TUI Group Q3 Numbers: Cruise Prices Up

Posted on 15 August, 2024 by Spacejunkie2

Mein Schiff 3 photo credit Spacejunkie2 – Flickr images

TUI Group announced its third quarter results and noted that cruise prices are up two per cent for its three brands: TUI Cruises, Marella Cruises and Hapag-Lloyd Cruises.

The three brands will deploy 17 ships during the summer, the company said, with passenger cruise days going up 11 per cent for the coming four quarters thanks to the new Mein Schiff 7, which joined the fleet in June.

Occupancy rates were up at all three brands. The Mein Schiff fleet saw occupancy at 101 per cent, up from 98 per cent a year prior; Hapag-Lloyd was up to 78 per cent from 73 per cent, and Marella Cruises was up to 98 per cent from 95 per cent.

The average daily ticket prices were also up, reported at 207 euros for TUI Cruises, up from 191 euros last year. Hapag-Lloyd saw its daily ticket price at 733 euros, up from 706 euros, and Marella Cruises reported its average daily ticket price at 189 pounds, up from 178 pounds in 2023.

Marella Sending Discovery 2 to Med and Canaries for Winter 2024-25

Posted on 24 May, 2024 by Spacejunkie2

Starting November 7, Marella Cruises will homeport the Marella Discovery 2 in Malaga, Spain for a series of winter sailings before heading to Tenerife and Gran Canaria in December 2024.

The ship was previously slated to sail in Asia.

These itineraries go on sale on May 23.

Chris Hackney, managing director of Cruise for TUI UK & I said: “We are delighted to offer these itineraries out of two of our well-established homeports for this winter. We know guests love the beautiful Canaries and Madeira and as Marella Cruises is part of TUI, we can offer incredible experiences ashore with our destination teams as well as a great onboard experience too. All of these itineraries offer cruise and stay options too, with great flying options across various UK airports.”

“We do appreciate how disappointing it was to those customers who were impacted by the cancellation of our Asia program on Marella Discovery 2, but we are confident with the breadth of the program we have to offer something different to our customers.”

From Malaga, Spain, Marella will offer two itineraries:

Spanish Flavours, departing from November 7, 2024, with visits to Malaga, Palma de Mallorca, Barcelona, Valencia, Cartegena, Gibraltar and porting in Malaga.
Sights and Delights, departing from November 14, 2024, visiting Malaga, Lisbon, Portugal, Cadiz, Casablanca, Cartagena, Motril and Malaga, Spain.

From Tenerife, the Marella Discovery 2 will also offer two new itineraries:

Winter Escape, departing November 28, 2024, with visits to Malaga, Gibraltar, Cadiz, Gran Canaria and Tenerife.
Sail into Spring, departing on March 24, 2025, visiting Gran Canaria, Tenerife, Cartagena, Malta and Limassol, Cyprus.

Modest Growth Forecast for UK Market

Posted on 10 May, 2023 by Spacejunkie2

Celebrity cruise in Southampton photo credit Spacejunkie2 (Flickr)

The UK market has had to absorb additional capacity amounting to 316,000 more passengers, coming out of the pandemic in 2022 and 2023, according to the 2023 Cruise Industry News Annual Report.

The capacity growth was driven by P&O Cruises’ introducing two new ships in short order, the Iona and Arvia, boosting the brand’s capacity from just short of 550,000 in 2019, the last typical operating year, to nearly 800,000 in 2023.

The other major operator in the UK market is Marella Cruises, which will see its capacity grow from approximately 407,000 in 2023 to 440,000 by 2024. It remains at that level, barring any more ship introductions, and maintaining its position as the second-largest brand in the UK.

Thus, the national cruise supply is forecast to see little growth from 2023 to 2029, only increasing from approximately 1.6 million to 1.8 million passengers over the time period.

The P&O and Marella brands typically target different market segments, with P&O in the premium segment and Marella in the more price-conscious so-called budget segment.

Cunard Line is also based in Britain, but also markets its capacity in other countries, such as the United States, Australia, Germany and Japan.

Other more typical British brands include Fred. Olsen, Saga and newcomer Ambassador Cruises, with the latter taking up the slack where Cruise and Maritime have been.

As the second largest national cruise market in Europe, Princess and MSC also have ships dedicated to the UK market and other European and North American cruise lines market.