CLIA (Cruise Lines International Association) is the world’s largest cruise industry trade association.
As a cruise specialist, I’m a proud member of CLIA and also a CLIA Accredited Cruise Counsellor (ACC).
Every year, CLIA releases a report to its members about the state of the industry, and what trends they are seeing. There are also some interesting data that if you’re a stats-nerd like me, you might find interesting.
First, the Trends:
- Wellness & Spas: It seems that cruising isn’t just about the casino and production shows anymore. People are increasingly looking for more and better spa services, and other offerings related to health and wellness.
- On-board Technology: The best example right now is the Princess Medallion, that is making guests more connected (to each other, and the crew) when on board the ship. Look for this trend to continue across all the cruise lines.
- Off Season Travel: We are seeing more ships in Europe (for example) in the winter months. People want to see places when they are not as crowded.
- Achievement Travel: People want to participate and be active on vacation, so the cruise lines are offering more than shuffleboard and lying by the pool for the guests.
- Instagram: For many of us, the idea of managing yet another social media channel is not a pleasant thought, but the iconic nature of travel, and people’s desire to share their experiences, make Instagram perfect for the job.
- Conscious Travel: Cruise ship guests want to connect with local cultures, and are increasingly interested in environmental stewardship.
- Traveling to the ends of the earth: People want to go where they haven’t been before (and they’ve been to a lot of places). The polar regions, and well as other out of way destinations are growing quickly.
- Women Rule: Women are already more than half the population, but the cruise lines have started to figure out that women are the decision-makers for far more travel choices than men are. Look for female-centric cruising to be a thing.
Now for the numbers:
- 30 Million – the estimated number of people that will cruise in 2019. It was 17 million in 2009.
- 18 new ships in 2019. This brings to total CLIA member ships to 272.
- 1.1 Million jobs are directly related to cruise ships. The associated jobs would be several times higher
- $45.6 Billion – the payroll of all those jobs.
Where do the ships go? (by % of berths available):
- Caribbean: 34.4%
- Mediterranean: 17.3%
- Europe (other than Med): 11.1%
- China 4.9 %
- Australia/New Zealand: 4.8%
- Alaska: 4.7%
- Asia (excluding China) 4.3%
- Other 16.2
Where do Cruise Ship Passengers come from?
- USA:
11.9 million
- China: 2.4 million
- Germany: 2.19 million
- UK: 1.93 million
- Australia/New Zealand: 1.34 million
- Canada: .92 million
- Italy: .77 million
- Spain: .51 million
- France: .5 million
- Brazil: .45 million
The one thing that would be hard to ignore in the destination and passenger trends is there is no doubt that China is going to be an increasingly important factor in where ships are deployed, and how the cruise lines will be marketing in the future.
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I look forward to hearing from you.
Sue Bradley
Sue Bradley
