Oft-quoted figures from the Cruise Lines International Association (CLIA) peg the portion of cruise vacations sold by travel agents at 90 per cent. Conversely, agents find that cruise sales often account for half of sales. If the symbiosis between travel agent and cruise line were any tighter, agents would be sporting brilliant white uniforms with embroidered cuffs and epaulets.
Agents aren’t just critical to filling spare cruise ship cabins. They offer qualitative insights that cruise lines can use to promote guests’ loyalty and goodwill. Agents are well positioned to tell which way the wind blows when it comes to the habits and preferences of guests, as well as reaction to new vessels, amenities or itineraries from cruise lines.
Four top-producing north American agents say business is better as the global economy slowly recovers. They all point to considerable improvement in 2013. According to Howard Moses, president, The Cruise Authority, “Business is better, if still only fair, and there’s general restraint.” But bookings lifted in the first half of 2013, he says, after the US presidential election was decided, the impact of Hurricane Sandy on East Coast bookings had faded, and the US Congress had addressed the ‘fiscal cliff’.
“We’re definitely getting fewer mixed signals,” says Moses. “Still, we’ll sell a world cruise one minute, then see a family struggle to fund a four-night Bahamas cruise the next. Yet I’m more optimistic for 2013 – the economy is better, business is picking up.”
Agent Jeffrey Gordon, president of the Gordon Group, similarly finds most of 2013 to have been encouraging. “There seems to be plenty of capacity available, making our year even stronger,” he says. “And our 2014 business has taken off like a rocket, especially in niche markets like river cruising. People are creatures of habit: once they travel, they want to travel again. The overall recovery has been slow, but the stock market has been soaring, translating to an increase in our inquiries, bookings, sales and profit.”
Early 2013 – the so-called wave season – yielded a welcome fringe benefit to agents, says Gordon, with the cruise lines taking a more creative and curative approach to the traditionally vexing issue of the lines’ overcapacity. “Finally the cruise lines have been promoting deals that favour the agency community, whereas before they had reduced prices and commissions to fill space,” says Gordon. “An example would be Celebrity’s new 1.2.3 GO promotion, wherein the cruise line funded the incentive (if only for the wave season). This was one of the most effective promotions I have seen in a long time.”
Even with the economy turning, the buying behaviour of an agency’s new cruise clients may be unpredictable. But agents can still find, in the premium and luxury segments, plenty of repeat cruisers to close. That itself is always revealing and affirming, says Gordon. “Repeat clients still call and are a source of strength,” he says. In addition, it appears booking windows are somewhat longer – except, perhaps, for so-called mass-market or contemporary clients, for whom “we’ve definitely seen a closer-in booking window over the last year”.
In any case, says Gordon, “Avid travellers are still looking for something to excite the tastebuds and are forward-thinking.” Mary Jean Tully, chair and CEO of Canadian agency The Cruise Professionals, agrees: “The clientele I deal with are loyal and continuing, realistic but optimistic. They simply won’t give up their God-given right to travel.”
Generally, the differences between first-timers and repeaters seem to have become more pronounced: for example, first-timers and mass-market types tend to be aggressive shoppers for deals; they don’t necessarily ‘get’ the value of a good agent.
In contrast, premium and luxury clients are indeed Gordon’s creatures of habit, quietly insisting that certain things they want, like cruising, aren’t substitutable. This is especially the case if, while on cruises, they have greater freedom of choice among amenities and freedom from service-related worries. And so those clients have hardly stopped cruising and by no means wish to eschew an agent’s proven services. As to booking windows, agents mostly agree that, in terms of retail business, the more complicated destinations are booking reasonably far out, whereas the easier itineraries still book relatively closer in.
Certainly this has been the case for Amy Jetter, a consultant and founder of Destinations Travel – with some stipulations, that is. She actually asserts that rebounders aren’t very significant in her business and, truth be told, the length of booking windows, for her, has never varied much.
“My clients have been steady all the way through,” says Jetter. “If anything, the lower cruise prices in recent years encouraged them to take advantage of more trips, longer trips, higher categories like suites.” In addition, “Both my group bookings and individual ones continue to be made with normal to long lead times – not closer in than usual. My clients understand that to book earlier is usually in the best interest of all.”
A number of exciting vectors, say the agents, currently enlarge the scope of cruising for their clients. Group, theme and cobranded cruises, says Moses, are on the rise and are forming an ever larger part of his business. He stresses that themed and special cruises are not just important in their own right but for their ability to invigorate demographics and build the cruise business overall. “From our standpoint, we focus much of our efforts on developing and implementing large affinity and thematic groups,” says Moses. “Based on the success of our ‘theme cruise finder’ website (a separate subsidiary of The Cruise Authority), many others are exploring this road, too. A silver lining to the down economy has been that licensing groups and other media-related concerns are simply being forced to investigate new means of gaining ancillary revenue – one of which is developing and co-branding special cruises and/or promoting theme cruises.”
This is an abridged version of an article that appeared in the Autumn/Winter 2013 edition of International Cruise & Ferry Review. To read the full article, you can subscribe to the magazine in printed or digital formats.