Fain "sees silver lining;" Interview in Lloyd's List

[Maraprince]

Maraprince- Hey I'm not to thrilled with the skimmers either. The point is that you seem to be sniping at ALL corporations right now. TEXASMUNK said it right, the cruiseline CEO aren't skimming off the mortgage crisis so why are you spitting so much venom in here at them??

 

As for my area, I've seen houses on three sides get foreclosed on. Complements of people getting (or being tricked into) subprime ARMs that they couldn't afford when the interest jumped up. The fourth house was paid for by it's owners when it was built in the 60s and they're still there.

 

So yeah, I see hurt. I'm not getting much of it because DW and I went into Dave Ramsey's Total Money Makeover and I saw ARMs as traps from day 1. So we don't need or want credit any more. That's just having some sense to see a way out and doing it. Don't spend what you don't have and you don't have a problem.

 

aurelius180- You mean wet-behind-the-big-ears junior. Whoever heard of someone trying to get the top dog job in a company after only 143 days in the business??? I better stop there, my political opinions might show and we really don't want to go there.

Darkwolfe,

 

So why are you singling me out? You express your opinion on what you know about where you live.

 

My opinion is my opinion and just that. My area of the country is facing different situations than yours and people who have had nothing to do with the mortgage problems or Wall Street are suffering because of it. Prices have been going up and up on everything in our area including cruises.

 

We do not have the wide choices of sailings like those in out of Florida. What we have available is not being discounted in any way. RCCL's cruise prices have only risen since we booked in January '08 while the prices for some sailings out of Fl. have gone down considerably. Obviously, we are paying for the new ships and all the rock climbing walls, etc. whether or not we use them.

 

 

MARAPRINCE

[GXmanDC]

Darkwolfe,

 

So why are you singling me out? You express your opinion on what you know about where you live.

 

My opinion is my opinion and just that. My area of the country is facing different situations than yours and people who have had nothing to do with the mortgage problems or Wall Street are suffering because of it. Prices have been going up and up on everything in our area including cruises.

 

We do not have the wide choices of sailings like those in out of Florida. What we have available is not being discounted in any way. RCCL's cruise prices have only risen since we booked in January '08 while the prices for some sailings out of Fl. have gone down considerably. Obviously, we are paying for the new ships and all the rock climbing walls, etc. whether or not we use them.

 

 

MARAPRINCE

 

I think prices are going up because of demand in your area, if you live outside of South Florida you probably have fewer cruises available. If people were not willing to pay the prices, RCI would not be charging them.

[dolfandude]

Back to the original article...I'm sure Fain knows what's what. I think it's just "spin". If he makes everything sound OK, then he hopes some people won't panic and cancel their cruises, etc.

 

No more, no less...just spin

 

Short and sweet and straight to the point. Well said!

[PhoenixCruiser]

You won't regret it.:)

 

Darkwolfe, I didn't even have to try to find Ramsey today, he was on Good Morning America and did an interview with Glenn Beck on his radio show, lol.

 

Still want to see his full show, however :p

 

###

[Traveler723]

I am retired and on a comfortable fixed income. My intent when I plan a vacation is to get the best bang for my buck. While I am platinum on RCCL I believe at this moment that after my November cruise on the AOS that I will be switching to Carnival. I have cruised on most lines and find that the quality of food and entertainment are superior and in my opinion, rccl has lost it's motivation to make the cruise experience something special for it's customers. Carnival on the other hand, has been working feverishly to improve it's image and again, in my opinion, has been very successful. Of course not every ship on every line is always consistent within it's own line, but for me, the switch to huge ships, with a lower crew-to-passenger ratio, to lower quality food, to a lesser customer service has tempted me to make my move after '08. While Carnival may not have the beauty of the rccl ships, the attempt to really please me more than makes up for it. Having done so many cruises, I don't need to be impressed with the glass and bronze.

[Shannon12]

I think some of you may have missed the point. Regardless of the mortgage crisis and all the garbage with the banks, day to day cost of living has gone up. Plain and simple. Gas (obviously), groceries, electric, heating gas, clothing, toiletries, EVERYTHING has gone up in price and it does add up. What I think the point of this was that a lot of people may choose to spend money on those things instead of vacations.

[Maraprince]

I am retired and on a comfortable fixed income. My intent when I plan a vacation is to get the best bang for my buck. While I am platinum on RCCL I believe at this moment that after my November cruise on the AOS that I will be switching to Carnival. I have cruised on most lines and find that the quality of food and entertainment are superior and in my opinion, rccl has lost it's motivation to make the cruise experience something special for it's customers. Carnival on the other hand, has been working feverishly to improve it's image and again, in my opinion, has been very successful. Of course not every ship on every line is always consistent within it's own line, but for me, the switch to huge ships, with a lower crew-to-passenger ratio, to lower quality food, to a lesser customer service has tempted me to make my move after '08. While Carnival may not have the beauty of the rccl ships, the attempt to really please me more than makes up for it. Having done so many cruises, I don't need to be impressed with the glass and bronze.

You hit on many critical points in your post. Other lines offer similar ports at lower prices. After you have been on RCCL ships, there are just so many times you can see the same ice show, rock climb, etc.

 

Unless you have a lot of sea days, there just isn't time to do and see it all! My 7/31 didn't allow us time to get to some areas of the Explorer at all since 7 out of the days, we were in a port and doing things off the ship. The first sea day didn't happen until day 3. By that time, we were exhausted and we just looking forward to relaxing. The second and only other sea day, we were packing to leave the ship.

 

When the Grand Princess was first introduced, the same thing happened. Without a lot of sea days, you cannot get to do and see everything on board. So the feeling developes that you are paying for things you don't use. If that is the case, you might as well go with another line who charges less for basically the same ports.

 

In the past, passengers were more interested in the ports than spending time on the ship. If there were things to do, fine but it was not the major reason they booked. This is especially true of port intensive sailings like the one I did. Sea days were few and far between. Now the ships have become the "destination" in themselves.

 

It all comes down to why you book a ship and what you are looking for. This will determine who you book with and how much you are willing to pay. Everyone's priorities are different.

 

 

MARAPRINCE

[Darkwolfe]

PhoenixCruiser- He's got a number of clips posted out on foxbusiness.com if you have trouble finding the show itself.

 

Maraprince- "It all comes down to why you book a ship and what you are looking for. This will determine who you book with and how much you are willing to pay. Everyone's priorities are different."

 

Very, very, true statement. I stick with RCI for several reasons. Chief among them is the simple fact that I'm very comfortable aboard their ships. DW and I also have a running habit of booking a year in advance so we can usually get a very good price for our cruises.

 

On the economic side of things, I get teased a little about my negativity towards credit cards. Oh well, I expect that. Being in debt has become "normal" in this country. I intend to be "abnormal" in that regard and stay that way. It's one of the things that lets DW and I cruise on a budget that's less than six figures a year between the two of us.

 

One of the more amusing things about this is while some living expenses have gone up a lot this year, some have recently dropped. Gas finally fell below $3 a gallon here this week. Who would have though that would be cause to cheer a couple of years ago??

 

Perhaps I'm overly optimistic, but I suspect that in the long run Fain is right. Cruising does deliver a pretty heavy bang for the buck compared to many land vacations (even at today's costs) and I wouldn't be surprised to see it stay that way for the forseeable future.