price drops, when?

[Colo Cruiser]

That is irrelevant to my comment. Yes, I KNOW the ships always sail full. But my response was to this

 

Of course its relevant.

No they are not always full but the sign is always there.

 

I always assumed that sign was there to stop people trying to change cabins, try and get a cheap upgrade etc. As has been mentioned, if there are a few cabins available, that does allow for some flexibility in the event of an occupied cabin becoming uninhabitable due to some plumbing issue for example, but no need to let anyone know about them.

 

Yes!! I say the comment in jest.

Of course they always have cabins available.

[Pam in CA]

Carnival Corp (which owns Princess) has said in meetings with stock analysts they are adopting a philosophy of sailing with a few (maybe about 1%) cabins unsold rather than have deep discounting to fill up the ships.

This is one of the new marketing policies Princess is now following. The other is to offer upsells than give free upgrades to create availability of the lower, and cheaper, cabin categories. Not hogwash at all.

 

It's a gamble whether to wait for a price reduction or not. Sometimes you win, more often you lose. There have been some itineraries that Princess literally couldn't give away. For instance, the short 3-4 day getaways. In 2016, there are far fewer of them. Whenever an itinerary has to have a sale or steep discounts to fill the ship, expect ships to be redeployed or itineraries changed. Economics 101: supply and demand. When supply is reduced, demand pricing goes up.

 

Always follow the money. It might take two years to implement but Princess will always sail ships where they can charge the most per-cabin and make the most profits.

 

For savings, your best bet is to use a TA that books a very high volume of Princess cruises and discounts. To my knowledge, I have very rarely paid more for a cruise than the lowest sale price and the few times I have, it was because I book as a solo and often, sales are for double occupancy only.

Edited August 13, 2015 by Pam in CA

[Astro Flyer]

Those short getaway cruises from LA & FL were a great "giveaway" for passengers.

 

This fall there are more cruises from Vancouver including coastal cruises to LA & roundtrips to Hawaii. I've seen the 3-day coastals for as little as $79 which is cheaper than flying. Roundtrips to Hawaii are currently as low as $999 which is $300 less than from SF and $350 less than from LA. The lower Vancouver prices could be an attempt to generate sales to Canadians who are experiencing a worse exchange rate to the US$.

 

But the bottom line is they must not be selling well & are being discounted...more supply than demand, There are many variables to pricing but with prices from Vancouver to Hawaii about 25% less than from LA maybe their attempt to add additional Vancouver cruises this fall will not be cost-effective for Princess & ships will be redeployed elsewhere in the future.

Edited August 13, 2015 by Astro Flyer

[ISABELLA]

Carnival Corp (which owns Princess) has said in meetings with stock analysts they are adopting a philosophy of sailing with a few (maybe about 1%) cabins unsold rather than have deep discounting to fill up the ships.

 

RCCL is doing the same. At the last Royal Caribbean phone conference, they said:

 

"I wanted to update everyone on the early signs that we're seeing from my price integrity policy. As a reminder, we adopted this policy to address the kind of deep last-minute discounts that are so frustrating to our guests and our travel partners and ultimately so damaging to our brands. Depending on the sourcing of the type of cruise, the last-minute might be 10, 20, or 30 days out but from that point on our policy is to hold our price at the prior level."

 

They said this will take educating passengers that it is better to book early than to wait hoping to get reduced pricing at the last minute.

They all say that, but they do completely opposite. X is offering very deep price reductions for sailings that are not full ( for example: Summit repo 6 days - inside from $700/pp down to $399/pp, balcony to $550/pp)

So Cruise Lines will do anything and everything to fill cabins for most ships and itineraries.