In article
,
Rick wrote:

Ray, or anyone...Please try to explain to me....

On Jan 5, 11:05*am, Ray Goldenberg wrote:
Hi Rick,

It is simply a matter of economics to the cruise lines. *They can gain
more revenue by placing their sailings in other home ports during the
summer.
Explain this: Does every ship have to "claim" a home port? I
thought ships
got moved around all the time...am I wrong? NY seems to be a "year
round seasonal port".
Meaning its most busy during the summer. So if ships can be added
during the summer why can't more
ships be added? If a "home port" doesn't sell well don't they move
that ship to another port where It will?
Therfe is a lot more to it than that. There is a limited amount of
dock space and what impact might a couple more ships have on the prices
of food, etc., since there is more competition. Just because you can go
out of NYC, doesn't always mean that there are places you go to FROM
NYC, both from space availability at distant ports and such constraints
as how far a ship can travel in a certain amount of time. The summer is
peak travel season, so extending that doesn't mean that people will
continue to travel from there as weather changes. Similar concerns from
any port.



*There are also a limited number of Caribbean sailings from
Florida and San Juan during the summer.
I understand this. I sailed out of San Juan once on July 4th.
I thought the ship was going to melt it was so hot. That I
understand.
But why not add 2 ships out of NYC if the need is there? Does Miami
really need
3 Carnival ships sailing daily, or 3 or 4 Royal Caribbeans sailing?
Are they
sold out to capacity and charging $1800 - $2300 p/p for a Balcony
cabin?


Why not move one of these to NYC for the short cruise season where
they do collect
those prices and sell out? Do you
see what I mean here?

Again you get into supply and demand concerns. The high prices they are
getting in NYC may be directly related to how many cruises are going out
of there. You increase the number of sailings, you may very well
overshoot the demand and lose those nice numbers. If they were getting
those prices and still running a fair percentage of the ship as a
waiting list, then it might make sense. If they are getting those prices
for full ships but little else, then you are essentially robbing from
yourself if you add extra ships.




Just really trying to understand the reasoning here. IF: 1 ship sells
out at double the price
p/p of a florida sailing + adding another ship at double the price p/p
of a florida sailing =
4 times the revenue (+ fuel surcharge) for the cruise line. Doesn't
that seem more profitable?

Thanks for the info.

The IF is the constraining factor. Just because you add ships doesn't
mean you automatically add to the profit.