Monday, December 4, 2023
Next year is looking like a banner year for cruise vacations.
This is because travellers across all income and budget levels have been booking voyages. The number is at greater volumes than even before the COVID-19 pandemic.
It is according to U.S. cruise operators and travel agents.
Travellers are looking to cruises in 2024 because they are still cheaper than land-based alternatives. With occupancy levels approaching pre-pandemic levels, operators plan to hike prices in coming months.
Even as travellers have cancelled or postponed planned vacations to the Middle East, cruise bookings will still hit record levels in 2024. Analyst Patrick Scholes said this.
Prior to the Oct. 7 attacks in Israel, industry-wide bookings for 2024 were about 25% higher than in 2019 for bookings in 2020.
Bookings in November for 2024 were about 20% higher than the same period in 2019, Scholes said.
About 35.7 million passengers may cruise in 2024, up from 31.5 million in 2023.
It is 6% more than the amount of passengers that set sail in 2019, according to the Cruise Lines International Association (CLIA).
The one thing holding back bookings?
Enough capacity to deal with all of the demand. Carnival (NYSE:CCL) CEO Josh Weinstein in September said volumes for 2024 will recede as the company could run out of inventory to sell despite a 5% increase in capacity from 2023.
Smaller operators say volumes are overflowing.
Oslo-based private luxury cruise line said bookings are so strong for 2024 and 2025, that they have already opened bookings for autumn of 2026, according to its CEO.
Royal Caribbean told investors that in the third quarter, two-thirds of its guests were either on a cruise for the first time or using Royal Caribbean for the first time.
The company’s repeat bookers have doubled, according to a report. Online travel companies are taking notice of the cruise boom.
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