Bottle Wine Packages

[nslatin]

After cruising extensively with NCL, Carnival and Celebrity we are going on our first Princess cruise on the Discovery Princess (4/17/22).  We have a casino offer and will not have the Princess Plus package.  Does Princess offer multiple bottle wine packages?  Does anyone have any recent pricing & offering information?

 

Thanks

 

Neal

[Astro Flyer]

Prior to the pandemic pause in cruising Princess offered wine packages on cruises of 10 days or longer & haven’t read any reports about it’s current availability. With only 7 day cruises currently available when sailing from the USA it’s unlikely that wine packages are currently available. Maybe after longer cruises begin wine packages will be available again.

[franktown]

Friend just got off his Princess cruise and no wine packages were offered.  It was a 7 day cruise.

[skynight]

My guess is no. In the past offered on longer cruises. 

FYI. You can carry on 1 x 750ml bottle of wine/adult (not cabin) without charge for use in your cabin. You can carry on additional 750ml bottles if you wish. Bottles in excess of the 1 per person are charged a $20 corkage fee. The charge is to your on board account when boarding. These bottles are marked and can be used anywhere on the ship.  

[Astro Flyer]

4 minutes ago, franktown said:

Friend just got off his Princess cruise and no wine packages were offered.  It was a 7 day cruise.

None were offered on Majestic two weeks ago on a 7-day cruise.

[nslatin]

Thanks for the info.  Starts to sound like one and done.

[donaldsc]

24 minutes ago, skynight said:

My guess is no. In the past offered on longer cruises. 

FYI. You can carry on 1 x 750ml bottle of wine/adult (not cabin) without charge for use in your cabin. You can carry on additional 750ml bottles if you wish. Bottles in excess of the 1 per person are charged a $20 corkage fee. The charge is to your on board account when boarding. These bottles are marked and can be used anywhere on the ship.  

 

The issue of whether you should bring your wine on board and pay corkage has been discussed before on CC.  It basically depends upon how much you normally spend on  wine because the corkage is the same for a bottle of 2 buck (now 3 buck) chuck as it is for an expensive wine. 

 

If you normally buy $15/bottle it will cost you at least $30 on board.  Therefore it is advantageous to buy $15/bottle on board for $30 as opposed to paying $35 ($15 for the wine + $20 corkage) to bring it on board.

 

If you normally buy $25/bottle it will cost you at least $50 on board.  Therefore it is advantageous to bring it on board since buying it on the ship will cost you $50 while bringing it on board will cost you $45 ($25 for the wine + $20 corkage).

 

The decision as to whether to buy on board versus bringing it on board totally depends upon the cruise company markup and the price of the wine.  Doing the math is easy.

 

DON

[Cruise Raider]

I asked the guy that runs Vines since the restart and he said they are only offered on longer cruises.  

[jwattle]

@Cruise RaiderI know you were on a B2B; did you ask if that would work? We are going to try for that on our B2B on Majestic in March. 🥂

[suzyed]

4 hours ago, franktown said:

Friend just got off his Princess cruise and no wine packages were offered.  It was a 7 day cruise.

They weren't offered on 7 day cruises even before the pause.

 

[wowzz]

We were on a 14 day European cruise in October. No wine package. 

I wonder if the ubiquitous Princess Plus deal will lead to the demise of the package. 

[jwattle]

15 minutes ago, wowzz said:

We were on a 14 day European cruise in October. No wine package. 

I wonder if the ubiquitous Princess Plus deal will lead to the demise of the package. 

The 25% off per bottle IS a nice thing❣️🥂

[wowzz]

1 minute ago, jwattle said:

The 25% off per bottle IS a nice thing❣️🥂

But you still have to pay 18% service charge !  

[Cruise Raider]

3 hours ago, jwattle said:

@Cruise RaiderI know you were on a B2B; did you ask if that would work? We are going to try for that on our B2B on Majestic in March. 🥂

 

I don't think it will.  We had the beverage package but asked the guy in charge of Vines, he said it was only on longer sailings ... ones of 10 days or more.  

[jwattle]

Just now, Cruise Raider said:

 

I don't think it will.  We had the beverage package but asked the guy in charge of Vines, he said it was only on longer sailings ... ones of 10 days or more.  

Thank you for the reply; we have Princess Plus, so we'll stick with the bottle discount 🥂

[Cruise Raider]

1 minute ago, jwattle said:

Thank you for the reply; we have Princess Plus, so we'll stick with the bottle discount 🥂

 

We have had luck with promising to drink the entire bottle and just paying the upcharge on 5 glasses....both before and after the pandemic pause.  

[jwattle]

12 minutes ago, Cruise Raider said:

 

We have had luck with promising to drink the entire bottle and just paying the upcharge on 5 glasses....both before and after the pandemic pause.  

I like that tactic! Well played my friend; I believe I will borrow that one! ❣️

[jwattle]

33 minutes ago, wowzz said:

But you still have to pay 18% service charge !  

I'll survive 🙂

[Cruise Raider]

1 minute ago, jwattle said:

I like that tactic! Well played my friend; I believe I will borrow that one! ❣️

 

It's worth a try.  Not sure if that's standard practice but they've offered it to us on several cruises already.  We got some nice wines that way ... was even allowed to take them to our room or sent to the dining room for us.  

[Astro Flyer]

3 hours ago, jwattle said:

I know you were on a B2B; did you ask if that would work? We are going to try for that on our B2B on Majestic in March. 🥂

Once I was able to get a wine package on B2B 7-day cruises but doubt if that’s routinely done…we just got lucky & hopefully you’ll get lucky too. 🍷