Cruising Hits New Heights

Ben Bouldin, Royal Caribbean’s UK & Ireland Director, talks to Richard Buckley about a buoyant cruise industry and how his company is shaping up for a fast-growth future...

Ben Bouldin has plenty of statistics at his fingertips about the sizeand scale of Royal Caribbean,and the even bigger scale ofthe global cruise industry.

For example, well over 100 brand new cruise ships worth close to$60 billion are scheduled to be built and delivered between now and 2026. Royal Caribbean, for its part, has 10 new vessels on order. And those new ships, along with the existing fleet, will help fuel the 63% growth that the company is confidently predicting for the next five years or so.

“So if the cruise industry takes a sudden slowdown for any reason, there will be lot of free ships out there,” he jokes. “But that’s not going to happen. The growth we’ve been seeing is very steady and it’s sustainable.”

Bouldin is a regular visitor to Northern Ireland. It’s a place that’s home to a large and loyal Royal Caribbean customer base, many of them regular cruisers and members of the cruise line’s Crown & Anchor loyalty club.

“Northern Ireland is a very strong market for us, and it’s a little different in that a high proportion of cruisers (90% of them) book their holidays through one or other of the very strong travel agencies based here who specialise in cruising.”

Royal Caribbean offers cruise holidays worldwide, but most customers (about 60% of them) from Northern Ireland cruise first from the port of Barcelona in Spain, a couple of hours flying time from Belfast. From there they can progress to the Caribbean and also helped by the arrival and other destinations for their in the Mediterranean of the cruise holidays. And, according to world’s largest cruise ship, Royal Ben Bouldin’s statistics, a healthy Caribbean’s brand new Symphony 50% become repeat customers.

"It's a relatively small market but it's one that grew by 61% from last year to this year, helped by some excellent travel agents and also helped by the arrival in the Mediterranean of the world's largest cruise ship, Royal Caribbean's brand new Symphony Of The Seas. It's spending its maiden season cruising the Med from Barcelona... and plenty of Northern Ireland passengers are flying south to join it.”

People are seeing what a cruise holiday can offer and how it is so different from most land-based holidays, especially package trips to beach resorts. Cruising can offers multiple destinations, it can offer a really wide range of activities, and it can offer real relaxation at the same time.

The Symphony Of The Seas takes cruise ship size and scale to another dimension. Some 360 metres long with a gross tonnage of 228,021, it has 18 decks, a kids water park, ice skating rink, two 43-foot rock climbing walls and a central park area with 20,000 plants. And it can carry more than 5,500 passenger along with its 2,200-strong crew.

It might be the new kid on the block but, for Royal Caribbean, investment is constant. It’s also invested in a major refit of another favourite with NI-based cruisers, the Independence Of The Seas, which offers longer Mediterranean cruises departing from and returning to Southampton.

And the group has continued its expansion by taking a significant stake in Silverseas Cruises, another company with a significant Northern Ireland customer base. The addition of Silverseas means that the group covers a lot of cruising bases through Royal Caribbean itself in addition to Celebrity Cruises and Azamara Cruise Line.

As an aside, but a potentially important one for Northern Ireland, one of Azamara’s ships, the Azamara Pursuit, is currently at Harland & Wolff in Belfast where it is undergoing a £50 million refit under the supervision of the MJM Group.

Ben Bouldin reckons that more and more younger customers are discovering the merits of a cruise holiday. “We’ve all heard the old maxim that cruising is for the overfed, newly wed and almost dead. But, in reality, a lot of younger people and young families are joining us now. In fact, the average age has dropped from the mid-50’s to the early-40’s.

“People are seeing what a cruise holiday can offer and how it is so different from most land-based holidays, especially package trips to beach resorts. Cruising can offers multiple destinations, it can offer a really wide range of activities, and it can offer real relaxation at the same time,” he says.

It’s a formula that seems to work for a lot of people. Royal Caribbean’s customer survey results show a really high level of satisfaction with its cruise holidays. And it continues to work on that formula. “Bigger ships like the Symphony are important, but we also look all the time at the facilities, the dining, the entertainment and the attractions that we offer on board and on our shore excursions,” says Bouldin.

And it’s not just about ships and on-board facilities. Over in the Caribbean, Royal Caribbean has its own private island, Coco Cay, in the Bahamas. It’s currently spending some $200 million to transform the island into what it calls a Perfect Day resort.....including a 13-waterslide water park complete with the tallest waterslide in North America; the

Caribbean’s largest wave pool; a 1,600-foot zip line crisscrossing the island 50 feet in the air and, if that’s not enough, a helium ballon that floats up to 450 feet over Coco Cay. Cruise customers from Northern Ireland, as well as everywhere else, should be able to book cruises departing from Florida which feature Coco Cay from later next year. As a sign of ambition and confidence in a booming cruise marketplace, the Coco Cay investment is hard to ignore.

For Ben Bouldin and his UK & Ireland team, it should mean more cruise bookings. But they’ll need a few more to pay for Royal Caribbean’s investment plans.