Specialty Dining Prices

[Stuartm]

I just went on the App to book Sabatinis for our up coming Coral Princess circumnavigation cruise and the cost is $47.25.  I thought the price was $25 US which at the moment would make it $37 AU. Has the US price gone up or do Princess add a gratuity to the bill?

Also annoying is  that I wanted to book a table for 4 with our 2 friends that are linked to my booking but Princess wanted to bill my credit card for the whole amount.

I'll just wait till we board.

 

I'm also interested in seeing how the drinks packages will be managed as we are on the 'old' package because we booked a year ago but some will be on the latest package which enables you to order drinks at a higher price. The one thing I REALLY hope is that along with the new package, Princess have also realized that the entry level wines they offer are extremely mediocre and have done something about it.

cheers

Stu

 

[arxcards]

The specialty restaurant prices have just gone up. All departures after 20th February have the new price, unless they were booked before Christmas.

[capriccio]

On Princess cruises priced in USD, the Crown Grill (and I presume, The Bayou Cafe and Sterlings Steakhouse on ships without a Crown Grill) is now $39 per person and Sabatinis is now $35 per person according to posts on the Princess forum.

[Aus Traveller]

35 minutes ago, capriccio said:

On Princess cruises priced in USD, the Crown Grill (and I presume, The Bayou Cafe and Sterlings Steakhouse on ships without a Crown Grill) is now $39 per person and Sabatinis is now $35 per person according to posts on the Princess forum.

The Coral Princess has AUD pricing on board. Not all US prices translate exactly to the AUD price they use.

[OzKiwiJJ]

1. The speciality restaurant prices have gone up. 

 

2. You will get the new $22 limit for your drinks package but won't get the extras of the new package - speciality desserts ( which appear to be ridiculously large ice-cream sundaes), juice bar whatever that is, and fitness classes.

 

3. From what I've seen so far it appears they are still only offering the same nine wines by the glass instead of the 25 promised. The prices of some (most?) have gone up e.g. the De Bortoli Semillon/Sauvignon Blanc is now $14 a glass. It retails for $5.99 a bottle if/when you can buy it that way rather than in the 4 litre casks. That makes their markup on that wine over 1100%!!!!!!🤬🤬🤬

Edited February 25, 2023 by OzKiwiJJ

[capriccio]

6 hours ago, Aus Traveller said:

The Coral Princess has AUD pricing on board. Not all US prices translate exactly to the AUD price they use.

We will be on the Coral Princess on April 2nd so I’m aware of that.  I was just adding the new USD prices to show that the pricing has changed across the fleet.

[Normanville]

15 hours ago, OzKiwiJJ said:

1. The speciality restaurant prices have gone up. 

 

2. You will get the new $22 limit for your drinks package but won't get the extras of the new package - speciality desserts ( which appear to be ridiculously large ice-cream sundaes), juice bar whatever that is, and fitness classes.

 

3. From what I've seen so far it appears they are still only offering the same nine wines by the glass instead of the 25 promised. The prices of some (most?) have gone up e.g. the De Bortoli Semillon/Sauvignon Blanc is now $14 a glass. It retails for $5.99 a bottle if/when you can buy it that way rather than in the 4 litre casks. That makes their markup on that wine over 1100%!!!!!!🤬🤬🤬

Hi Julie, could you please tell me where to find the new drink prices. You will be getting on the Grand as we get off. Thanks for all the informative posts and live report.

Juls, another one! Lots of Julies and Julias around!

[arxcards]

Just now, Normanville said:

Hi Julie, could you please tell me where to find the new drink prices. You will be getting on the Grand as we get off. Thanks for all the informative posts and live report.

Juls, another one! Lots of Julies and Julias around!

I have done some screen captures for uploading later. Julie is on the mark, and I have cocktails & beers as well.

[arxcards]

14 hours ago, OzKiwiJJ said:

1. The speciality restaurant prices have gone up. 

 

2. You will get the new $22 limit for your drinks package but won't get the extras of the new package - speciality desserts ( which appear to be ridiculously large ice-cream sundaes), juice bar whatever that is, and fitness classes.

 

3. From what I've seen so far it appears they are still only offering the same nine wines by the glass instead of the 25 promised. The prices of some (most?) have gone up e.g. the De Bortoli Semillon/Sauvignon Blanc is now $14 a glass. It retails for $5.99 a bottle if/when you can buy it that way rather than in the 4 litre casks. That makes their markup on that wine over 1100%!!!!!!🤬🤬🤬

There is only one thing worse than getting wines by the glass on the package - buying them on the ship.

[bazzaw]

16 hours ago, OzKiwiJJ said:

1. The speciality restaurant prices have gone up. 

 

2. You will get the new $22 limit for your drinks package but won't get the extras of the new package - speciality desserts ( which appear to be ridiculously large ice-cream sundaes), juice bar whatever that is, and fitness classes.

 

3. From what I've seen so far it appears they are still only offering the same nine wines by the glass instead of the 25 promised. The prices of some (most?) have gone up e.g. the De Bortoli Semillon/Sauvignon Blanc is now $14 a glass. It retails for $5.99 a bottle if/when you can buy it that way rather than in the 4 litre casks. That makes their markup on that wine over 1100%!!!!!!🤬🤬🤬

and a "glass" is 150 ml - hardly what most of us Aussie wine drinkers call a "glass" . 

 

[joejoe 59]

Crazy pricing on the wines 🍷 

Does anyone know if the $15 corkage has gone up please. 

[OzKiwiJJ]

2 hours ago, Normanville said:

Hi Julie, could you please tell me where to find the new drink prices. You will be getting on the Grand as we get off. Thanks for all the informative posts and live report.

Juls, another one! Lots of Julies and Julias around!

So far I've only seen them on FB forums, screenshots of the Medallion App drinks section. I might try to cobble together a spreadsheet during the week showing old and new prices. If so I'll post it here.

 

[OzKiwiJJ]

1 hour ago, bazzaw said:

and a "glass" is 150 ml - hardly what most of us Aussie wine drinkers call a "glass" . 

 

That's a fairly standard pour in most restaurants these days. Some places use very small glasses so 150ml fills them to the brim. Decent restaurants use decent glasses which often makes it look like you're only getting half a glass but allows you to appreciate the wine better.

[Aus Traveller]

1 hour ago, joejoe 59 said:

Crazy pricing on the wines 🍷 

Does anyone know if the $15 corkage has gone up please. 

It was still AUD$15 a week/10 days ago.

[NSWP]

1 hour ago, OzKiwiJJ said:

That's a fairly standard pour in most restaurants these days. Some places use very small glasses so 150ml fills them to the brim. Decent restaurants use decent glasses which often makes it look like you're only getting half a glass but allows you to appreciate the wine better.

Some places and ships sell wine in 250 glasses.

The bigger the better is what I say.

 

[Relaxing Robbies]

2 hours ago, joejoe 59 said:

Crazy pricing on the wines 🍷 

Does anyone know if the $15 corkage has gone up please. 

The $15 corkage appears at item 24 Alcohol and Gambling in the Passage Contract for a cruise I booked this month. Those Terms and Conditions were updated in December 2022. Item 2 says that a legally binding agreement on these terms and conditions becomes effective when they receive the first payment for the cruise eg deposit. I don’t see how they can increase the corkage charge for any currently booked cruises. They had better not try, or I will be having a big argument with them on March 16.  

 

I purchased the Plus Package for my 4 cruises since covid, but the latest price increase is too much for the amount of alcohol I think it is sensible to consume daily. The new wine prices are too high for very ordinary wines, so I will be taking my own and paying the corkage.  I might add the soda package to cover mocktails if the new price is reasonable.  I do not drink coffee.

[bazzaw]

49 minutes ago, NSWP said:

Some places and ships sell wine in 250 glasses.

The bigger the better is what I say.

 

Les - Over many years on different cruiseships around the World, it has become obvious to me that "wine drinking" is regarded as something that only rich people do and therefore they can charge high prices for it. We know that here in Australia wine is about the cheapest alcoholic drink that we can buy (in the bottle shops) - far cheaper than even beer. I like my wine - but I prefer to drink beer on the cruiseships - especially Guinness Stout. I can only drink one can of Guinness - but can easily duff a whole bottle of wine if not stopped from doing so 😞 I will leave my wine drinking for when I return home 🙂 

[NSWP]

Yong Barry Barry, same, wine is way overpriced on the ships, I am a De Bortoli man,

decent wine for a decent price. Outreagous what the ships are charging.

Edited February 26, 2023 by NSWP

[arxcards]

4 hours ago, OzKiwiJJ said:

So far I've only seen them on FB forums, screenshots of the Medallion App drinks section. I might try to cobble together a spreadsheet during the week showing old and new prices. If so I'll post it here.

 

Yeah, who needs cruise critic! 😉

Wine caps from the app. I will get a menu photo soon at dinner.

 

[OzKiwiJJ]

Thanks. It looks like 12 wines under the Plus package now but still not great. Both the Chardonnays have too much oak for me. We mostly drink lightly oaked or unoaked Chardonnay these days and, from what I've read from various wine writers, that is the current trend in Australia.

 

Unfortunately the only other whites are Sauvignon Blancs which I can't drink. Where are the Pinot Grigios and the dry Rieslings?

 

The Rosè is a decent drop, as are both the Pinot Noirs and the Merlot. That's it for me though as I can't drink Cabernet Sauvigon either. I'd love to see a Sangiovese or Tempranillo, or even just a straight unblended Shiraz 

 

Tonight with dinner at home we had a very nice Tempus Two Chardonnay. They have a great selection of wines all very well priced at Dan's. Cheaper then the Masterpeace wines I think and far, far better than those De Bortoli wines. 

Edited February 26, 2023 by OzKiwiJJ

[Tripmode33]

6 hours ago, joejoe 59 said:

Crazy pricing on the wines 🍷 

Does anyone know if the $15 corkage has gone up please. 

Just printing out luggage tags for tomorrow boarding of Majestic Princess. They include the wine policy on the luggage tag and it states $15 corkage.

I've packed a bottle for each dinner to pay corkage on - our first cruise without drinks package!  We have another 3 Princess cruises booked for 23/24 with the old $30 Plus Package. Really miss that pricing!

[OzKiwiJJ]

@arxcards have you discovered what the Speciality Desserts are that they have included in the new Plus package? I'm curious. Are they just super-sized ice cream sundaes from Swirls or are there new extra-cost  or package-only desserts in the MDR?

[arxcards]

5 minutes ago, OzKiwiJJ said:

@arxcards have you discovered what the Speciality Desserts are that they have included in the new Plus package? I'm curious. Are they just super-sized ice cream sundaes from Swirls or are there new extra-cost  or package-only desserts in the MDR?

It is just a Swirls etc deal, so far at least. The only desserts in the dining areas are the usual menu fare, with no extra pay options.

 

The fresh juice/smoothies is already a pain for the bars that have it. They are already busy enough, and now they are cubing pieces of fruit to feed the juicers.

 

I meant to get a photo of the wine menu, but got sidetracked. The app seems to cover most of it.

 

Many of the staff are in the dark about the changes. They thought the caps were the same, but were noticing $21 cocktails were still coming up as $0 on their POS. The ones partly in the know were given brief training 2 days prior to this cruise. 

Edited February 26, 2023 by arxcards

[lyndarra]

11 hours ago, Tripmode33 said:

Just printing out luggage tags for tomorrow boarding of Majestic Princess. They include the wine policy on the luggage tag and it states $15 corkage.

I've packed a bottle for each dinner to pay corkage on - our first cruise without drinks package!  We have another 3 Princess cruises booked for 23/24 with the old $30 Plus Package. Really miss that pricing!

AUD15. Bargain!

Corkage on HAL is a rip-off USD20.

[OzKiwiJJ]

Thanks Geoff.

 

So the more expensive Plus package now includes three things I don't want:

- two super-sized ice cream sundaes a day. Hmmmm what are they providing for people who are diabetic or who prefer not to stuff themselves with ice cream. My idea of a nice ice cream is a single scoop in a cone and it's not something I'd have every day either let alone twice a day.

- unlimited juices, most of which have high natural sugars. 

- but, hey, we'll give you two fitness classes a cruise to counteract all that sugar and ice cream.

 

🙄🙄🙄🙄🙄