Looking for someone currently on Edge (1/3/23) that can confirm/deny scaled back dinner buffet??

[BermudaBound2014]

Is anyone on the EDGE right now that can confirm/deny?

 

This was posted to social media today (1/3/23) at 10:00 a.m. EST. According to this cruiser he is currently on the edge and the ocean view buffet is scaled back significantly. He claims this was all that was offered at 6:00 p.m. and that the scaled back version went into effect 1/1/23 (at least on the Edge).

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited January 4, 2023 by Host Carolyn
op request

[jelayne]

The room service charge just went into effect.  There is no charge for continential breakfast, but other times do have the charge.  

 

Can't comment on the scaled back OV but it would be interesting to know how full the ship is.  If the ship is sailing with very low passenger count it may make sense.

[RICCruisers]

34 minutes ago, BermudaBound2014 said:

Is anyone on the EDGE right now that can confirm/deny?

 

This was posted to social media today (1/3/23) at 10:00 a.m. EST. According to this cruiser he is currently on the edge and the ocean view buffet is scaled back significantly. He claims this was all that was offered at 6:00 p.m. and that the scaled back version went into effect 1/1/23 (at least on the Edge).

 

 

 

 

 

 

We are currently onboard Edge 1/2/23 sailing. I had heard about a possible Room Service charge. The X App does not indicate a charge and we ordered Room Service for breakfast today and to my knowledge there was no charge. I’ll keep checking my account to see if it shows up. I cannot speak to the OV offerings since we didn’t eat there last night. I asked our waiter last night about the passenger count and he said about 2,200 which surprised me since I did a mock booking last week. It appeared there were close to 50% of Veranda and Concierge cabins available. All Suites and Aqua were booked at 100%. I was expecting about 1,900-2,000. He said the numbers went up quite a bit just before the cruise started. I may try to run through the OV tonight to see what is being offered. The OV for lunch on embarkation was excellent , but since that was the primary location for food it was undoubtedly necessary. Hope this helps. 

[BermudaBound2014]

1 minute ago, RICCruisers said:

We are currently onboard Edge 1/2/23 sailing. I had heard about a possible Room Service charge. The X App does not indicate a charge and we ordered Room Service for breakfast today and to my knowledge there was no charge. I’ll keep checking my account to see if it shows up. I cannot speak to the OV offerings since we didn’t eat there last night. I asked our waiter last night about the passenger count and he said about 2,200 which surprised me since I did a mock booking last week. It appeared there were close to 50% of Veranda and Concierge cabins available. All Suites and Aqua were booked at 100%. I was expecting about 1,900-2,000. He said the numbers went up quite a bit just before the cruise started. I may try to run through the OV tonight to see what is being offered. The OV for lunch on embarkation was excellent , but since that was the primary location for food it was undoubtedly necessary. Hope this helps. 

 

THANK YOU!! 

 

I'm sure I'm not the only one who would appreciate you running thru OV tonight to see what is being offered. 

 

Enjoy your sailing!

[RICCruisers]

5 hours ago, BermudaBound2014 said:

 

THANK YOU!! 

 

I'm sure I'm not the only one who would appreciate you running thru OV tonight to see what is being offered. 

 

Enjoy your sailing!

OMG OMG. We just finished dinner in Cosmopolitan and went up to the OV. It was a ghost town. The reports are correct. If you favor the OV for dinner, do not expect to have much of a choice. I will try to post a photo of what we saw. We didn’t check the pizza area, but this is the most egregious cutback that we’ve ever seen.
 

Not to sound too cynical, but I guess RCL has to figure out a way to continue to pay their top Executives $2,000,000+on the backs of cruisers that save all year to afford a vacation on one of their Modern Luxury ships. 
 

I can only hope that tonight was a Chic Night and maybe this was a one off and that a real dinner service will be back on future evenings. 

Edited January 4, 2023 by RICCruisers

[BermudaBound2014]

Thank you so much. A picture is worth a thousand words!! 

 

If you happen to walk thru on another night and it fares any better I'd be very much appreciative of another update.

 

Keep on enjoying your vacation!! 

[RICCruisers]

One more thing to add. They had staff clicking in the number of people entering the OV tonight. A sure sign that X is tracking the number of guests “eating” tonight. What they don’t track are the number of guests that enter and exit without eating once they see the basic offerings. 

[RICCruisers]

1 minute ago, BermudaBound2014 said:

Thank you so much. A picture is worth a thousand words!! 

 

If you happen to walk thru on another night and it fares any better I'd be very much appreciative of another update.

 

Keep on enjoying your vacation!! 

We are having a great cruise. I can’t speak for guests that prefer the Buffett over the Dining Rooms. 

[nikel]

2 minutes ago, RICCruisers said:

One more thing to add. They had staff clicking in the number of people entering the OV tonight. A sure sign that X is tracking the number of guests “eating” tonight. What they don’t track are the number of guests that enter and exit without eating once they see the basic offerings. 

 

What they will do is say "see, people are not interested in the buffet any more" then go ahead and eliminate more !....they have a plan !!

[BermudaBound2014]

Just now, RICCruisers said:

We are having a great cruise. I can’t speak for guests that prefer the Buffett over the Dining Rooms. 

 

That's Wonderful to hear!!!

 

Guests that prefer the buffet are in for a shock thou, those pictures really show an extremely scaled back dinner buffet. 

 

BTW: Is there a $9.95 charge for room service showing on your app? 

[Susanb10567]

Thanks for the update…glad you are enjoying your cruise 

[LGW59]

7 minutes ago, RICCruisers said:

We are having a great cruise. I can’t speak for guests that prefer the Buffett over the Dining Rooms. 

I'm glad you are having a great cruise, but sorry you are being asked to be a personal photographer and app checker.  Oh, if you see Nanu Nanu at the Eden bar, tell him I said hello.

[BermudaBound2014]

19 minutes ago, LGW59 said:

I'm glad you are having a great cruise, but sorry you are being asked to be a personal photographer and app checker.  Oh, if you see Nanu Nanu at the Eden bar, tell him I said hello.

 

How silly. No need to "be sorry" for anything. RicCruiser made a personal choice to contribute and is  being a nice person by sharing current changes which I find quite shocking. He chose to be kind in words and actions.

 

In fact, many people (me included) don't mind sharing a requested photo or app info especially given this appears to be quite a significant change.  I would wager to say that the vast majority of people who choose to check CC while on vacation are ok with answering questions.   Otherwise, he could have chosen not to reply to the thread at all 😉 

Edited January 4, 2023 by BermudaBound2014

[horseymike]

Good food and multiple choices are a HUGE  part of cruising. I hope the cruise lines don’t 

forget this.

[BermudaBound2014]

I don't understand Celebrity's thinking. If those photos are the entire buffet (and it certainly appears that is the case), this will push a lot of guests into the main dining room. Causing overcrowding and even longer lines there. I know that we choose to eat at the buffet for ease several times during a 7 day cruise. Plus, I just don't enjoy sitting for extended periods of time. If that is all that is offered on the buffet, DH will insist on the MDR.

 

 

[nikel]

1 minute ago, BermudaBound2014 said:

I don't understand Celebrity's thinking. If those photos are the entire buffet (and it certainly appears that is the case), this will push a lot of guests into the main dining room. Causing overcrowding and even longer lines there. I know that we choose to eat at the buffet for ease several times during a 7 day cruise. Plus, I just don't enjoy sitting for extended periods of time. If that is all that is offered on the buffet, DH will insist on the MDR.

 

 

Not only that, the odd time you come back from a shore excursion and are either too tired or don't have the time to change to make it to the MDR.  You just want something fast from the buffet.

[WonderMan3]

53 minutes ago, RICCruisers said:

OMG OMG. We just finished dinner in Cosmopolitan and went up to the OV. It was a ghost town. The reports are correct. If you favor the OV for dinner, do not expect to have much of a choice. I will try to post a photo of what we saw. We didn’t check the pizza area, but this is the most egregious cutback that we’ve ever seen.
 

Not to sound too cynical, but I guess RCL has to figure out a way to continue to pay their top Executives $2,000,000+on the backs of cruisers that save all year to afford a vacation on one of their Modern Luxury ships. 
 

I can only hope that tonight was a Chic Night and maybe this was a one off and that a real dinner service will be back on future evenings. 

Can you clarify what you saw that they were offering? The two photos you posted show stations that are offering food. Or were those the only two stations that were open?

[retird]

1 minute ago, WonderMan3 said:

Can you clarify what you saw that they were offering? The two photos you posted show stations that are offering food. Or were those the only two stations that were open?

Im curious too.  Good question

[OysterD]

3 minutes ago, BermudaBound2014 said:

I don't understand Celebrity's thinking. If those photos are the entire buffet (and it certainly appears that is the case), this will push a lot of guests into the main dining room. Causing overcrowding and even longer lines there. I know that we choose to eat at the buffet for ease several times during a 7 day cruise. Plus, I just don't enjoy sitting for extended periods of time. If that is all that is offered on the buffet, DH will insist on the MDR.

 

 

If those pictures are representative of other nights in the buffet then I absolutely understand their thinking. Its a ghost town. Nobody in there. Why spend tens of thousands filling the buffet at night if only a couple of people use it and 90% of the food goes to waste? They know how many people use it in the evenings versus eating in the main dining rooms and specialty reataurants, they know exactly how much food they prepare and put out and how much goes to waste. If this is a permanent thing moving forward rather than a one off due to extraneous circumstances, I'm sure they've done a lot of number crunching and had a lot of meetings about it first. 

 

Also, Edge class have 4 main dining rooms with different menus and anytime seating. Maybe that is encouraging people to eat in those/try them out each night and fewer people are using the buffets?

[LMaxwell]

11 minutes ago, OysterD said:

If those pictures are representative of other nights in the buffet then I absolutely understand their thinking. Its a ghost town. Nobody in there. Why spend tens of thousands filling the buffet at night if only a couple of people use it and 90% of the food goes to waste? They know how many people use it in the evenings versus eating in the main dining rooms and specialty reataurants, they know exactly how much food they prepare and put out and how much goes to waste. If this is a permanent thing moving forward rather than a one off due to extraneous circumstances, I'm sure they've done a lot of number crunching and had a lot of meetings about it first. 

 

Also, Edge class have 4 main dining rooms with different menus and anytime seating. Maybe that is encouraging people to eat in those/try them out each night and fewer people are using the buffets?

If you mismanage and ruin a venue, and no one comes, is that cruiser preference? Strikes me as corporate aloofness. 

[Tigerfnan23]

We only had the buffet for dinner one night on our recent Edge cruise but it was very busy.  It also seemed very busy any time we passed through during dinner hours when on our way elsewhere.  I would imagine they could strategically cut back without it being so obvious if they wanted to maintain at least the illusion of a decent buffet, but those pics make it look like they are actively attempting to dissuade people from even trying to eat there for dinner.  Hope that trend doesn't continue.  

[WonderMan3]

On my one Edge cruise we visited OV one evening and it was pretty quiet until one of the shows let out while we were there and the place got flooded with people mainly going for desserts/ice cream. On S and M class cruises I found OV to be busier. Maybe it’s because there are fewer specialty dining options on those ships? 

Edited January 4, 2023 by WonderMan3

[RICCruisers]

To answe some of the questions that were posed. The photos I took were after we finished our dinner in Normandie at about 7:30. Much of the seating area in the OV was dark. Those of you familiar with the OV on Edge know about the area on the back wall where they traditionally offer made to order steaks and fish etc. That area was totally closed. The photos may have been a little exaggerated due to my shock in how little was actually open. We did not walk to the back of the OV so I can neither confirm or deny the Pizza area availability. 
 

On the question about a Room Service charge. We still have not been charged for our Room Service breakfast from this morning and I will challenge any charge if it does show up since it was not on the menu card we filled out the night we placed the order. The only mention of a charge in the App is the $4.95 charge for the late night service. 
 

One additional change we noticed today was the lunch in the Eden Cafe. The size of the terrific brownies and chocolate chip cookies has noticeably decreased. The food was still very good but to a chocolate aficionado like my DW it was disappointing. Especially since she spent an hour in the fitness center today before lunch to offset her cookie enjoyment. 😉

 

On a positive note, we saw the 9:00 Kaleidoscope show. We’ve seen it before, but this cast was terrific. 

[WonderMan3]

22 minutes ago, RICCruisers said:

To answe some of the questions that were posed. The photos I took were after we finished our dinner in Normandie at about 7:30. Much of the seating area in the OV was dark. Those of you familiar with the OV on Edge know about the area on the back wall where they traditionally offer made to order steaks and fish etc. That area was totally closed. The photos may have been a little exaggerated due to my shock in how little was actually open. We did not walk to the back of the OV so I can neither confirm or deny the Pizza area availability. 
 

On the question about a Room Service charge. We still have not been charged for our Room Service breakfast from this morning and I will challenge any charge if it does show up since it was not on the menu card we filled out the night we placed the order. The only mention of a charge in the App is the $4.95 charge for the late night service. 
 

One additional change we noticed today was the lunch in the Eden Cafe. The size of the terrific brownies and chocolate chip cookies has noticeably decreased. The food was still very good but to a chocolate aficionado like my DW it was disappointing. Especially since she spent an hour in the fitness center today before lunch to offset her cookie enjoyment. 😉

 

On a positive note, we saw the 9:00 Kaleidoscope show. We’ve seen it before, but this cast was terrific. 

I honestly wouldn't be surprised to see them start charging for Eden Cafe with the way things are going. I guess they're going to start with the smaller portions route first.

[jelayne]

42 minutes ago, WonderMan3 said:

I honestly wouldn't be surprised to see them start charging for Eden Cafe with the way things are going. I guess they're going to start with the smaller portions route first.

Smaller portions started in the fall which isn’t necessary all bad, some portions were to large for some of us as evidenced by plates with half eaten meals being cleared. 
Items like pasta and carved  meat served by staff at the OV were  smaller.  If you asked for more you got it, no problem.  
Last month on the Solstice all the pastries at Cafe Al Bacio were at least 50% smaller.