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2 Variety Cruises VARIETY CRUISES I PROFILE
The yacht cruise experience Mr Venetopoulos is very clear about the USP of Variety Cruises: “It’s the overall cruise experience. It’s the size of the fleet, the Greek hospitality and the Greek twist that
A bespokeodyssey
The concept is providing seven-day life-enriching experiences at sea that allow the fleet’s guests to go deeper into the destinations. Deeper into the culture, deeper into the communities, deeper into the culture, so the limited collection allows returning guests to experience the same destinations by going deeper per the thematic.
Variety Cruises is a Greek small cruise line offering immersive sevenday life-enriching adventures at sea. Filippos Venetopoulos, CEO, discussed his vision for the company with Phil Nicholls. T he Covid pandemic hit the cruise industry hard. Filippos Venetopoulos took over Variety Cruises as CEO in 2020 on the passing of his father and inherited a business with zero revenue. “I took over a 70-year-old start-up; that’s how I see our business,” said MrThisVenetopoulos. ‘start-up’began in 1949 when Diogenis Venetopoulos launched Zeus Tours Company. The company evolved into Variety Cruises in 2006 under the leader ship of Lakis Venetopoulos, in a merger with Hellas Yachts. Filippos Venetopoulos is now the third generation of the family at the helm of the business as it builds up again after the global pandemic. Variety Cruises operates a fleet of eight small cruise vessels. The fleet varies in size from 17 to 36 cabins, operated by a team of 250 employees. Variety offers 12 itineraries visiting 16 countries across four continents, operating 290 days a year and carrying, annually, around 15,000 passengers. As to be expected for a Greek company, the Variety portfolio features cruises around the Aegean and the eastern Mediterranean. Variety also provides a selection of cruises across the globe including ones exploring Tahiti, the Seychelles, West Africa and Costa Rica. The Limited Collection cruise packages from Variety feature itineraries devoted to themes such as Aegean wine, unexplored Greek Islands or a culinary cruise in the Seychelles.
“A Variety cruise is about exploring the destination, it’s going into small beaches that only yachts can reach, it’s going into marinas instead of cruise terminals. It’s swimming off the back of the boat and having kayaks where you can paddle out to the beach and enjoy a barbecue. It’s alfresco dining, sleeping on the roof deck and watching the stars. It’s a very small boat yacht cruise experience.”
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Fleet expansion
Alongside increasing the range of locations served by Variety Cruises, Mr Venetopoulos is exploring options to increase the number of vessels in the company’s fleet. “Operating 60 small cruise yachts is an achievable target as part of a steady growth plan with the right distribution, the right branding and the right people supporting and creating our bespoke cruise experi ences,” he said. 2022 saw the first steps in this ambi tious growth plan. A cruise around Tahiti and French Polynesia was added to the Variety destination list. The themed Limited Collection Cruises option is another new addition to the portfolio.
we bring. We try and sell the destination while being on a very comfortable boutique yacht, with a soft adventure touch.
“There are many destinations that we’re not currently visiting,” he said, “Places in Asia like Indonesia, Thailand, Malaysia, Japan and the Philippines. Then there are other possibilities like the Maldives or the Caribbean islands; these are places where we could deploy a year-round operation.”
To be a ‘start-up’, even one with a 70-year history, is all about growth. Mr Venetopoulos has ambitious plans for the future of Variety Cruises.
Variety Cruises is embarking on a fleet upgrade program over the next five-to-seven years. The schedule includes both a refit of the internal furnishings and improvements to the efficiency of the engines. These upgrades run in parallel with the boat building program at Variety Cruises.
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In 2019, Variety Cruises banned all single use plastic on its fleet and the refit pro gram reduces the ecological impact of each vessel. An example of the latter is the Callisto, launched in the 1960s, which is scheduled to be refitted with hydro-elec tric propulsion. Three foundational pillars “We are also engaged with our Variety Cruises Foundation, which focuses on three core pillars,” continued Mr Venetopoulos. “For us, corporate
“The latest ship we built was in 2012, which was the Variety Voyager, a 68m mega-yacht,” explained Mr Venetopoulos “One of the unique aspects of Variety Cruises is how we are a 360 degree, ver tically integrated business, which means we design, build, operate and distribute ourGrowthvessels.”inthe shipbuilding arm of Variety Cruises is another plank of Mr Venetopoulos’ plans. Each aspect of this plan is conducted with growing sustain ability goals. “We seek to grow not only as a business in terms of numbers and size, but as a busi nes s with eco-evolution as our key goal, said Mr Venetopoulos. “We are committe d to having a plan of action over the next course of years to gradually lower our carbon emissions.”
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6 Inside Marine responsibility is not solely sustainability, which is a massive topic in the industry, but it’s about understanding our social impact as well.”
The first core pillar of the Variety Cruises Foundation is diversity and inclusion exploring how to support female captains and staff to help them break any barriers they face. The cruise industry has a history of gender roles, which the foundation is seeking to banish.
“Our inclusion goes further by sup porting the LGBTQIA+ communities which are facing a wide range of challenges in the geopolitical sphere, especially as we serve a number of different destinations with a different perspective on human rights,” stated Mr Venetopoulos. “Our close affiliations with the Trevor Project (the leading suicide prevention line for LGBTQIA+ youth), the IGLTA and other organisations are key to the continuing education of our team and communities, as well as that of safely catering for all guests regardless of background or gender identification.
“The second pillar is around education for all,” Mr Venetopoulos said. “My father built a school in West Africa with five class rooms.” With support from the foundation , this site has grown to include a well and a farm, building a new community in the area. Art plays a key role in our contribu tion in the education field as we seek to support education via the lesson most global of all; art. Examples include our collaboration with INSIDE OUT and French artist JR in The Gambia.”
Mr Venetopoulos has clear objectives for Variety Cruises : “We’ve been working on our 2050 vision of where we see the business. Our goal is to absorb 1% of the cruising market through building and operating an eco-friendly fleet of 60 small cruise boats around the world.”
This vision is driven by Mr Venetopoulos’ personal enthusiasm for Variety Cruises: “What gets me excited is the heritage, the responsibility of the people we support and the impact we have in the destination Our vision is basically to create a better world at sea. We’re always open for part nerships and investments and support in delivering our vision.” n
While addressing the above challenges, Variety Cruises is also facing the operating challenges of the business. Mr Venetopoulos acknowledged how fuel costs are affecting industries across the board. More specific to Variety Cruises is the difficulty of recruiting qualified staff when the industry stood idle for two years and people drifted away in search of employment. Recruitment remains a test, even though Variety Cruises needs only 18 staff for a ship, not the 2,000 or more of the larger liners.
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The Foundation’s third pillar is clean oceans for all, which deals squarely with sustainability, carbon emissions, plastic reduction and grey waters. This pillar is an objective for the whole cruise industry, but Mr Venetopoulos is clear on the value of taking positive action: “The more you are proactive instead of reacting, then the better you can deal with these issues.”
