Where will Queen Victoria sail?

Cunard will be left with: a matronly QE2 and a new QM2 and Queen Victoria?

I am not up to speed re: Cunard!

...Ken

[ 08-20-2003: Message edited by: Salty Sailor ]

I do find it quite odd that what were once rivals, P&O and Cunard, are now both owned by Carnival. I wonder how Carnival will diferntiate the two brands? I see them historically aiming for passengers in the same niche?

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Originally posted by Malcolm @ cruisepage:
In my opinion Cunard will only operate two ships, in the near future, QM2 and QV.

I do find it quite odd that what were once rivals, P&O and Cunard, are now both owned by Carnival. I wonder how Carnival will diferntiate the two brands? I see them historically aiming for passengers in the same niche?

That does not make much business sense, does it?

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I think P&O is geared toward the middle class (and always has been), while Cunard is *supposed* to be more premium and upscale.

Certainly the current fleets of these lines do not validate their positioning, as P&O seems more upscale to me, at least where the hardware is concerned.

A two ship fleet (in the case of Cunard) is not very profitable. I'm certain Carnival has no intention of keeping Cunard small, otherwise they would not have bought the line to begin with.

Of course things don't always turned out as planned, even for Carnival Corp.

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Originally posted by Barryboat:
Two ship fleet not profitable? Crystal seems to have done just fine.

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I would say Crystal is marginally profitable. It took them over a decade to build a 3-ship fleet. Had they been blockbuster success, they would have expanded much quicker like RSSC.

Carnival Corp. did not buy Cunard to operate it has a two ship fleet using expensive older tonnage. There are no economies of scale to be achieved from a small fleet, except those synergies with the larger parent. I don't think Carnival was looking for a marginally profitable brand such as Crystal when they bought Cunard. They were looking at a bigger picture where they could market a fleet of average ships such as QUEEN VICTORIA and use the famous Cunard name to jack up the prices! The kind of profits that Carnival would eventually like to see from Cunard cannot be obtained from a two-ship operation.

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Originally posted by feargus:
although crystal is fairly small it's parent company is certainly not. NYK are one of the big boys, they have well over 150 cargo vessels under ownership or management.

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This is true, but like all smart companies, NYK was not willing to invest further in Crystal unless they showed a decent return on their investment. It has taken quite some time to do this, but Crystal finally has a third ship.

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Originally posted by Fairsky:
This is slightly off topic, but if Carnival Corp is all about building large brands- then how do you explain the lack of development with Seabourn and Windstar?

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That's easy, they are niche operators. Small ships offering a luxury product to a very small segment of the population. They are not real money makers, but they round out the Carnival portfolio of being able to offers all things to all people.

Cunard on the other hand is a well known name associated with a premium product. Carnival has every intention on exploiting the Cunard name and building up the brand.

Carnival did try to build up Seabourn with the two small Cunard twins, not to mention the SEABOURN SUN. It was not successful and brought Seabourn to a new low. Luckily Carnival realized the mistake and quickly sold off or moved the three unsuitable ships in question. An attempt was also made to build up Windstar, with the acquisition of the Club Med ship, and now I hear negotiations are underway to acquire the remaining Club Med ship. Even so, I think Carnival knows it's not feasible to make huge returns on a large fleet of ships catering to the luxury market. There are just not enough passengers, which is why they are niche operators. Renaissance learned the lesson the hard way.

One thing that does ease the economies of scale for these two niche operators is that they are combined with Holland America and Cunard respectively. Carnival was smart in doing this rather then let them operate on their own. Purchasing, reservations, sales, operations, etc. are all combined with their larger parents. Even the crew is the same on Windstar as on HAL making staffing even easier.

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Originally posted by Fairsky:
Cunard is one of the most recognized names in the business, operates the only regular trans-atlantic service, and has huge profit possiblities... none of which is true for seabourn or windstar- they are niche brands and look to remain that way.

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I agree that Cunard has huge profit possibilities, but not with two ships. I doubt Cunard is very profitable right now, with two aging ships that are expensive to operate. I have heard from someone who works at Cunard that last year was the first time in "many, many" years that Cunard turned a profit, and a marginal one at that. I don't think Cunard will suddenly become profitable with QM2 either. It will take a long time to see a return on this $800m ship even if she sails at full capacity for many years to come. Frankly, once the first year is over for QM2 I'm sure we will see discounting on her just like every other ship.

What will be profitable for Cunard is a series of Vista-Class ships sailing varied itineraries under the Cunard house name. Smaller flexible ships, which can sail anywhere at a fairly high speed, and the economies of scaled gained by being near-sisters to many other ships in the Carnival family. Virtually interchangeable except for the interior decor. We may not like it (I don't), but that is what will make Cunard profitable. I look at QM2 as the gimmick to gain Cunard even more notoriety with the general public, but I doubt there will be more than one.

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Originally posted by eroller:
Frankly, once the first year is over for QM2 I'm sure we will see discounting on her just like every other ship.

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And yes, she has a lot of cabins to sell! There are still cabins available now for many of her 2004 cruises!

I think we will see the QM2 spending more time in the Carib, if the cabins are not selling in year two and onwards. All those veranda's are there for a reason.

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Originally posted by John Bowman:
. Standards had slipped on recent cruise (see review, Norway cruise).

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An interesting review!

When I was in the med recently it suddenly occurred to me that we are often talking about two different animals here on cruisetalk.

When Americans think cruise, they mean a sunshine voyage on a floating resort with a young party atmosphere and BAR-B-Q, around the pool.

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two aging ships that are expensive to operate.

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Originally posted by Colin:
That would have been my assumption too, but according to the chief engineer on Caronia, due to the type of engines, she is the cheapest ship in the Carnival Corp. fleet to operate.

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That may because she is now one of the smallest ships in the Carnival fleet?

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Originally posted by Colin:

That would have been my assumption too, but according to the chief engineer on Caronia, due to the type of engines, she is the cheapest ship in the Carnival Corp. fleet to operate.

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I wonder if the bean counters at Carnival Corp. in Miami would agree? Chief Engineers love to brag about "their" ship. Who knows though, maybe the Chief Engineer is right? I don't know enough about the engines on CARONIA...... maybe someone else can chime in?