Suddenly most of the cruise lines put policies in place that prevented travel agents from advertising prices different than those a consumer could find by booking directly with the cruise line. And indeed, Royal Caribbean and Celebrity cruise lines prohibited travel agents from selling cruises on their ships for anything less than the cruise line itself is charging. The other cruise lines, while forbidding travel agents from advertising reduced rates did allow them to discount the cabin prices to those who contacted the agencies directly -via telephone call, e-mail, or walking into the agency.

The cruise consumer got the shaft!! Let’s roll back the clock just a bit to before these policies were put in place.

Before these policies arose any of us could simply surf the Internet to check for pricing on cruises we were interested in. Those travel agents who were willing to discount a portion of their commissions to aid them in attracting customers, or to keep their customers loyal, were allowed to do so. Not that anyone would, but if they chose to they could sell the cruises at a loss.

To understand that premise, one must realize that the cruise lines pay the travel agents commissions on their sales. That commission comes out of the fare, not as an add on to the cost to the consumer. Many people seem to believe that it costs them extra to use a travel agent, and that is simply a false premise. If that were the case, buying the cruise from the cruise line should be less expensive because the cruise line is not paying a travel agent. Fact is that doesn’t happen.

So, understanding that,… back to the way it “used to be”.

Prior to the placement of what the cruise lines refer to as Flat pricing policies we could very easily price shop, looking for the very best deals we could find on cruises. With the growth in the Internet this led to many large agencies coming to the fore, that became known as discounters. These agencies were willing to work on very small margins (keeping their commissions to a minimum) to build businesses that thrived and grew based on large volumes; simply put make less on each sale, but sell lots and lots of cruises.

There is no question that this put pressure on the more traditional travel agencies who felt because their costs of operation were higher they had to keep their commissions higher to keep their businesses afloat, and to make a profit.

They felt they were not on a “level playing field” with the discounters. Though in my view they certainly were. They were perfectly able to compete with the discounters if they CHOSE to. However, instead they chose to petition the cruise lines to regulate the prices for them, and dictate that their commissions remain in tact.

It’s my opinion that they asked the cruise lines to eliminate competition in their industry by regulating prices. And that regulation has led to customers getting the shaft, by being forced to pay higher prices.

Yes, pricing competition still exists within the cruise industry, between cruise lines trying to appeal to the consumers. However, that same condition existed, and would continue to exist if the flat pricing policies did not exist. What has happened is that consumers are paying upwards of 10% more for their cruises because the flat pricing policies are in place.

Another result of these pricing policies has been the cruise lines getting very heavily into the business of selling cruises themselves directly to the customer. This could be a good thing if the cruise lines were to discount direct bookings by the amount they would normally pay a travel agent. However, that isn’t the case. It doesn’t happen.

Ironically, the very travel agents who petitioned the cruise lines for these regulatory pricing policies, now find the competition for business has expanded. Besides competing against other travel agencies, they are now also competing for business with the cruise lines… which in some ways makes me chuckle. But that chuckle isn’t nearly as satisfying as lower prices for cruises!

There are still some options left for the consumer in some of the cruise lines flat pricing policies. Some, like all the Carnival Corporation companies for example, though forbidding travel agents from advertising lower prices, do still allow them to discount their prices (by reducing their commissions) if the customer contacts them directly.

This means if you contact travel agents directly you should be able to find those who will still discount. The system does require a bit more work on your part, other than surfing web sites, but the savings can be worth the effort, so don’t give up. Don’t simply accept the situation and be another consumer getting the shaft. Be a smart customer bucking systems that are unfair to you, and save yourselves BIG $$$$.

 - A View from the Kuki Side of Cruising -

This is your editor, Paul. I just want to welcome you to our cruise blog and get right to posting.

Times are tough right now, economically, and many of you may not be cruising as much as you used to. I am curious how dutracted from your favorite vacation you are right now?

First of all - these recent hurricanes are not exactly putting me in the mood to book a cruise in two weeks. Heaven knows where we might end up cruising to.

Next of all - we have the economy. Gas prices are outrageous, and many of us are struggling to pay bills for energy and heating oil, or air conditioning as the case may be. A lot of us have had our home equity lines of credit reduced, so money is not as easy to find as it was a few years ago.

Lastly - it’s election season, and I for one cannot tear myself away from the television. I want to hear the latest updates on the candidates. I’m on a 24 SECOND (not hour) news cycle.  Now that is a new concept we never heard before, the “news-cycle”. I guess in the old days we had a 24-hour news cycle, meaning we had the newspaper arrive every morning, essentially givin us yerterdays news (which we considered today’s news, but it was all written the day before). And we had the 6:00 news on a major network.

Today, we have 24-hour news channels on cable, and we have the Internet. I want the latest news NOW.

Strangely, with all the other news happening right now, the cruise news cycle has really slowed down. There just is not that much happening right now. This will change however - and the timing couldn’t be better.

Right after the election, on November 17 to be exact,  Celebrity Solstice is set to debut. Now, the vitally important thing about this ship is that it is a whole new class of ships set to debut between 11-17 and through 2012.

We will be seeing new ships from not only Celebrity, but also NCL, Princess, Carnival, Oceania Cruises, Silversea, Seabourn and most impressively of all - the next BIGGEST CRUISE SHIP IN THE WORLD: Oasis of the Seas.

Oasis of the Seas, coming from Royal Caribbean, is going to be a game-changer - there is no better way to describe it. This ship is SO innovative that it will be like nothing anyone has ever seen before. For our review of the ship,  please go here:

  Oasis of the Seas

This ship will be 220,000 gross tons, 1/3 bigger than the world’s biggest cruise ships, which are in themselves much larger from the next largest cruise ships. The only other ships that come close from any other cruise line are barely half the size of the what Oasis will be. Oasis will debut in December 2009. By then, I am sure everyone will be interested in cruising once again. No more bad economy, election, hurricanes, etc. Whoever wins the eection - I am just waiting foor things to get back to normal. Comments are more than welcome below:

Politics and Cruising

by Paul Motter
We went to Alaska on August 13 and asked locals what they thought of Sarah Palin as VEEP. If I knew she was under consideration three weeks ago, can she really be the “surprise” many people suggest? In any case, after visiting Alaska I believe Sarah Palin is far more “real” than the media appears to regard her.

Hubbard Glacier in Juneau Alaska.
I wonder if some Americans don’t take her seriously because they don’t take Alaska seriously. Travel agents tell of people asking if Alaska requires a passport and accepts U.S. dollars. I can tell you that Alaska is not only all-American, it is über-American. The citizens are hardy and independent, and we found a very high regard for their governor - despite “trooper-gate” which was no secret.

Why am I using a cruise newsletter to discuss Sarah Palin? Because traveling gives you a unique perspective. Alaska is surprisingly temperate, and it covers an area greater than 20% of the lower 48. The Baltic Sea area in Europe, that continent’s geographic equivalent to Alaska, is home to more than 250 million people. So, I believe Alaska has a huge role in our nation’s future.

Juneau derives 90% of its tourism from cruise ship visitors, and Sarah Palin knows the cruise industry. No matter who wins the election, I am glad for the recognition that she has received.

I took a quick look into cruise politics for this newsletter. Travel Weekly is reporting Governor Palin backed the industry when the Alaska legislature tried to impose levies on onboard sales and tour operations. She kept our cruise fares lower, but increased state coffers by socking it to the oil industry, increasing two-fold the amount of the yearly checks each Alaska citizen receives from the oil rent trust fund.

What about John McCain? Sarah wouldn’t be alone is knowing cruise industry issues. He introduced the U.S. Cruise Ship Tourism Development Act of 1999 with Senators Kay Bailey Hutchison (R-TX), Dianne Feinstein (D-CA) and Frank Murkowski (R-AK) as co-sponsors. That bill allows cruise ships to visit successive U.S. ports, as denied by the Passenger Vessel Services Act of 1886. It limits these visits to repositioning cruises.

“America’s cruising public has been denied the opportunity to cruise to many attractive U.S. port destinations, and those ports have been denied the economic benefits of those visits because of a law that was written over 100 years ago,” McCain said. Other parts of the legislation also led to the creation of NCL-America which provided jobs for U.S. seamen and maritime union members. He found a way to please cruise enthusiasts and help the unions at the same time.

Compare that to Minnesota’s James Oberstar (D-MN), head of the House transportation committee. He has taken it upon himself to deny the Delta Queen Steamboat the right to continue operating as a passenger vessel. He is withholding a piece of legislation Congress has previously passed seven times. Oberstar doesn’t like that, so this year he is holding the bill in his committee - denying a fair vote.

Why? Since the last time he personally voted FOR the Delta Queen bill his local maritime union now opposes it. He denies the union is the reason, but that’s the only thing that has changed. Whether you agree that this National Historic Registry steamboat deserves to continue operating or not, doesn’t it make sense to at least allow the full House to vote on it?

What else is Congress doing concerning the cruise industry? All I could find on Google were bills to enhance “cruise safety” by requiring extensive reporting of all reported crimes, whether subsequent investigation led to prosecution or not. Most of these reports will never even be investigated. This casts a pall over the cruise industry that it doesn’t deserve. Would you like it if Congress passed a law saying every accusation concerning you (even peripherally) was to be made public whether or not you had your day in court?

Congresspeople involved in these anti-cruise industry bills include Democrats Doris Matsui (CA) in the house and John Kerry (MA) in the Senate. There are some Republicans co-sponsoring the House bill (Shays, CT), But Matsui and Kerry are the most vocal cruise industry critics. Two other bills that never became law were S.793 (sponsored soley by five Democrats) and H.R. 1636 sponsored by 46 Democrats and two Republicans. These bills were to regulate cruise ship discharge, but neither were ever passed, even with a Democratic congress.

Why propose cruise bills that never go forward? When certain interest groups get vocal enough they introduce legislation and get their pictures in the papers. But ultimately nothing actually changes. Whether you are for or against these bills, there is no way you appreciate the futility of these Congressional dog and pony shows.

This is not an endorsement of either party - just a snapshot of what I found. I Googled both Obama and Biden with “cruise ship” and found just one article, Obama criticizing using Carnival cruise ships for emergency Katrina housing where more than 8000 lived aboard and over two million meals were served. For three ships’ use for six months Carnival was paid over $200 million.

No matter what, there are obviously more important issues in this election than the cruise industry, but a lot of Americans depend on the cruise industry for a living, it contributes $35 billion/year to our economy.

In the coming weeks and months I’ll be trying to share my views, opinons, and my own slant on cruising, and the cruise industry with you. At times we’ll attempt to take a humorous look at some of the happenings, and when it’s called for, a more serious tone.  I won’t be shy about posting my views about what may be seen as controversial items, and I don’t expect you to be shy about expressing your opinions right back to me. In fact I’m counting on it. Let’s just be respectful of each others views, even when we strongly disagree.

One of the first articles I wrote for CruiseMates when the site first went public was a debate; the topic was small ships vs mega-ships, and I wrote about my preferences, and the advantages I saw in the “Mega-ships”. At the time the “Mega-ships” I was speaking of were just over 100,000 tons (GRT). Today’s big buzz in the industry is the up and coming Royal Caribbean Oasis of the Seas - at more than twice that size; 220,000 GRT.

So now we’re left to come up with a new “tag” to describe the various ship sizes. Do we call all the ships 150,000 tons and over MONSTER ships? Well, that seems to carry with it a bit of a negative connotation. On the flip-side, do we now call 100,000 ton ships “medium-sized”? Trying to say ships that large are “medium-sized” would likely get stuck in my throat. While I wait for all the outstanding Public Relations writers to come up with the perfect “tags” for their brochures I’ve decided that I’m still going to refer to the ships in the 100,000 ton range as Mega-ships, and I’m going to call the larger ones built, and about to be built, those “REALLY HUGE SUCKERS”.

Now, those “REALLY HUGE SUCKERS” have excited a great many people. In fact, at present thousands await each and every new announcement about the REALLY HUGE SUCKER, Oasis of the Seas. Bookings have recently opened, and people are lining up to place their deposits.

I have to admit I’m not one of those. I do love creature amenities on ships, and that’s perhaps one of the reasons I did like the move from 40,000 ton ships, to 70,000 ton ships, to 100,000 tons plus. With larger ships, came larger pool decks, and one of my favorite features was the addition (because of space availability) of more than one swimming pool.  Some designers opted for indoor atrium-style pools, which I’m personally not that fond of. I am however a fan of two full outdoor pools, though having one of the two with a removable maga-drome roof are a nice comprise in case of bad weather. All of this might seem odd when you learn I’m not a big fan of swimming. I am however a big fan of sunshine, with umbrella drink in hand, people watching, while staring out at miles and miles of sea.

And it’s the “staring out at miles and miles of sea” where the REALLY HUGE SUCKERS lose me. I of course haven’t seen the Oasis design yet, but on her predecessors like the Voyager Class I found the pool deck to be a very small area for the size of the ship, and the size of the passenger loads. These ships seem to drive much of the action on the ship to their indoor Promenade decks, which in my view are much like a visit to a mall. Which by the way was a significant turn from Royal Caribbean’s earlier Vision Class of ships, which I always described in my reviews as the ships with Walls of Glass. On those Vision Class ships the atriums were virtually surrounded with decks high windows, and you could sit in a number of bars and look out at the sea; a far superior design for my tastes.

I know there’s many of you who simply love the Rock Climbing Walls, and the Flow Riders, and whatever the next trick ride innovation that may be coming along. The people who do love those, are also probably those who also love theme parks and fairs, and frankly those numbers are likely higher than the those who are “stick in the muds” or “wall flowers” like me. At 58 I’m just getting to be an “old foggie” who wants to sit and enjoy time on a sunny deck, with glimpses to appreciate the awe of the ocean, enjoy great conversation with fellow cruisemates. Now I do enjoy some “fun activities” as well, but I enjoy the more spontaneous and sometimes mischievous interactive activities that we’ve been known to come up with the odd time.

I’d certainly be interested in hearing your thoughts. Are you chomping at the bit, credit card in hand, waiting to book the next REALLY HUGE SUCKER that escapes from a shipyard?

And, btw, do you have a better name for them than REALLY HUGE SUCKERS? If so, I may want to be your agent to sell the new classification to the cruise lines for their brochures…… and hundreds of cruise industry writers will be forever indebted to you.

- A View from the Kuki Side of Cruising -

Hello fellow cruisers..

Our first post in this new blog was written on September 11, 2008. In today’s newsletter we reviewed the shock to the nation after the tragedy, and also told the not-so-well-known story of what the cruise industry endured that day. Here is the post:

September 11^th and Travel
Seven years ago today we all stared in shock as the twin towers burned and suddenly collapsed before our eyes. Then came the indignation. But probably the emotion that stuck with me the longest after the attack was uncertainty; about how life would be in the coming days, weeks and years.

It took several years for some people to regain the courage to fly again, but personally I feel like a hero. My partner and I had a cruise scheduled in Europe the following week, and we decided not to let the terrorists beat our hearts and minds. For the September 13, 2001 version of this very newsletter we used the headline “We Choose to Fly!” And as far as I recall, we were among the first journalists anywhere to state that in public.

And so I did fly to New York City from Phoenix on September 17, and we flew from Newark to Europe on September 19. On my way in I flew right over the tip of Manhattan and could still see the burning wreckage of the twin towers from the air, the smoke trailing southeast over Coney Island for miles out to sea. With our public decision not to let the event affect our travel plans I like to think we gave courage to our readers to keep living the good life those terrorists wanted to deny us.

There were many heroes around the 9/11 events; but some you may not hear about were the cruise lines like Princess, NCL, Carnival and Celebrity with ships home-ported in New York City that summer. Those cruise lines had ships full of passengers out to sea when the tragedy occured, and when the New York Port Authority closed the New York harbor these ships were not allowed to return to New York. Adding to the challenge, all of the nation’s planes were grounded.

The crew on those ships went far beyond the call of duty those critical days that followed. The cruise lines opened up the ship’s phone lines (back when satelite calls were charged at $12/minute) to all people who had relatives in New York City. The staffs comforted the bereaved who knew people in the twin towers, and those people who were unsure of a loved one’s whereabouts. They all held prayer vigils in the punlic theaters and kept alive the tradition we all love and respect so much in this cruise industry; caring for people.

For a particularly poignant interview by one cruise director who led one of those New York-based cruises read our Interview with Carnival’s Corey Schmidt. His stories are touching and inspiring.

The cruise lines made the decision to end the cruises as soon as possible and get their guests home as soon as possible. Most of them landed in Boston and arranged for busses to take New Yorkers home. The airlines remained grounded for days; Amtrak was not coming all the way to Manhattan.

And so, today we celebrate those U.S. and foreign citizens working on those stranded cruise ships of 2001, who did their humble duties for their ships full of American passengers and showed us that in the cruise industry respect for our way of life goes on no matter what.

When it comes to changes in our daily lives, arguably travel has been affected the most; as evidenced by the long security lines at airports. You now need a passport to fly internationally, and you face strict rules on what you can carry about the plane.

But many people do noy know that cruise ships also have stringent security procedures for passengers, because many of them are done behind the scenes. For example, every cruise ship now sends a copy of its passenger manifest to the Dept. of Homeland Security at least a day before it sails. If there are any red flags, the cruise line is notified immediately. So far, there have not been any terrorist incidents, but the lines have captured a few other kinds of felons attempting to flee the country.

After many years of “open wounds,” it now seems acceptable to openly discuss 9/11 in the media again. I watched several shows last weekend showing exactly what happened in the air. What has never been fully reported is how the cruise lines dealt with the event, so I want to assure you that there were many heroes in our industry. They may not have risked life and limb, but their compassion and perseverence to comfort and assist their guests, and to get them home, went far beyond the call of duty.