Cunard dissertation!

Hi there, i wonder if anyone can lend a hand.. I am writing my postgrad dissertation on Cunard Line and its current strategies. Also to formulate alternative strategies with regards to which customers to target, how to compete with similar cruise companies and how to retain the success levels it has achieved since the introduction of the QM2 and today's cruise industry in general!.. phew quite a mouthful. Anyway my problem is that there is little information available in detail on Cunard. The company website isn't very helpful and i just wanted to know if anyone knew of any publications/ websites that might help me out!
Thanks in anticipation

[Kuki]

I'd suggest beginning by reading Selling The Sea, a book by Bob Dickinson, Pres. of Carnival Corporation... which owns Cunard.

You should seriously consider booking a voyage on either QE2 or Queen Mary 2 -- they both have excellent collections in their libraries that deal with the history of the Cunard Line. At the same time, if you did book a voyage, you could conduct oral interviews with senior officers -- great as a piece of field research. Also, take a look at Stephen Fox's book "Transatlantic" (excellent on line's history & development). Also, send an email to the webmaster of the World Ship Society. He is a Cunard historian (see website for email - www.worldshipny.com). Authors John Maxtone Graham and Frank Braynard are well regarded for their scholarship as maritime historians. Bill Miller is also knowledgeable in a general sort of way.

I assume you are looking at marketing, but you cannot divorce marketing from pure martime/ oceanliner history which is what Cunard (read Carnival) is selling. Queen Mary 2 is, quite sadly, a prefabricated theme park of the golden age of transatlantic travel which Cunard/Carnival exploits, very obviously on the Queen Mary 2 and in its brochures. QE2 is the old real blueblood, the last surviving link to the age that Cunard is tapping into. QE2 is acutally an interesting story in herself in terms of how she has evolved and has been marketed.

Sounds like a very interesting dissertation. Good luck & let me know through the messageboard if you need more ideas or direction.