Cruise as you choose from easyJet founder
easyJet entrepreneur Stelios Haji-Ioannou is making a special appearance at the Maritime Hotel Conference to outline his plans for flexible budget cruising from £29 per night.

The easyCruise brand could be launched by Easter 2004 and the company is currently searching for ships. The concept embraces low-cost airline innovations such as on-line reservations and early booking discounts. Prices would be berth-only, with extra charges for meals and beverages as consumed.

In a further break from the package tradition, there will be no defined cruise length so passengers will be able to choose where they join and leave the ship subject to availability. Itineraries will cover popular Mediterranean ports in the summer and the Caribbean in winter.

Mr Haji-Ioannou is already active in shipping through Stelmar Tankers, which he founded in 1992 some three years before easyJet's debut.

[ 04-17-2003: Message edited by: Onno ]

For Dambrosi - the ship is presently called THE EMPRESS, she was originally NCL's very first SUNWARD (their first ship) and a long line of other things that I'm too lazy to go through . In the past few years she had been doing cruises out of Southeast Asia but since has been laid-up.

More on her here, though if you want a full history you'll really have to go here (Swedish only, sorry - translated words from the same site may help).

She's a nice little ship with a very significant history though she has mainly be forgotten. Hope ship finds work soon.

Incidentally, it is reported that easyCruises wants to start up next year with up to 13 ships! Now, where on earth are they going to get a whole fleet of 13 ships in one shot? I don't think they could have one newbuild done by next summer, let alone 13, and a widely varied fleet of second/third/fourth-hand ships really does not suit the "easy" strategy!

I personally would not dislike the idea so much if they did not call it a "cruise" - I imagine anyone going expecting what would normally be called a "cruise" would be sorely disappointed! Perhaps something like "easyShips" (like easyJet!) would be a better name?

[ 04-17-2003: Message edited by: cruiseny ]

CGT

[ 04-19-2003: Message edited by: CGT ]

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Originally posted by gpcruisedude:
A very interesting concept indeed, But what ships would be used?

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I read in a UK Newspaper that Stelios (EasyJet CEO) was looking for a fleet of 13 ships!

Stelios could also pick up some of the older ships Royal Olympia is discarding. Is Jason still around? She might be perfect.

If he was just a year or so earlier he could have picked up all 8 Renaissance ships or hey maybe he could get all the old NCL white ships back and They look close to the Empress, and even the Old Sun Princess! Their are alot of lines looking for buyers for their older ships!

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Originally posted by peterscooter:
Has the Greek man gone mad !!?

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I take your point, but people said he was mad when he started easyjet and now the various national carriers of Europe are reeling from his success!

I think that there is plenty of room in the UK and European cruise market for expansion and innovation.

It is not like running an airline... Yes, easyJet's first airplanes were not brand new... But ships are not built like airplanes (or at least not passenger ships). With airplanes, you could easily go out and buy 15 Boeing 737s as there are thousands of the things, and all of them are, comparitively alike (though even still not as much as you might think - but at least they are the same size and shape). With ships, you usually have two or three ships of the same type, which may have gone to different operators, been refitted, subjected to poor maintenance, laying-up in some backwater, and so on.

If he wants to seriously go ahead with this concept, he had ought to go to Poland, Croatia, South Korea or the like, where he can get, inexpensively, a fleet of IDENTICAL, modern vessels, that will not require costly maintenance upgrades, have labor-intensive designs, provide an inconsistent product, and so on.

Now, what he is apparently proposing may be in the time-honored tradition of Greek shipowners (a group of which he is already one), but the fact is:

1. Times are changing, and passengers will no longer accept "anything that floats", and
2. It flies in the face of his much-vaunted strategy, AND it does not even make economic sense; old ships like that will need to be constantly upgraded, and replaced (as most of their lifespan is finished), and will use more fuel, require more labor, and so on!

No, he had ought to come up with a modern, efficient design, one that fits his concept, and then shop around and find someplace to build it for him, cheaply, and in great volume. THEN perhaps it will not be so crazy!

Otherwise, he will simply be following the idea of so many ventures that have been driven out of the cruise business, and increasingly, the ferry business too, or at least driven to modernise...

[ 05-19-2003: Message edited by: cruiseny ]

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Originally posted by anthemius:
Why shouldn't he buy some of the ships Meyer shipyard has built for PELNI (Indonesian Passenger Line)?

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Well is PELNI looking to get rid of some?

I'm sure Meyer would be happy to build easyCruises some copies of these "Passengerships for Indonesia"... They could call them "Passengerships for Indonesia and easyCruise" now .

The 900-pax (in PELNI configuration, which would be different from easy's), 5,000 GRT (yes, a PSR of 5.5!) Type 1000 ships would be suited to them I think...

I don't think the easy ships will have real dormitories, nor will they have the equivalent of PELNI's first-class cabins... So they would probably wind up with a few less pax.

Even the especially attractive 14,000 GRT, 1,500-2,000 pax Type 2000 ships might be suitable...