Are cruises out of Galveston more or is it because it is my home port?

[Eli_6]

When I search cruises, I notice that the price of cruises from Florida or Los Angeles are often considerably less than the prices it shows me for a cruise out of Galveston. For example, I can go on a 3, 4 or 5 day out of Miami or Jacksonville from $50-99 per person plus tax, fees, etc.  Yet, the least expensive interior room I can find on a 4 day sailing out of Galveston is $285 per person and there is only 1 date for that rate in January.  Same thing with sailings on the Vista vs Horizon or Panorama.  Do cruises out of Galveston simply command a higher price? (Perhaps because there are more cruise lines, ships, and ports in Florida?)  Or has the Carnival algorithm somehow identified Galveston as my home port and so makes the cruises more expensive?  

[lifes-a-beach]

I suspect they command higher prices for a number of reasons, not the least of which is because it's a good bit farther from Galveston to to Cozumel than from Miami to Nassau.  But who knows.  They might have some formula that includes regional income and that sort of thing. 

[bguppies]

Any of the ports outside of Florida will cost more than any of the Florida ports. (Why we sometimes drive from Charleston, which has the Sunshine, to Jacksonville or Tampa which have similar cruises for much less)

 

I always assumed it was a supply and demand thing.

 

How many cruises a week are departing from Miami, Tampa, Port Canaveral and Jacksonville?

 

How many from Galveston?

Looks like 5 sailings on 3 lines over the next 4 games.

 

Charleston-2 Carnival cruises per week. (at least Galveston you have 2 Carnival ships and RCCL and NCL)

 

Much more competition from other Carnival ships and from other ships from every other cruiseline in Florida.

For instance.Miami..today -4 ships from Carnival, RCCL, MSC and Virgin

Tomorrow - 5 ships from MSC, 2 RCCL, carnival and Disney

Sunday - 3 from NCL, Virgin and Carnival

Monday - 5 from NCL, RCCL, Celebrity and 2 from Carnival

 

So 17 choices in just 4 days.

 

Versus no competition in Charleston, Galveston, New Orleans, Baltimore, etc.

Jacksonville only has to compete with all the other Florida ports.

Edited October 28, 2022 by bguppies

[jsglow]

Two words..... Supply/Demand.

 

Kinda like with any product or service.

[pe4all]

I feel for you, as cruises out of NY are always more expensive, which is why we fly down to Florida and pick up a cruise there.  Even adding airfare on, Florida is almost always cheaper than me driving into NY. (my homeport). Only reason I took NY Magic in June was I got such a great casino rate.

[BlerkOne]

about 8 billion people live within a easy drive of Galveston and a whole lot fewer ships than Florida.

[Saint Greg]

That's pretty common. The reason I went on the Sailabration cruise on Glory out of New Orleans was because that 8 day was considerably cheaper than even the 5-day Breeze out of Galveston. Vista was even worse. That said I think I got a pretty good price on Jubilee. Cheaper than Mardi Gras or Celebration (before the Celebration price drop).

[Saint Greg]

2 minutes ago, pe4all said:

I feel for you, as cruises out of NY are always more expensive, which is why we fly down to Florida and pick up a cruise there.  Even adding airfare on, Florida is almost always cheaper than me driving into NY. (my homeport). Only reason I took NY Magic in June was I got such a great casino rate.

 

New York is on another level more expensive than Galveston.

[Lee Cruiser]

Supply and demand does play a big role, but I also suspect a big reason is the proximity to any port of call is further.

[Saint Greg]

My thought on it is there are a lot of people in Texas. And many of them are fanatical about doing everything in Texas. They would rather pay more money to cruise out of Galveston than fly or drive somewhere else.

[bguppies]

4 minutes ago, Saint Greg said:

My thought on it is there are a lot of people in Texas. And many of them are fanatical about doing everything in Texas. They would rather pay more money to cruise out of Galveston than fly or drive somewhere else.

Sounds right.

My Family from Dallas is kind of nuts like that.

[shof515]

3 hours ago, Saint Greg said:

 

New York is on another level more expensive than Galveston.

its even worse that Carnival only sails out of New York for only 3-4 months of a year 😞

Edited October 28, 2022 by shof515

[Eli_6]

4 hours ago, Saint Greg said:

My thought on it is there are a lot of people in Texas. And many of them are fanatical about doing everything in Texas. They would rather pay more money to cruise out of Galveston than fly or drive somewhere else.

Given the state of affairs of flying and being packed on an airplane and likelihood of lost luggage or delay or getting Covid...I can't say that I blame them.  That's honestly my reasoning as well.  It is 90 minutes to Galveston.  We park across the street and walk on.  I can't even get through security at most airports in 90 minutes.

 

[CarnivalShips480]

5 hours ago, bguppies said:

Any of the ports outside of Florida will cost more than any of the Florida ports. (Why we sometimes drive from Charleston, which has the Sunshine, to Jacksonville or Tampa which have similar cruises for much less)

 

I always assumed it was a supply and demand thing.

 

How many cruises a week are departing from Miami, Tampa, Port Canaveral and Jacksonville?

 

How many from Galveston?

Looks like 5 sailings on 3 lines over the next 4 games.

 

Charleston-2 Carnival cruises per week. (at least Galveston you have 2 Carnival ships and RCCL and NCL)

 

Much more competition from other Carnival ships and from other ships from every other cruiseline in Florida.

For instance.Miami..today -4 ships from Carnival, RCCL, MSC and Virgin

Tomorrow - 5 ships from MSC, 2 RCCL, carnival and Disney

Sunday - 3 from NCL, Virgin and Carnival

Monday - 5 from NCL, RCCL, Celebrity and 2 from Carnival

 

So 17 choices in just 4 days.

 

Versus no competition in Charleston, Galveston, New Orleans, Baltimore, etc.

Jacksonville only has to compete with all the other Florida ports.

Carnival Legend and Enchantment of the Seas from Baltimore

[cruisinqt]

I’m in Texas and I rarely cruise out of Galveston or Houston. For the past 20 years it’s been cheaper to fly to Florida and cruise from there than to cruise out of Texas. Yes, believe it or not, even with airfare included it’s cheaper cruising out of Florida. I think it’s because there’s only 2 ports here and 5 in Florida. And some of those ports in Florida are massive with lots of sailings. Texas has tons of customers and very little competition. On the other hand Florida has tons of ports with numerous sailings to choose from so with so much competition the prices go down. 

[staceyglow]

6 hours ago, Lee Cruiser said:

 I also suspect a big reason is the proximity to any port of call is further.

Irrelevant. Pricing is 100 percent about what the market will bear. If for some reason people started avoiding Galveston in droves, the price would go down. 

[SCBarker]

It's not just Carnival either. I've been getting complementary room offers from RCCL all year, but my very latest one has pretty much all North American ports except Galveston. I've been waiting on the elusive Allure freebie, but previously they were only offering me Jan 29th and now they've seemed to stop.

[firefly333]

8 hours ago, Saint Greg said:

My thought on it is there are a lot of people in Texas. And many of them are fanatical about doing everything in Texas. They would rather pay more money to cruise out of Galveston than fly or drive somewhere else.

Well of course I'd pay more... .I'm paying over $500 to fly to miami and it's just a lot more bother. I keep hoping for a sale. 

[Saint Greg]

5 hours ago, shof515 said:

its even worse that Carnival only sails out of New York for only 3-4 months of a year 😞

Yeah I think that adds to it.

[Saint Greg]

1 hour ago, firefly333 said:

Well of course I'd pay more... .I'm paying over $500 to fly to miami and it's just a lot more bother. I keep hoping for a sale. 

Or you could save that money and more by driving to New Orleans. But I’d spend the money to fly and get to different ports. It’ll be different once Jubilee is in. I could see sailing that one a few times for the ship. Once the newness is over I’ll mostly be done with Galveston. 
 

Edited October 29, 2022 by Saint Greg

[Saint Greg]

5 hours ago, Eli_6 said:

Given the state of affairs of flying and being packed on an airplane and likelihood of lost luggage or delay or getting Covid...I can't say that I blame them.  That's honestly my reasoning as well.  It is 90 minutes to Galveston.  We park across the street and walk on.  I can't even get through security at most airports in 90 minutes.

 

State or affairs has nothing to do with it. I’m not taking about this year. I’m taking about forever. How far is it to New Orleans? Would you pay $1800 for a 5 day on Breeze vs. $1400 for a 8 day on Glory? That’s what I’m talking about. You don’t have to fly to Miami.
 

Texans are fanatical about doing everything in Texas. They dont go to disney world. They go to six flags/Astro world. They dont go to Cancun. They go to south padre Island. I know people who have never left Dallas in their lives.

 

Kyndall Fire is a perfect example of a Texan. Vista CD. She’s  only on Mardi Gras to get the experience to be the first Jubilee CD. Has to be a Texan out of Texas. Because it’s Texas.

 

I watch this couple out of the UK that does YouTube reaction videos.  The one I watched yesterday was on the Civil War. At the end they said even though there are states people fly the US flag not the state flag. The state they used as an example was Texas and I was like….ehhhhh. That’s the worst state you could pick because there are more state flags flying in Texas than any other state.

 

Edited October 29, 2022 by Saint Greg

[Jamman54]

5 hours ago, Saint Greg said:

Yeah I think that adds to it.

And most of those cruises are during the summer which is peak time. You can get some decent prices on September and October cruises though. 

[Rudyard]

11 hours ago, Eli_6 said:

Given the state of affairs of flying and being packed on an airplane and likelihood of lost luggage or delay or getting Covid...I can't say that I blame them.  That's honestly my reasoning as well.  It is 90 minutes to Galveston.  We park across the street and walk on.  I can't even get through security at most airports in 90 minutes.

 

This. I'm only 30 minutes from Galveston. For me it's more of a practicality thing than a Texas thing. If I choose to fly somewhere to cruise, it ends up costing me more than sailing from Galveston when you figure in air fare, food, hotel on each end, etc. New Orleans and Mobile are within driving distance, but the itineraries are the same so not much reason to burn that much gas unless there's a ship I really want to sail on. One day I'll cruise from somewhere I have to fly to, but for now I'm just happy to be out on the water. 

[christyran1228]

2 hours ago, Rudyard said:

 

This. I'm only 30 minutes from Galveston. For me it's more of a practicality thing than a Texas thing. If I choose to fly somewhere to cruise, it ends up costing me more than sailing from Galveston when you figure in air fare, food, hotel on each end, etc. New Orleans and Mobile are within driving distance, but the itineraries are the same so not much reason to burn that much gas unless there's a ship I really want to sail on. One day I'll cruise from somewhere I have to fly to, but for now I'm just happy to be out on the water. 

This.  It's a 4 hour drive to Galveston for us .... not only airfare, etc., I don't have to worry about luggage weight or how much liquid I have in my carry on. Lol

 

It's a 8-9 hour drive to New Orleans for the exact same itineraries, did it once because it was cheaper.  The drive there was fun because it was our first cruise and we were excited, but the drive home was 😖. 

 

We've flown to Puerto Rico to go on the southern Caribbean itinerary and we're about to fly to Miami next month to visit some ports unavailable from Galveston on a deal we couldn't refuse.

 

Prices from Galveston are brutal.  😐

[Eli_6]

On 10/29/2022 at 12:57 AM, Saint Greg said:

State or affairs has nothing to do with it. I’m not taking about this year. I’m taking about forever. How far is it to New Orleans? Would you pay $1800 for a 5 day on Breeze vs. $1400 for a 8 day on Glory? That’s what I’m talking about. You don’t have to fly to Miami.
 

Texans are fanatical about doing everything in Texas. They dont go to disney world. They go to six flags/Astro world. They dont go to Cancun. They go to south padre Island. I know people who have never left Dallas in their lives.

 

Kyndall Fire is a perfect example of a Texan. Vista CD. She’s  only on Mardi Gras to get the experience to be the first Jubilee CD. Has to be a Texan out of Texas. Because it’s Texas.

 

I watch this couple out of the UK that does YouTube reaction videos.  The one I watched yesterday was on the Civil War. At the end they said even though there are states people fly the US flag not the state flag. The state they used as an example was Texas and I was like….ehhhhh. That’s the worst state you could pick because there are more state flags flying in Texas than any other state.

 

I am a lifelong Texan.  I don't cruise out of Galveston because it is "Texas."  I cruise out of Galveston because it is 90 minutes from my house in north Houston.  New Orleans is 5-6 hours away from Houston and Mobile is 7-8 hours.  In 2021 we went to NOLA (and we hit some bad traffic and road construction on the way) and it took us 9 hours to get there from Houston! I don't think Texans are *THAT* dedicated to Texas that they are choosing Galveston just because it is Texas.  Pretty much everyone in the entire state of Texas (Houston, San Antonio, Austin, Dallas and all the small towns in between) are going to be substantially closer to Galveston than they are to New Orleans.    New Orleans is on the far side of Louisiana from Texas...and it isn't exactly a "scenic" drive.  My husband is from the Orange/Beaumont area and even for that area (which is right on the Louisiana/Texas border), it is still more than twice as far to NOLA than Galveston...under 2 hours to Galveston vs over 4 hours to New Orleans.  

 

And Astroworld isn't even in existence anymore...and hasn't been for 17 years.  Texans ABSOLUTELY go to Disney World.  

Edited November 2, 2022 by Eli_6