State of Cruising today

[TWELVEOHONE]

I have been on 50 cruisies since 1985 and have seen the service and quaility of the food and service go down. Not only on RCCL but almost all the cruises lines.

 

RCCL is no better nor any worse than some of the others.

 

 

1985 Fairsky SITMAR

1986 Song of America ROYAL CARIBBEAN

1986 Oceanic PREMIER

1987 Oceanic PREMIER

Nordic Prince ROYAL CARIBBEAN

Nordic Empress ROYAL CARIBBEAN

Viking Seranade ROYAL CARIBBEAN

Regal Princess PRINCESS

Royal Majesty MAJESTY CRUISE LINES

1992 Monarch of the Sea ROYAL CARIBBEAN

1995 Sovereign of the Sea ROYAL CARIBBEAN

1996 Song of America ROYAL CARIBBEAN

1999 Oceanic PREMIER

1999 Splendor of the Sea ROYAL CARIBBEAN

(Apple Vacation) OCEANIC CRUISE LINE

Legend of the Sea ROYAL CARIBBEAN

Majesty of the Sea ROYAL CARIBBEAN

Grandeur of the Sea ROYAL CARIBBEAN

Enchantment of the Sea ROYAL CARIBBEAN

2000 Voyager of the Sea ROYAL CARIBBEAN

2000 Horizon (Alaska) CELEBRITY

2001 Explorer of the Seas ROYAL CARIBBEAN

Crown Princess PRINCESS

2001 Dawn Princess (Alaska) PRINCESS

2002 NCL Dreamward

2002 Carnival Legend CARNIVAL

2002 Brilliance of the Sea ROYAL CARIBBEAN

2003 Navigator of the Sea ROYAL CARIBBEAN

Aug 2003 Horizon (Bermuda) CELEBRITY

Oct 2003 Serenade of the Seas ROYAL CARIBBEAN

Jul 2004 Mariner of the Seas ROYAL CARIBBAEN

Dec 2004 Empress of the Sea ROYAL CARIBBEAN

Sept 2005 Explorer of the Seas ROYAL CARIBBAEN

Oct 2005 Infinity CELEBRITY

Nov 2005 Enchantment of the Seas ROYAL CARIBBEAN

Feb 2006 Golden Princess PRINCESS

May 2006 Zenith CELEBRITY

May 2006 Freedom of the Seas ROYAL CARIBBEAN

Dec 2006 Millenium CELEBRITY

Jun 2007 Caribbean Princess PRINCESS

Aug 2007 Explorer of the Seas ROYAL CARIBBEAN

Oct 2007 Vision of the Seas ROYAL CARIBBEAN

Jul 2008 Explorer of the Seas ROYAL CARIBBEAN

Oct 2008 Solstice CELERITY

Nov 2008 Enchantment of the Seas ROYAL CARIBBEAN

Nov 2009 Dream CARNIVAL

Dec 2009 Solstice CELERITY

Jun 2010 Emerald Princess PRINCESS

Nov 2010 Enchantment of the Seas ROYAL CARIBBEAN

July 2011 Allure of the Seas ROYAL CARIBBEAN

 

Dec 2011 Silhouette CELEBRITY

May 2012 Oasis of the Seas RORAL CARIBBEAN

[hmallett]

So.. how can this be that one cabin steward used to serve 2-3 cabins and now it's more like 15? Are these numbers from the current website figures or are you using old brochures? It seems like there are less 'people facing' staff than years ago. That's my opinion anyhow.

As stated, it's from current website figures.

The guest to crew ratio (as a whole) probably isn't that meaningful of a statistic. The cruise lines like to build bigger ships because economy-of-scale comes into play. Take the engine room, for example, the number of crew staffing the engine room probably isn't that different between the Voyager class, Freedom class and Oasis class. With a bigger ship you can add a lot more passengers without adding more bridge officers or ships engineers (especially with automation).

This is true, and I was intending to merely present the figures, anticipating this sort of reply. To take it to the most extreme example, the smallest ships have one captain, and the largest ships also have one captain. To what extent this skews the figures, we don't know, as the crew numbers aren't divided into guest-facing and non-guest-facing crew. However, bear in mind that with these economies of scale, you would expect the Oasis class ships to have a higher guest/crew ratio, but in actual fact it's lower.

I do wonder to what extent memory comes into play, after all, reminiscing about the "good old days" of cruising, there may be rose-tinted glasses coming in to play to some extent. I have not been cruising long enough to remember these days!

[Jimnbigd]

I just hope the mainstream cruise lines like Royal Caribbean don't cut back like airlines did. Gosh, can you imagine a "Bistro Bag" for lunch on a cruise ship? I'd rather pay a little more to keep the quality up. And I do. Royal Caribbean is usually $100 or more than Carnival from Galveston.