Up next in 10
I explore why cruises have, and are, being treated differently to other travel? And look at if there really is a double standard, if cruising is being treated unfairly, or just about right based on what cruises and cruising is and is not. And why it may help cruising return and bounce back
I discuss why cruising is unique and different, why it needs to be treated different to other travel, and how the way it was treated and the solutions cruising has come up should ultimately work to the industry and cruisers benefit in the medium and long term.
The authorities and media getting it wrong on flying and other forms of travel, and letting people go on land-based vacations, does not mean that the approach on cruising has been totally wrong. It does mean the approach on those others though probably has.
I discuss during this episode, it will end up I believe benefiting cruising in the medium and long term
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0:00
why is cruising being treated
0:01
differently to other travel and is it
0:03
being treated unfairly or not i'm gary
0:06
bembridge
0:07
and i have been thinking about and
0:09
looking at these questions
0:10
for many many months now as a major
0:13
major cruise fan where i ended up may
0:15
though actually come as a surprise
0:17
to some of you first off let's be really
0:20
clear and i want to discard
0:22
one kind of myth and make a point that i
0:24
do believe in very strongly
0:26
that does still set all of this up
0:28
people flying around the world
0:30
with few restrictions and little
0:31
controls other than i guess in australia
0:34
and new zealand were undoubtedly the
0:37
main culprit spreading this really
0:39
infectious virus
0:40
all around the world it's it's not
0:42
cruising and cruises
0:44
the real big issue in my view is that
0:47
the restrictions the precautions
0:49
on flying driving going by train
0:52
to cross borders between countries they
0:54
were two lakhs
0:55
so while cruising was shuttered to stop
0:58
transmission and stop spread
1:00
other travel forms of course were not
1:02
getting it wrong on flying
1:03
and the other forms of travel and
1:05
letting people go on land-based
1:07
vacations does not necessarily mean
1:09
that the approach on cruising has been
1:11
totally wrong
1:12
now as i discussed during this episode i
1:15
think you're going to find that not only
1:16
to believe that
1:17
wasn't necessarily wrong but i believe
1:19
it's actually going to benefit cruising
1:22
in the short medium and the long term
1:24
now first of all the reality
1:26
is that the majority of cruise
1:28
passengers are those
1:29
who've been shown to be the most
1:31
vulnerable and getting seriously ill
1:33
ending up in hospital and dying from
1:35
covert that is
1:36
just kind of a fact so although the
1:39
average age of cruisers according to
1:41
clear anyway is 46.7 years it actually
1:45
hides the actual split
1:47
who's ready cruising and it hides the
1:49
reality that most cruisers are actually
1:51
on
1:51
an older spectrum way over half of
1:54
passengers who go cruising are over 50
1:56
years
1:57
and they only account for about a third
1:58
of the population in countries like the
2:00
u.s the uk
2:01
and so on so over half are over 50.
2:04
33 to a third of passengers are actually
2:07
60 years or older
2:09
and the biggest passenger age group in
2:11
total is the age of 60 to 69.
2:14
now 8 out of 10 deaths from covet were
2:16
by people
2:17
over the age of 50 to date that's
2:19
according to the uscdc
2:21
once you get under that age the risk of
2:23
hospitalization
2:24
and dying falls really really
2:26
dramatically
2:28
even early on before the shutdown there
2:29
were proposals put forward by clear for
2:31
example
2:32
to kind of put restrictions on people
2:33
over 70 cruising and even people like me
2:36
in my 60s
2:37
there was lots of talk about having to
2:38
get medical certificates and so on to
2:40
cruise
2:41
the us and uk you should advise against
2:43
older people cruising because of the
2:45
risk
2:46
of what happens if older people contract
2:49
covet
2:51
the age of travelers i guess on flights
2:53
land-based vacations is going to be much
2:54
broader than it is on cruising
2:56
probably also even younger certainly as
2:58
an average and overall
3:00
now we don't all necessarily like the
3:02
outcome and implication i guess but i
3:04
guess we can see
3:05
if we thinking about it logically why
3:07
governments have taken a conservative
3:09
view on cruising
3:10
with that older profile overall because
3:12
they have a duty they felt they needed
3:14
to protect
3:15
people over 50 60 70 80 and so on and
3:18
they've done that on land
3:19
you know as the pandemic emerged many of
3:22
those age groups had to shields
3:23
completely and they are the priority for
3:26
having
3:27
vaccines now ironically this approach
3:30
this protection
3:31
could also be a way of aiding an
3:33
accelerated opening for cruising as we
3:35
head through this year
3:36
because those very same people that
3:38
they're trying to protect are also the
3:40
ones that are going to be vaccinated
3:41
early
3:42
and by summer pretty much everyone in
3:44
those age groups everywhere will have
3:46
been vaccinated
3:47
we've seen vaccinations of this age
3:49
group helping lions
3:51
that cater for older travelers like saga
3:53
american steamboat
3:55
victory they're requiring vaccines
3:57
because they can open with an older age
3:59
group
4:00
it's exciting the european river cruise
4:01
people secondly
4:03
the next major factor for taking a
4:05
strict approach which i think is
4:07
probably understandable on some levels
4:09
is cruisers are a social experience
4:11
they're where people mix in numbers they
4:14
go dining we go to bars we go to the
4:16
theater we go gambling we go to deck
4:18
parties we've got a night clubs we go on
4:19
group excursions
4:21
all of those social things that we have
4:23
learned are perfect
4:24
for spreading the virus whether it's at
4:26
land or at sea
4:28
they are an issue it's not just a sea
4:29
related thing
4:31
social contact is the big risk and
4:33
social contact
4:34
is exactly what cruising is we go on
4:36
vacation we go on cruises to engage we
4:38
go
4:38
on to interact we go to meet people
4:41
bearing in mind
4:42
most of those activities that we do in
4:44
the day and the night on a cruise
4:46
are the very same ones that have been
4:48
shut down on land
4:50
but they are integral to the cruise
4:51
experience we know we're asking
4:53
governments to open
4:54
cruises which have all the things that
4:56
they've closed
4:58
or have severe controls on land so
4:59
there's no theaters open there's no
5:01
nightclubs
5:02
in many places you can't dine inside
5:04
attractions are closed
5:05
other than i guess vegas casinos are
5:07
closed in many places so all those kind
5:09
of social things that we do on a cruise
5:11
are closed down or very restricted so i
5:13
don't fully agree that you can
5:15
compare going flying on a train to
5:17
cruising they're not
5:18
as social they're not mixing events like
5:21
cruising and they don't involve
5:22
you know a week of interacting when
5:24
we're flying or going on a train we're
5:26
mostly sitting facing one way we're
5:27
getting from a to b
5:29
there's not a lot of mixing of course at
5:31
the airport and boarding
5:32
there are probably some issues that need
5:34
to be addressed
5:35
so of course again i do believe though
5:39
that this has played to the line's
5:40
advantage eventually because
5:42
they put themselves in a really strong
5:44
position versus land-based
5:46
social places to reopen so first of all
5:49
cruise lines have
5:50
put in place phenomenal protocols that
5:52
have been proven to work in practice
5:54
so we've seen msc cruises mind shift
5:56
hapag lloyd
5:58
in europe we've seen royal caribbean and
5:59
dream cruises in singapore they put
6:01
together protocols which they've proven
6:03
to work
6:03
and secondly cruise lines can probably
6:06
enforce
6:07
much more than they can on land-based
6:10
social events
6:11
because they can really require people
6:14
to sign up before they're going to
6:15
cruise
6:16
they can ensure compliance and they have
6:18
the ultimate lever they can throw them
6:21
off
6:21
if people don't follow it so they
6:22
actually are in a really strong position
6:25
to actually not only have strong
6:26
protocols but to enforce them
6:28
another thing to consider about why
6:30
cruise lines have been treated
6:31
as they are is understanding why
6:34
governments have taken that approach
6:36
on cruising versus other transportation
6:39
and vacation
6:39
forms and i think it is kind of
6:41
interesting because
6:42
there are two really big exceptions
6:45
italy
6:46
and germany which i think kind of prove
6:48
the point about
6:49
why cruising is being treated the way
6:52
it's been treated
6:53
so let's have a look at it first of all
6:55
airlines
6:56
train companies even if you take
6:58
eurostar for example resorts
6:59
theme parks they are of course big
7:01
employers like cruise lines are overall
7:04
but they are incorporated they have
7:05
strong roots in the country they're part
7:07
of the infrastructure
7:09
cruise lines are incorporated and
7:11
registered in foreign
7:12
tax and maritime havens but the big
7:15
exception
7:16
in all of this is italy and germany
7:19
those are the two countries that allowed
7:20
cruising to resume
7:22
right back in the summer of 2020 and
7:24
they'd be much more flexible
7:26
with cruising why it's not actually
7:28
because they've got the virus in better
7:30
control italy has been particularly
7:32
challenging but pretty much all of the
7:35
world's cruise ships are actually built
7:37
in italy or germany cruising is part of
7:40
the country infrastructure it's part of
7:41
the strategic
7:42
economy and the governments therefore
7:45
supported cruising and worked with
7:46
cruising to return
7:48
the governments they're invested
7:49
emotionally politically economically in
7:52
cruising in italy and germany but not in
7:54
uk
7:54
not in spain or the u.s not australia
7:57
and so on
7:58
so there's not been as much pressure
8:00
there's not been as much connection
8:02
with the cruising as in those other
8:05
countries
8:06
governments just don't feel a need to
8:07
work they need to feel to open faster
8:10
unlike they do with airlines which are
8:12
integral cruising has also kind of
8:14
fallen down
8:16
while flying keeps going and trains keep
8:18
going because those are seen as
8:20
essential to the running of the economy
8:21
cruising of course
8:22
is a 100 recreational travel
8:26
so governments won't close down flying
8:28
trains or
8:29
ferries because they need those to keep
8:31
the business going they need people to
8:32
go
8:33
to and from their work it brings in
8:35
cargo including things like
8:36
ppe vaccines it's used to repatriate
8:39
residents who are
8:40
stranded abroad it helps people to go to
8:42
travel to care for people
8:44
medical treatment visit people who are
8:46
perhaps dying or whatever
8:48
cruising doesn't have that lever to use
8:50
it faces very different standards
8:52
because it's seen as a recreational
8:54
setting there's no
8:56
strategic way no angle that you can find
8:58
to
8:59
argue that cruising needs to keep going
9:00
for the economy or
9:02
anything like that so it has different
9:04
standards it has higher thresholds and
9:06
that
9:06
is the reality but i think that again
9:08
that helps cruising because they can
9:10
increase the bar cruise ships of course
9:12
are easy to track they have to report
9:14
it's easy to know what happens this is
9:16
why cruising has always been
9:19
getting high attention and having higher
9:21
standards you know for example
9:22
ships have a reputation for being a
9:24
hotbed of norovirus
9:26
but in fact compared to land the
9:28
outbreaks are pretty low
9:30
but they're reported they're recorded
9:32
and it's not so much the case on land in
9:34
schools hospitals restaurants events
9:36
if there's an era outbreak it's not
9:38
really reported it's not
9:39
the same so think about diamond princess
9:42
ruby princess and all those
9:43
on america ships and even when sea dream
9:45
tried to start cruising the caribbean
9:47
everyone knew exactly who was how many
9:50
affected
9:51
and where they were on land events
9:54
on flights there's very little data that
9:56
and very little contact
9:58
tracing that really identifies in
10:00
practice what's going on
10:01
so cruising visible it's an easy target
10:04
but on the positive side
10:06
i think this visibility could be a
10:08
positive you know over 30
10:10
000 people were carried by msc cruisers
10:12
last year without any issues
10:14
more being carried now this means
10:17
there's a lot of data
10:18
a lot of visibility that the cruise
10:20
lines have around what's working
10:22
one reason for this trick to rules is
10:24
the fear and the implications of
10:26
outbreaks think of all those ships
10:28
struggling to find something to dock
10:30
as the lockdown started when they had
10:32
cases on them
10:33
countries had to cope with managing all
10:35
these people coming in
10:37
other countries then repatriating their
10:39
uh
10:40
people there were fears of swamping
10:42
local facilities with non-residents of
10:44
the state or the country
10:46
now this was a problem it got in the way
10:48
but the issue
10:49
has been addressed and it will lead and
10:51
i think lines
10:53
to get out of where they are because the
10:54
protocols for the return
10:56
have agreements now with local medical
10:59
and transportation providers to care for
11:01
and get people home
11:02
so that fear of what to do with people
11:04
has been taken out of government's hands
11:06
it is
11:06
something that the cruise lines are
11:07
doing cruising has and is being held at
11:10
different standard rules because it is
11:12
different to flying it is different to
11:13
trains
11:14
it needs its own rules the worst
11:17
possible thing that could happen to
11:19
cruising
11:20
is to reopen and there be a major
11:22
outbreak it would hammer cruising for
11:24
years it would be absolutely
11:25
just catastrophic so opening cautiously
11:28
and the right has to be the way not just
11:30
charging in
11:31
and saying let us fly let us train let
11:34
us do what they're doing
11:35
i've actually never seen any of the ceos
11:38
from the cruise line
11:39
complain about how they're being judged
11:41
versus flying
11:43
and if there's something i've missed let
11:45
me know it's because i see
11:46
cruising for what it is it's unique it's
11:48
different it's not like flying
11:50
it's not like a resort it's a very
11:52
unique situation
11:54
and scenario it needs its own rules
11:57
the ceos keep talking about not being in
11:59
a rush to open
12:00
to open the right way because as i said
12:03
the worst thing that could possibly
12:04
happen is for there to be an outbreak
12:06
and we've seen that happen with
12:08
land-based travel
12:10
what we've seen happen now is countries
12:13
are locking down
12:14
they are banning flights coming in from
12:16
countries
12:17
they're putting in hotel quarantining
12:19
they're putting in
12:20
testing so although airlines
12:24
and cross-country train journeys were
12:26
allowed
12:27
it didn't necessarily help them in the
12:30
medium term
12:31
by having a different standards and
12:33
treating cruising perhaps very harshly
12:36
i think it's actually going to play into
12:38
cruising's hands because it's developed
12:40
strong protocols
12:41
it's developed a strong set of standards
12:43
and it has a lot of visibility
12:45
around it what do you think have i got
12:46
it completely wrong
12:48
love to hear what you think and remember
12:50
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