Bargain and Expensive Cruises compared

In the past week a cruise journalist has reported that a top end cruise liner, Crystal Serenity, is sailing with only half capacity – 550 passengers on a ship which can comfortably accommodate 1070. She didn’t give crew figures, but the standard complement for Serenity is 650, so if they are fully staffed, it’s a cruise where the crew outnumber the passengers, surely a phenomenal service ratio!

Crystal cruises are not cheap – you’re looking at around £3,500 per person for a 12 day cruise.

On the other hand, the bigger, more middle-market lines, are simply cutting their margins to the absolute minimum to fill their ships. So if you’re travelling with Royal Caribbean, P&O, or NCL, you’ll be getting a great deal – a bargain cruise. It’s easy to find a 11-12 day cruise for £900 at present, for example.

However, there’s a bit of a catch – sail with Crystal and all that crew capacity will be devoted to giving you the best possible experience, because their margin is already made. Sail on a cruise liner where break-even is the best the cruise line can hope for and you will find yourself on the end of some pretty hard sells drinks, premium restaurants, the spa, the photographer (who is usually a nuisance anyway), trips ashore and so on … you can bet that every twenty minutes somebody will by trying to sell you something to improve the profitability of the cruise and that can get annoying and stressful, so you pays your money and you takes your choice – more cost, less hassle, less cost, more hard-sell!