River vessels named after French composers

Maybe I'm just crazy, but Crystal should seriously consider re-naming both Crystal Debussy and Crystal Ravel. As we all know, these vessels were initially "marketed" as vessels meant to navigate the French rivers. It made sense then, but now that they are not going to be there, it makes a lot more sense to name them after composers associated with the regions they travel. Actually, having both Debussy and Ravel travel the Danube/Rhine, etc., makes it look like Crystal people have no clue who Debussy and Ravel are.

There are many well-known composers from countries such as Germany, Austria, and even Hungary. I think this might be a good time to consider this.

Maybe I'm just crazy, but Crystal should seriously consider re-naming both Crystal Debussy and Crystal Ravel. As we all know, these vessels were initially "marketed" as vessels meant to navigate the French rivers. It made sense then, but now that they are not going to be there, it makes a lot more sense to name them after composers associated with the regions they travel. Actually, having both Debussy and Ravel travel the Danube/Rhine, etc., makes it look like Crystal people have no clue who Debussy and Ravel are.

 

 

There are many well-known composers from countries such as Germany, Austria, and even Hungary. I think this might be a good time to consider this.

What if they change the river cruises to include French rivers sometime down the line? Should they change the names back? It seems to me that Crystal (and all cruise lines) invest time and treasure in marketing and the ship's name is part of that marketing. I was very disappointed when the French rivers were deleted from the schedule, but I can't see that using the name of one European classical composer versus another matters here nor there. That's just my opinion and you know what they say about opinions! :cool:

Patty

What if they change the river cruises to include French rivers sometime down the line? Should they change the names back? It seems to me that Crystal (and all cruise lines) invest time and treasure in marketing and the ship's name is part of that marketing. I was very disappointed when the French rivers were deleted from the schedule, but I can't see that using the name of one European classical composer versus another matters here nor there. That's just my opinion and you know what they say about opinions! :cool:

 

Patty

My (perhaps incorrect) assumption is that the Debussy and Ravel, as they are already built, will be too big for the French rivers they were initially planning to navigate. If they can go to French rivers, I guess we can keep the names.

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My (perhaps incorrect) assumption is that the Debussy and Ravel, as they are already built, will be too big for the French rivers they were initially planning to navigate. If they can go to French rivers, I guess we can keep the names.

 

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That is my understanding as well. When the decision was made to keep them in the Rhine/Danube they were built to the specs of the larger ships. I suspect the names were left unchanged due to copyright requirements as the names had already been protected before the decision to change them was made. As to the names themselves, I don't think there is a line whose ship names have anything to do with the river they sail. I also suspect anyone who is not also on Cruise Critic even knows (or cares) about the association between names and rivers, or possibly even that they are named after composers!! :)

They could always rename one the Crystal Wagner. But then of course they'd have to add a larger brig for any "undesireable" passengers!

That is my understanding as well. When the decision was made to keep them in the Rhine/Danube they were built to the specs of the larger ships. I suspect the names were left unchanged due to copyright requirements as the names had already been protected before the decision to change them was made. As to the names themselves, I don't think there is a line whose ship names have anything to do with the river they sail. I also suspect anyone who is not also on Cruise Critic even knows (or cares) about the association between names and rivers, or possibly even that they are named after composers!! :)

I think there are a few ships named after a person that sails in the region associated with that person. There is Viking Schumann that travels between Prague and Berlin. There is Igor Stravinsky that sails in Russia. Mozart sailed the Danube even before Crystal bought it. It's true that there aren't that many ships named after classical composers. But when when they are named as such, they are often named because of the region they sail. I guess many of us don't care (or have no clue!) about it, but I think in the case with Crystal River Cruises, when they go "all-out" with composer names, they'd better know what they are getting themselves into, and they'd better get it right to prevent the embarrassment.

They could always rename one the Crystal Wagner. But then of course they'd have to add a larger brig for any "undesireable" passengers!

And maybe the last one in the series the Crystal Gotterdamereung in keeping with the Wagner theme!!! :):)

We could name one after my dear MiL, as every time she takes a break to take on air (silence is golden) it's like music to my ears.

to prevent the embarrassment.

Really?? In almost 14 years in this industry I have never met anyone who booked a cruise based solely on the name of the ship. Reputation of the ship/line yes, name of the ship, no. I also suspect there are very few people who are that worried about an association between any composer and a particular river.

Ships can fairly easily be reassigned to other regions (and are often done so) so naming them after regional composers might not make much sense.

Ships can fairly easily be reassigned to other regions (and are often done so) so naming them after regional composers might not make much sense.

This has been discussed earlier in this thread. Not all river vessels are interchangeable. Also, it's Crystal who went "all-in" with naming the vessels after the regions they were supposed to sail....but had to make a change in marketing.

Really?? In almost 14 years in this industry I have never met anyone who booked a cruise based solely on the name of the ship. Reputation of the ship/line yes, name of the ship, no. I also suspect there are very few people who are that worried about an association between any composer and a particular river.

I think the fact that Crystal is operating two French composer ships in the current locations is a clear evidence of the planning missteps that the company made a few years ago. Keeping the names as they are, in my opinion, makes them permanent reminder of the troubled past. I think that reflects rather poorly on the reputation of the brand, especially in terms of whether they are able to deliver what they promise in terms of new ships.

I think the fact that Crystal is operating two French composer ships in the current locations is a clear evidence of the planning missteps that the company made a few years ago. Keeping the names as they are, in my opinion, makes them permanent reminder of the troubled past. I think that reflects rather poorly on the reputation of the brand, especially in terms of whether they are able to deliver what they promise in terms of new ships.

If people don't read Cruise Critic and what small percentage of all possible cruisers even know Cruise Critic exists, how do you suppose they would have any idea of the "history"?? I am not a fan of all of Crystal's "history" under Edie, but I think you are making a mountain out of a mole hill. :cool:

I think the fact that Crystal is operating two French composer ships in the current locations is a clear evidence of the planning missteps that the company made a few years ago. Keeping the names as they are, in my opinion, makes them permanent reminder of the troubled past. I think that reflects rather poorly on the reputation of the brand, especially in terms of whether they are able to deliver what they promise in terms of new ships.

What a strange attitude, doesn't make sense to me!

The main thing is that passengers enjoy the cruise and ship.

As the OP thinks Crystal made a right balls up, maybe they can rename the ships Crystal Ball I, Crystal Ball II etc. and be used anywhere.

I think the fact that Crystal is operating two French composer ships in the current locations is a clear evidence of the planning missteps that the company made a few years ago. Keeping the names as they are, in my opinion, makes them permanent reminder of the troubled past. I think that reflects rather poorly on the reputation of the brand, especially in terms of whether they are able to deliver what they promise in terms of new ships.

My wife is a classically trained pianist. She plays pieces by various great composers in our home on a regular basis, and I listen to them on a regular basis. I have no idea which composer she is playing at any given point in time unless I choose to go look at her chart. I would suggest that 90% of the people travelling on these two ships don't even know they are named after composers, let alone that they are FRENCH composers sailing on a Germanic river!! And what any of this has to do with Crystal's ability to "deliver what they promise in terms of new ships", I have no clue!! Patty suggested you are making a mountain out of a mole hill. I would suggest more like an Alp, or perhaps a Pyrenne, out of an anthill!! :rolleyes::rolleyes::rolleyes:

My wife is a classically trained pianist. She plays pieces by various great composers in our home on a regular basis, and I listen to them on a regular basis. I have no idea which composer she is playing at any given point in time unless I choose to go look at her chart. I would suggest that 90% of the people travelling on these two ships don't even know they are named after composers, let alone that they are FRENCH composers sailing on a Germanic river!! And what any of this has to do with Crystal's ability to "deliver what they promise in terms of new ships", I have no clue!! Patty suggested you are making a mountain out of a mole hill. I would suggest more like an Alp, or perhaps a Pyrenne, out of an anthill!!

Larry, I will argue with your assertion that 90% of Crystal cruisers don't know the river boats are named after composers - I've found that Crystal cruisers are much better educated than that! :o:D

P.S. Unless it's the Canadian cruisers, maybe!!:eek:;p:cool:

Knock, knock, knock

Penny?

Knock, knock, knock

Penny?

Knock, knock, knock

Penny?

Sacrebleu!

Knock, knock, knock

Penny?

 

Knock, knock, knock

Penny?

 

Knock, knock, knock

Penny?

 

Sacrebleu!

What am I missing? I get it's a Big Bang Theory reference, but I have no idea how it applies to this thread.

I see that some of us either don't know/don't remember/don't care about the total fiasco that ensued when these two "French river" boats were "redeployed" to Rhine/Main/Danube. These ships, which were initially designed to navigate the Seine/Rhone/Dordogne, was supposed to be smaller ships compared to Bach/Mahler, and was marketed to comprise the "Paris Class" of river vessels. I was not affected by this since I was rather skeptical that Crystal would have been able to deliver what they were initially promising to achieve in terms of new river vessels. From what I heard/read, Crystal aggressively marketed these vessels with French itineraries (that they sold to customers) that were abruptly cancelled with very poorly executed communication. Despite the fact that we were very interested in sailing one of the Crystal river ships, we waited until Mozart was in operation for more than a year to even consider booking a cruise on it, because we were afraid other "redeployments" may occur that may affect us. I'm putting it is quotes because this was not just a simple redeployment, but a big change in ship design and a substantial delay in deployment. Obviously, it is sort of silly to think that you can "redeploy" a ship that has never been deployed. By keeping the names Ravel and Debussy, is like calling the ships Crystal Debacle and Crystal Fiasco.

However, as I mentioned earlier, if some of you don't care, don't bother to even reply. If you don't care, I don't care if you care or not.

OH, just reminded of the wine train episode

After announcing plans for French river cruises, and prior to implementing those plans, Crystal made a strategic decision to change which rivers they were going to use. It was a decision based on economics as well as on geopolitical events of the time.

No harm was done by this change. I applaud Crystal for its flexibility in dealing with this.

I laughed so hard when I started reading this thread. The things we all seem to get really upset about - we’re all talking about VACATION time here. [emoji23][emoji23]

Just an FYI: In the maritime industry it is considered bad luck to re-name vessels while you own them. Honestly - the world didn’t panic when Pacific Princess suddenly started sailing in the Atlantic. ‘No, Get back in your proper Ocean, you naughty ship!! How dare Princess do this! What were they thinking!’ Silly when you look at it this way TBH.

Enjoy the ships, or don’t go on them. So Crystal’s marketing plan had to be tweaked - yes, annoying, etc. but they still have a good product.

P.S. Strasbourg is technically France.

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After announcing plans for French river cruises, and prior to implementing those plans, Crystal made a strategic decision to change which rivers they were going to use. It was a decision based on economics as well as on geopolitical events of the time.

No harm was done by this change. I applaud Crystal for its flexibility in dealing with this.

If this is what they've done, Crystal shouldn't have slapped Debussy and Ravel onto the two larger (and totally different) boats, pretending to be "redeploying" the ships, when these ships are completely different ships from the originally marketed "Paris Class" ships. Yes, Crystal made a decision to pull out of the French rivers (by not building ships that meet the specifications for the French rivers) and added two more ships (copies of Bach and Mahler) to the Rhine/Main/Danube rivers. What I found it distasteful at that time is that they re-used the names of the previously marketed ships and said this is a "re-deployment," effectively trying to fool some of the less-informed consumers/investors into thinking that these ships were already built at that time, and they are somehow interchangeable between the two markets. As far as I can see it, this was a borderline deceptive message to cover for the fact that the whole ship building/planning process for the river vessels was a total mess at that time. Also, if you remember (perhaps not) the announcement for the "re-deployment" was handled very poorly, which apparently alienated (at least temporarily) a few potential new (and old) customers to the line. Based on that, I though it would have been a much better decision to use new names for these new ships, instead of recycling the names of the "unborn" ships and pretending like this was just a "re-deployment," which is not exactly true, since ships on most of the French Rivers are not interchangeable with the Rhine/Main/Danube ships. I also read here that changing the names of the ships while under the same ownership is apparently bad luck. I think that re-using names of the the ships associated with a failed marketing/implementation on new ships is even worse than that. I see that Crystal is back on its feet again with successful booking on the new river ships (including a booking by us), they should have planned to put the troubled past behind us by not using the Debussy and Ravel names. But I guess it is too late now. Regardless of all of that, we are looking forward to our first river cruise on Crystal Mozart next year.

If this is what they've done, Crystal shouldn't have slapped Debussy and Ravel onto the two larger (and totally different) boats, pretending to be "redeploying" the ships, when these ships are completely different ships from the originally marketed "Paris Class" ships. Yes, Crystal made a decision to pull out of the French rivers (by not building ships that meet the specifications for the French rivers) and added two more ships (copies of Bach and Mahler) to the Rhine/Main/Danube rivers. What I found it distasteful at that time is that they re-used the names of the previously marketed ships and said this is a "re-deployment," effectively trying to fool some of the less-informed consumers/investors into thinking that these ships were already built at that time, and they are somehow interchangeable between the two markets. As far as I can see it, this was a borderline deceptive message to cover for the fact that the whole ship building/planning process for the river vessels was a total mess at that time. Also, if you remember (perhaps not) the announcement for the "re-deployment" was handled very poorly, which apparently alienated (at least temporarily) a few potential new (and old) customers to the line. Based on that, I though it would have been a much better decision to use new names for these new ships, instead of recycling the names of the "unborn" ships and pretending like this was just a "re-deployment," which is not exactly true, since ships on most of the French Rivers are not interchangeable with the Rhine/Main/Danube ships. I also read here that changing the names of the ships while under the same ownership is apparently bad luck. I think that re-using names of the the ships associated with a failed marketing/implementation on new ships is even worse than that. I see that Crystal is back on its feet again with successful booking on the new river ships (including a booking by us), they should have planned to put the troubled past behind us by not using the Debussy and Ravel names. But I guess it is too late now. Regardless of all of that, we are looking forward to our first river cruise on Crystal Mozart next year.

I know that you"asked" me not to respond, but I have every right to respond to any post on Cruise Critic. You have every right to feel however you chose on any topic, but do you get that no one else agrees with you? You can wail and gnash your teeth as much as you like, but it doesn't appear that you will be changing any minds. I'd say, let it go, but if you choose not to, well, that's your choice.

If this is what they've done, Crystal shouldn't have slapped Debussy and Ravel onto the two larger (and totally different) boats, pretending to be "redeploying" the ships, when these ships are completely different ships from the originally marketed "Paris Class" ships. Yes, Crystal made a decision to pull out of the French rivers (by not building ships that meet the specifications for the French rivers) and added two more ships (copies of Bach and Mahler) to the Rhine/Main/Danube rivers. What I found it distasteful at that time is that they re-used the names of the previously marketed ships and said this is a "re-deployment," effectively trying to fool some of the less-informed consumers/investors into thinking that these ships were already built at that time, and they are somehow interchangeable between the two markets. As far as I can see it, this was a borderline deceptive message to cover for the fact that the whole ship building/planning process for the river vessels was a total mess at that time. Also, if you remember (perhaps not) the announcement for the "re-deployment" was handled very poorly, which apparently alienated (at least temporarily) a few potential new (and old) customers to the line. Based on that, I though it would have been a much better decision to use new names for these new ships, instead of recycling the names of the "unborn" ships and pretending like this was just a "re-deployment," which is not exactly true, since ships on most of the French Rivers are not interchangeable with the Rhine/Main/Danube ships. I also read here that changing the names of the ships while under the same ownership is apparently bad luck. I think that re-using names of the the ships associated with a failed marketing/implementation on new ships is even worse than that. I see that Crystal is back on its feet again with successful booking on the new river ships (including a booking by us), they should have planned to put the troubled past behind us by not using the Debussy and Ravel names. But I guess it is too late now. Regardless of all of that, we are looking forward to our first river cruise on Crystal Mozart next year.

If I felt that a river cruise line's behavior was "distasteful," "trying to fool" consumers, "borderline deceptive," and a "total mess," I certainly wouldn't give them my business. But since those descriptions are totally and wildly inaccurate, I am eagerly awaiting my upcoming cruise on Crystal Mahler and hope that it is as truly wonderful as my last Crystal river cruise.