sent our review from Millennium Asia...shocked at how really poor the ship and crew performed...looking at the other reviews , I'm not alone. Thoughts?

[Orator]

Just sent our review from Millennium Asia...shocked at how really poor the ship and crew performed...looking at the other reviews , I'm not alone. Thoughts?

 

Can you provide some specific examples of what you found to be poor performance? I spent 14 wonderful days on Reflection prior to the TA and found service to be outstanding. Prior to that was on Connie for 10 days and found the same. Perhaps it's just me, but with one exception in more than 50 celebrity Cruises, I've found service and quality of product to be exceptional. That's why I keep coming back and believe that I'm not alone since I always see returning Celebrity cruisers on every cruise.

[ghstudio]

We spent 4 weeks in asia on the millenium last year and had a nice cruise. I know that cruise experience changes dramatically based on who's on board, officers, crew and even passengers. We haven't hit a real disaster cruise yet although we occasionally read about them here. So I'm curious as well as to the specific problems, both with the ship and with your experience...to see if it's something unique to your cruise or something that's more widely spread across Celebrity.

[patty1955]

I don't think Celebrity has fallen at all. I think they are trying to reinvent themselves. Some things work and some don't. Give them time, they'll get it right. They always have.

[TMLAalum]

We had a delightful time on our recent Dynasties & Dragons cruise. Yes, there were glitches, but based on some previous threads and posts, I expected to sail on a rustbucket with crew that could care less about the passengers. I'm happy to say those preconceived expectations were not met!

 

The Millennium was in fine form last month. We had an excellent stateroom attendant, but MDR service could have been improved had the staff not been under noro regimen and had time to adjust to having to take drink orders. Our sommelier was very attentive. I found no fault with our cabin other than the bedskirt could use replacing.

[jkgourmet]

I don't think Celebrity has fallen at all. I think they are trying to reinvent themselves. Some things work and some don't. Give them time, they'll get it right. They always have.

 

With their present corporation (RC/Celebrity), they have only been around for 16 years. That's not exactly a long corporate history to base such a comment, IMHO.

[Leviathan2772]

This is not directed at the OP. In their opinion it wasn't the experience they expected, I respect that.

 

This is just an observation in general.

 

I just find it amazing how quick people are criticize and throw someone or thing overboard. I know everyone has concerns when they are on a cruise. But should your whole experience be judged on a few negative experiences? It seems that many people judge something on that 5% to 10% negative experiences, opposed to the 90% to 95% positive experiences they had. Most of us on CC's Celebrity part of this forum are their biggest fans. I don't know about you, but I try to be a good ambassador for Celebrity when I'm on their cruise as well as here. We as good ambassadors need to further their brand as loyal clients the best we can.

 

Yes, we all have legitimate concerns; costs, quality of dining, activities, safety, etc. This is the forum for that. And yes again, Celebrity does read this forum, because statistically this group is representative of the whole of people who cruise with Celebrity. I just like to remind everyone to take a step back and think of what you write before you publicly humiliate someone or something. Try to abide by the "Golden Rule". If someone was over your shoulder at work and critiquing your every move, you wouldn't like it - huh?

 

Have I ever being guilty of this? Unfortunately, yes. My wife wrote something on a comment card after the first night - booked in a Celebrity Suite aboard Solstice. The next day the bar manager came to our door to discuss our issue - no big deal for me, but huge to the bar manager & my wife. My wife wrote about slow service at Martini Bar. Mind you, it was a very busy night. She was a server in college and seems to be critical of servers and the job the perform. I need to remind her often that she could eat or drink at home - and no, she can't cook or mix a drink. For me, I appreciate how hard these people work for my experience. As with my employees, their busting their a$$ me.

 

C'mon, we're all on vacation "Stay Calm & Relax!" And have a great time...

[ghstudio]

wow...this is amazing. We have no clue as to what problems/issues the OP had...and two of us asked for a little more detail. How about if we give the OP a chance to explain his comment......

[NLH Arizona]

Celebrity has fallen so far off the cliff, that I have two more cruises booked. I've never had a bad cruise experience on Celebrity or any other cruise line, but then again, I don't sweat the small stuff. I'm just thankful that I can take cruises, when so many people just dream about it.

 

I think if you read the reviews, both here and in the review section, you will see that there are more positive than negative reviews.

Edited May 13, 2014 by NLH Arizona

[wallie5446]

Just sent our review from Millennium Asia...shocked at how really poor the ship and crew performed...looking at the other reviews , I'm not alone. Thoughts?

 

Celebrity has fallen so far off the cliff, that I have two more cruises booked. I've never had a bad cruise experience on Celebrity or any other cruise line, but then again, I don't sweat the small stuff. I'm just thankful that I can take cruises, when so many people just dream about it.

 

Ditto!

 

And we just booked our longest sailing yet, after more than 25+ years of being locked into the 7 days max vacation time frame. An 11 day on the Celebrity Equinox! Has X changed some? Yup. But we will learn to 'cruise' with the changes.:D

[patty1955]

wow...this is amazing. We have no clue as to what problems/issues the OP had...and two of us asked for a little more detail. How about if we give the OP a chance to explain his comment......

He did have the chance to explain his comment when he first posted. I've read his review and a number of other reviews from the same sailing. I'm really surprised at how much they sound alike. Three people on the same cruise, complain about the lack of vacuuming. Interesting,I have no idea how often they vacuum.

Having been on a Noro stricken ship (the Millennium), I'll admit it sucks. But I don't blame Celebrity. Considering how much complaining people do, you'd think the crew like jumping every time someone asks.

[gek]

Just read a few recent reviews to see what the OP was talking about. Many of the negative comments seem to stem either directly or indirectly from a recent noro outbreak. There were other unrelated complaints but many seemed a little picky to me (rust on the outside of a ship - who would have thought? Not as fancy and new as the S-class ships - I'm astounded! )

 

On the other hand there are a bunch of extremely positive reviews from the same recent Asian cruises.

 

I have no doubt that some of the complaints and negative reviews are perfectly valid, but I think dealing with a noro outbreak on an Asian cruise during Celebrity's current re-alignment of priorities is bound to cause a flurry of bad reviews.

[We're The Groupnors]

Just read a few recent reviews to see what the OP was talking about. Many of the negative comments seem to stem either directly or indirectly from a recent noro outbreak. There were other unrelated complaints but many seemed a little picky to me (rust on the outside of a ship - who would have thought? Not as fancy and new as the S-class ships - I'm astounded! )

 

On the other hand there are a bunch of extremely positive reviews from the same recent Asian cruises.

 

I have no doubt that some of the complaints and negative reviews are perfectly valid, but I think dealing with a noro outbreak on an Asian cruise during Celebrity's current re-alignment of priorities is bound to cause a flurry of bad reviews.

 

Agreed. Having been on Millie in Asia last year I was interested in the reviews, and most of the negative does have to do with the Noro outbreak. If that's the main issue then the passengers, or at least one passenger, is to blame, as all it takes is one ill passenger to start an outbreak.

[boogs]

wow...this is amazing. We have no clue as to what problems/issues the OP had...and two of us asked for a little more detail. How about if we give the OP a chance to explain his comment......

 

If he wanted my sympathy he would have joined to ask us what he should have experienced to gain some comparison to what he actually experienced, instead of a one line complaint with zero details. If he had any sense he would have provided the link to his review instead of making us search for it. Why should we now go through the trouble of looking for his review? If he wanted us to see it, he should be making it as easy as possible for us to do so.

 

When someone posts what amounts to nothing much, I tend to think about it as just that - nothing much.

Edited May 13, 2014 by boogs

[PoppyandNana]

Having sailed on Celebrity since the early 90's I feel somewhat qualified to offer an opinion. Our last sailing was in July 2013 to the Adriatic. There were aspects that we did not care for: no more trays in the buffet, extremely loud music in the buffet. When we sailed into a quiet port at 7am on a Sunday morning the ship blasted heavy metal music from every outdoor speaker. There was no Campaign when we embarked, not Celebrity's issue but there were hordes of kids from one particular demographic that ran amok throughout the ship. They took over the Hideaway for entire the trip preventing anyone else from enjoying the space. They had water gun fights in the buffet, did the press every button on the elevator thing and chair hogged. Oh my the chair hogs. Unbelievable. By 7am every flat bed lounger was staked out for the entire day. Most chaises around the pool had towels and flip flops on them.

 

I have been on every mainstream cruise line at one point or another. For the most part our experience has been that Celebrity has been superior to RCCL or Princess. For this particular sailing, out of 26 on Celebrity, I would have to put RCCL on the same level as Celebrity. With the changes in the loyalty program and other similar changes I'm afraid that the Celebrity we remember from the past is no more.

 

We are sailing on her Constellation in June. Be interesting to see what that experience will be like.

 

Any negative expressions however have to be offset by their waffles.

[hulamoon]

We are pleased with the on board product. We have cruised enough to know how to book and participate to get what we want.

 

I absolutely believe that there can be horrid cruises, even on the same ship and sailing. To me it is just math. Not everyone meets the same steward, dining time, bartender or is served the same meals. Sure attitude, too high of expectation have some bearing, but not all. I have been grieving and lifted by staff, I have been happy and completely confounded by a manager threatening to fire a staff member in front of me. So as much as I do believe we are responsible for our total experience sometimes all we are responsible for is our reaction to our experience.

 

This is cruise critic, people should feel safe coming here and praising complaining, explaining as long as standards are met. When negative experiences are posted and are met with cheerleading only responses those responses become negative. Why negate someone else's life experience? They have a right to it as much as someone's happy experience.

[TMLAalum]

This is cruise critic, people should feel safe coming here and praising complaining, explaining as long as standards are met. When negative experiences are posted and are met with cheerleading only responses those responses become negative. Why negate someone else's life experience? They have a right to it as much as someone's happy experience.

 

This is right on; however, when no specifics are given about one's experiences, whether good or bad, the poster comes across as either a cheerleader or its opposite. (Is there a Cruise Critic term for a generic complainer?)

[willma]

We were also on a recent Asia cruise and there is no doubt that the experience does suffer from being in noro virus lockdown. I understand that vacuuming is not done under these conditions, possibly because it is thought that it spreads the virus around? Certainly staff were doing the best they could under the circumstances, but there is no doubt they were very hard pressed.

We had a great time, with amazing ports, and a fabulous aft view aqua cabin, but there were many complainers aboard.

[ghstudio]

Just read the review (thanks for the link) and it really doesn't match the OP's first post. I was expecting disasters; I found very little that's new news if you've cruised on Celebrity in the past year or so.

[ClairetoCruise]

We were also on a recent Asia cruise and there is no doubt that the experience does suffer from being in noro virus lockdown. I understand that vacuuming is not done under these conditions, possibly because it is thought that it spreads the virus around? Certainly staff were doing the best they could under the circumstances, but there is no doubt they were very hard pressed.

We had a great time, with amazing ports, and a fabulous aft view aqua cabin, but there were many complainers aboard.

 

 

You write positively about the cruise; therefore, let me ask if the heat and humidity may have affected the crew and the cruisers not accustomed to the extreme weather of SE Asia.

 

Claire

[willma]

Possibly, although I didn't think of that at the time. It certainly was hot and sticky outside.

It didn't help that we lost power to the toilets for most of a day, but that was due to stupidity on behalf of a cruiser trying to put unmentionable items down the toilet....Imagine no toilets working on a ship stricken with noro?? :eek:

[diligaf51]

I have sailed on Celebrity 22 times since my first cruise in 2008. I frankly have seen nothing change that matters to me or my wife. And the Captains Club has the best benefits of any cruise line.

[ClairetoCruise]

Possibly, although I didn't think of that at the time. It certainly was hot and sticky outside.

It didn't help that we lost power to the toilets for most of a day, but that was due to stupidity on behalf of a cruiser trying to put unmentionable items down the toilet....Imagine no toilets working on a ship stricken with noro?? :eek:

 

 

Willma, Thank you for the reply. Heat, humidity, noro, toilet down, tough for all.

Life happens even at sea. My heart is with the crew aboard.

 

Claire

Edited May 14, 2014 by ClairetoCruise

[CathyCruises]

We were on the same cruise as Mr. Horner. I am not a Celebrity apologist, but we had a fantastic time. I did not notice any rust or worn spots on our balcony railing such as pictured. In general, I avoid buffets and consider them to have 'vast quantities of mediocre food'. However, on this cruise, I really enjoyed the curries on a couple of occasions. The MDR food was fine IMO and about what I expected.

 

I do agree about the lack of port info if you don't take ship sponsored excursions. Face it, they are in business to make money and so it's no surprise that they want to direct you to their activities. That's why I and many others do our port research ahead of time, make our own plans, know how to get from the port to the city center on our own, etc. We don't rely on celebrity to get us the info, and thus we are never disappointed.

 

What makes a cruise extra fun are the people you meet and hang out with. Yes, our chatting may be 'useless drivel' to some, but I can guarantee that there was a group of twenty or more who had an absolute ball on this trip. So, if you're having fun, the little irritants don't matter at all and all you are left with is great memories.

[patty1955]

Just read the review (thanks for the link) and it really doesn't match the OP's first post. I was expecting disasters; I found very little that's new news if you've cruised on Celebrity in the past year or so.

That can't be the OPs review, can it? He said he was on the Millennium.