Probably our Last Royal Caribbean Cruise - Laundry & Wine

[mjldvlks]

[quote name='MrPete']Find out what your customer wants, and......
[/quote]
As a generality, I suspect they believe they have. And the majority here seems to agree with them.

[madforcruising]

[quote name='MrPete']Find out what your customer wants, and......

They can also put cabins where the Ocean Lab on the ExOS, the conference center, etc. There is SO much available space, I find that arguement hard to believe.[/quote]


I have no doubt they do some research about what their customers want, and reading this thread alone and some more in the past on this topic I get the impression (note this is no scientific poll, but a feeling and opinion) that those wanting the launfry rooms are in the minority.

As for the Oceal lab, Conference center etc.
Those things are hardly located in areas where they would have cabins, while the laundry rooms are exactly taking the place of cabins. In addition Conference rooms are used for onboard activities as well as rented to groups for money aka revenue. The Ocean Lab is not only a PR thing for the company, but probably expanses can be used against tax payments as well.

[MrPete]

[quote name='mjldvlks']As a generality, I suspect they believe they have. And the majority here seems to agree with them.[/quote]

[quote name='madforcruising']I have no doubt they do some research about what their customers want, and reading this thread alone and some more in the past on this topic I get the impression (note this is no scientific poll, but a feeling and opinion) that those wanting the launfry rooms are in the minority.
[/quote]

I could be wrong (wouldn't be the first time), but I'm not getting that from this thread. It seem most people are just defending the lack of them to the OP, with some degree of ridicule along the way. Perhaps a poll is in order.

[mjldvlks]

[quote name='MrPete']I could be wrong (wouldn't be the first time), but I'm not getting that from this thread. It seem most people are just defending the lack of them to the OP, with some degree of ridicule along the way. Perhaps a poll is in order.[/quote]
Point of clarification. I was focusing on the laundry question. I know you are too in this post, but I just wanted to be clear. I get the impression that most folks here don't care whether there is or isn't one. And I don't think RCI charges enough for the laundry for it to be much of a profit center. OP's comment about the "very substantial charge" for laundry was way over the top.

I might agree with you about the wine/liquor policy. It seems the majority of people on the CC board are more concerned about how to get around it. But I suspect RCI's motivation with regard to liquor was different than with the laundry. I don't drink so I don't have a dog in that fight and tend to ignore it.

[olemissreb]

How about a Survivor finale!

 

Never forget sitting on my balcony, partitions opened to the next room, where FIL and I enjoyed a nice wine watching Colby blow it. :)

 

No I hate reality TV - haven't watched a single episode of any of them!

 

I much prefer college sports (football and baseball mainly) in a bar with a bunch of other idiots like me yelling and screaming at a tv! :D

[klingoncruiser]

Ya know, if I canceled every cruise line that I had a few problems with, I would need to stay ashore. Not going to happen.:D

[Aquahound]

Could the lack of self-serve laundromats have anything to do with the court-ordered [I]Save the Waves[/I] program?

[bluegirlum]

BTW, how much does it cost to do your own laundry on Carnival or Princess? Just curious if anyone knows. Do they have detergent for purchase?

And how much is the laundry on RCI? $20 a bag? And it takes a day?

I honestly don't know, so I'm curious. Sometimes I'm willing to pay a little more to not have to do my own, but I'd like to know if it's worth my while.

[Older Party]

[quote name='mustangjoe']Watching television on a cruise is like uh, uh... doing your laundry. I'll do both at home, but on a cruise I want to enjoy every second and not have anything remind me of home. No cell phones and computers as well.[/quote]
Will you marry me? :D

[MJonTravel]

Count me as solidly in the camp of having no interest in doing my own laundry when onboard a ship. I do enough of it at home. And frankly, I don't think the fees they charge are all that high considering that we are a "captive" customer so to speak.

[brett08]

OK. I'm going to end it for me. I will be a first time cruiser on RCCL. I am on RCCL because my friends want it. I have been very comfortable on Princess (everybody gets into that comfort zone and they don't want to give it away.) I like the laundry room and irons, but no big deal. I'll have to see about the wine, but no big deal. People say RCCL is fantastic, so, I'll see. And for those people that don't want to watch TV, if we are cruising and an NFL game is on, I'll watch. Right, coach?:)

[wolfganghowell]

Mr Pete - and anyone else who cares ;) -

Actually I have owned a business (not currently but in the past) So has Mr Wolf. As a business owner, you make decisions based on your market research and what the majority of your clients want. Evidently RCCL has made decisions based on that criteria. And when making those policies, it's evident that not every single customer will accept all of them.

The laundry is priced fairly. They choose not to have laundry facilities. They don't hide this from their customers - it's a well stated fact. Responsible travelers should plan accordingly. Mr Wolf has traveled for weeks at a time - he stays at hotels, they don't have self serve laundry. Are they "bad" hotels? No - far from it. He takes enough clothes, he accepts the hotel upcharges for sending them out or he finds a laundromat in the area.

The wine issue - two words, George Smith. Actually I think there have been several cases of "smuggled booze" being involved in many problems - from behavior causing a passenger to be thrown off the ship, from injury to death. After paying over a million dollars to George Smith's widow because he was drunk (with a large part of the alcohol being smuggled on absinthe), I would bet the liability attorney's went crazy. Unfortunately, the irresponsible ones ruined it for the rest of us. The upshot being that RCCL has a restrictive alcohol policy - which probably covers them if another catastrophe happens with non-ship sold alcohol. Again - the policy is out there for anyone to see before they ever book the cruise. A passenger can accept it as part of the contract or find a cruiseline with a more lenient policy.

Finally - the tv issue. They have to use satellite at sea and as you may know, clarity of signal is dependent on weather. They most likely sign contracts with individual networks and I would imagine that the major broadcast networks have legal contracts and fees that are simply not worth the financial investment for the cruise line. Just my guess, but I work in the "entertainment" business so what do I know? :rolleyes:

Just because someone disagrees with a premise doesn't make them a "cheerleader". Maybe some of us just show impatience when people come back from a cruise and complain about issues that they should have been aware of before choosing the cruise line. We rotate between Celebrity and Royal and I can guarantee that we adjust our expectations accordingly for each line. Of course no one has to agree with a corporate policy but by buying the product, you are accepting the product ON THEIR TERMS.

[vickiw0318]

To my almost neighbor, very well said.

[mustangjoe]

[quote name='MrPete']It's simply options. I'm not worried about only the things that could affect me. :confused:

It's been years since we've used the launderette on a ship that has it, especially since getting free laundry service as a platinum member, but on the ships that do have it, they are always active.

These LARGE ships, and there's no room for a launderette. OK. :rolleyes:[/quote]

[CENTER][SIZE=3][COLOR=red]You do have options, it's called Princess, NCL, etc.:mad:[/COLOR][/SIZE][/CENTER]

[toxicfairy]

Walmart has under ware on sale! hurry stock up before your next cruise!

[beachchick]

As I recall, Norwegian cruises have the same policy in regards of bringing wine on board.

 

I'm being a lazy chick and not going to read all 13 pages to see if anyone already corrected this.

 

NCL allows you to bring wine onboard and charges a $15/bottle consumption fee regardless of where onboard you plan to drink it. This is unlike RCI's old policy where you only got charged the corkage fee if you brought your own wine to the dining rooms or restaurants--Back in the good old days when we were treated more like actual adults and were allowed to bring wine with us for RCI cruises.

 

NCL does not allow passengers to bring hard liquor aboard. They do offer a "bar setup" where you can order 1 liter size bottles from a list (at a hugely marked up rate, but still convenient and less expensive than buying "per drink" in the bars or through room service) and have it delivered to your stateroom at the beginning of the cruise. It's a pretty limited list, IMO, but many people use the option. (Caveat: It's not available on Pride of America due to Hawaii state law.)

 

I have to admit that we wish RCI had passenger laundry facilities, but it has never deterred us from cruising with them and having a wonderful time. We also miss being able to bring wine with us, as well as being able to buy a bottle of liquor in the duty free and paying a consumption fee to take it back to our stateroom. Those days are long gone on RCI. Yet, they remain one of the cruise lines we enjoy.

 

beachchick

[luckyprincess]

How about a Survivor finale!

 

\ :)

Lol! You've got me there! Okay - only for:

1. FOOTBALL - American and Everywhere Else lol

2. Lost finale

3. True Blood finale

 

Everything else I'll be okay dvr'ing. We have planned our cruises when there isn't a big football game happening! :p

[negc]

You do have options, it's called Princess, NCL, etc.:mad:

 

NCL has eliminated its self-serve laundries and have converted the space into more cabins, so that is one less option available. The problem of alcohol seems to be that while RCI once treated all its guests as "adults", a significant number of those guests abused the privilege and spoiled it for the rest of us. You don't need to do much research to find the accounts of raucous activity by out of control drinkers and to see the TV exposes that led to the institution of the liquor policy. As Pogo famously said,

"We have met the enemy and it is us":(

[The Big Booper]

NCL has eliminated its self-serve laundries and have converted the space into more cabins, so that is one less option available. The problem of alcohol seems to be that while RCI once treated all its guests as "adults", a significant number of those guests abused the privilege and spoiled it for the rest of us. You don't need to do much research to find the accounts of raucous activity by out of control drinkers and to see the TV exposes that led to the institution of the liquor policy. As Pogo famously said,

"We have met the enemy and it is us":(

 

As always, Bill is a calm voice of reason and sanity, in a universe of noise.

 

Obviously, part of the settlement in the Smith case and various other falling-overboard-while-smashed cases has been to apply the host reasoning to cruise ships sailing in international waters.

 

If you are a bar owner and you allow a customer to walk out polluted who then gets in a car and kills 4 people, your ass is grass. Similary, if you have a party in your house and some one leaves polluted and gets in a car and kills 4 people, your ass is grass.

 

This reasoning has been forcibly applied to RCCL by the Florida tort bar who will now come down on Carnival and it's subsidiaries. Notice all the drunks falling overboard now are pretty much limited to Carnival.

[brett08]

As always, Bill is a calm voice of reason and sanity, in a universe of noise.

 

Obviously, part of the settlement in the Smith case and various other falling-overboard-while-smashed cases has been to apply the host reasoning to cruise ships sailing in international waters.

 

If you are a bar owner and you allow a customer to walk out polluted who then gets in a car and kills 4 people, your ass is grass. Similary, if you have a party in your house and some one leaves polluted and gets in a car and kills 4 people, your ass is grass.

 

This reasoning has been forcibly applied to RCCL by the Florida tort bar who will now come down on Carnival and it's subsidiaries. Notice all the drunks falling overboard now are pretty much limited to Carnival.

 

Point of clarification. Only in those states that have dram shop laws as far as serving to people who then do something stupid. I know it's a minor point, but some states don't have these laws. Just a minor point, I'm not forcing the issue.:)

[brett08]

Point of clarification. Only in those states that have dram shop laws as far as serving to people who then do something stupid. I know it's a minor point, but some states don't have these laws. Just a minor point, I'm not forcing the issue.:)

Also, your homeowner's policy, under the general liability portioin will defend and pay for any damages as this result. Your personal umbrella wil follow suit. So, if you have wild parties, better to have a big amount for your umbrella.:)

[brett08]

Point of clarification. Only in those states that have dram shop laws as far as serving to people who then do something stupid. I know it's a minor point, but some states don't have these laws. Just a minor point, I'm not forcing the issue.:)

 

I'm talking about your bar owner situation, and also, liquor stores.:)

[jbond]

Obviously, part of the settlement in the Smith case and various other falling-overboard-while-smashed cases has been to apply the host reasoning to cruise ships sailing in international waters.

Not obvious to me. The ruling was in place when George Smith fell overboard. Those that believe that the ban is to save us from ourselves are welcome to believe that, personally, I believe it's all about the bottom line.

[browneyes7]

I´ve been mostly on cruises of 10+ nights, my longest so far on RCI was 16 nights and I didn´t miss laundry facilities a bit. I´ve sailed on three different ships / lines so far that offered laundry facilities and didn´t even think of using them. My next cruise will be 18 nights on Princess with pre and post nights and I´m not going to do laundry on that one either.

I have to fly to the ports and am an overpacker and not a small guy, however I don´t have a problem to pack enough to last 3 or 4 weeks without having to do laundry.

 

After doing three long (28, 22, 28 days) European cruises, I love being on a ship that has a self-serve laundry. The two Princess ships we were on had them....the RCL ship did not. With each of these cruises, I have packed less and less clothes because of the hassle of dragging luggage around Europe and in airports. On the RC cruise, I washed my clothes out by hand. I refuse to pay $20 for a small bag of clothes to be washed. Being on a ship that has the self-serve laundry for those of us who want to use it, is fantastic.:)

[madforcruising]

After doing three long (28, 22, 28 days) European cruises, I love being on a ship that has a self-serve laundry. The two Princess ships we were on had them....the RCL ship did not. With each of these cruises, I have packed less and less clothes because of the hassle of dragging luggage around Europe and in airports. On the RC cruise, I washed my clothes out by hand. I refuse to pay $20 for a small bag of clothes to be washed. Being on a ship that has the self-serve laundry for those of us who want to use it, is fantastic.:)

 

I´ve never used that laundry bag. I simply have enough clothes packed to get through my vacation without the need of laundry. I do send stuff to the cleaners onboard though as it´s cheaper than at home.

 

I think we can discuss the topic for years without getting a result. Some will need the laundry rooms and others not. Some cruiselines will have them and others not. I will cruise on ships that have them and on those that don´t have them. If those who need them decide to cruise on a ship that does not have them is up to them. At this point it seems that NCL eliminated them (at least that´s what I get from some posts here) and RCI seems to have no desire to add them to their ships. They might loose very few passengers that feel such a strong need for laundry rooms to base their cruise decision on this, but as far as I´m concerned I still can see the decision to not have them as the right business decision, especially seeing the right now running poll with so far less than 50% voting yes for a laundry room. Like it or not it´s my opinion. Will I stop cruising if they reverse their decision - no of course not. We are living in a free world to choose that product that fits our needs the best.