Do you think Celebrity should offer non-smoking staterooms

[Shirley and Les]

As a former smoker, I voted "No."

Most of the time, I don't like sitting in the smoking area of a restaurant if there are a lot of smokers there. It is my choice, but I prefer the smoking section of a local restaurant due to location and the personnel.

It is extremely difficult to enforce a "No Smoking" policy for a hotel room, a section of a ship or any other public place. Since exposure to cigarette smoke doesn't bother me, I will allow a friend to light up in a private "no smoking" area (my cabin).

I travelled when I was working. If a motel/hotel was out of smoking rooms when I checked in, guess what, my room was converted to a smoking room. Most places offered me an ashtray to use in the non-smoking room.

I just don't think a cruise line can honestly offer a non-smoking cabin.

Les

[rosinryanz]

I've never had a problem with my room smelling like smoke. In fact, when I visited my friends cabin (they are smokers), I honestly couldn't smell a thing.

 

Nevertheless, I think that a few cabins could be designated non smoking for the hyper-allergentic/ smoke-o-phobic. Just a few so that sector can be satisfied (will they every be though?).

[lisiamc]

If all else fails, here is a old trick from nursing days when we bought Avon perfume sticks. (Now I have Lauder's "Pleasures" in a stick.) Simply rub the stick under your nose and on your tongue. That will help for a while.

 

OK, can I just say ACKK! here? Perfume on your tongue? No kidding that will help me not think about the smell of smoke for a while! I'll be way too busy in the bathroom, washing my tongue! :p

 

Lisa

[brigittetom]

On our trip back from the last cruise we found a hotel that had nothing left except nonsmoking rooms. Not a problem since I could smoke on the balcony. The room had three ashtrays. I wouldn't trust hotels at all. The cruise ships eliminate smoke odors, so do hotels. :)

[Mike2131]

The much more restrictive policy on Oceania is one of the many reasons we selected them for a cruise in February.

[Mike2131]

The much more restrictive policy on Oceania is one reason (among many) that we selected them for a cruise in February.

[emptynest1]

Like many others here I have never smelled smoke in our cabin and I have been on several cruises of varing lenghs. The crew does a great job of keeping the cabins fresh.

Smoking is a physical addiction that is very difficult to quit.

 

It will be a long while before cruise lines ban smoking.

[geoherb]

That won't be very convenient for PAX in inside/outside cabins.

When it comes to safety, I don't mind making it inconvenient for someone to smoke. It's funny that whenever someone mentions bringing an iron or candles with them on a cruise, there will be a hundred responses about why they're such fire hazards on a ship--yet people will defend the rights of others to smoke in their cabins.

 

According to the National Fire Protection Association, "Cigarettes are the leading cause of fatal fires in the United States." In one report, the NFPA says, "Trash, mattresses and bedding, and upholstered furniture are the items most commonly ignited in smoking-material home fires."

 

I'm sure more sensitive smoke detectors could be put into cabins on cruise ships to detect anyone smoking in their cabins. Just like airlines have installed smoke detectors in airplane bathrooms.

[greeneg]

Just to add in, here is a link to a similar thread:

 

http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=90857

 

 

My only comment is that these numbers, on what is now a very long running thread/poll (1000+ responses) are very consistant and have been for quite sometime.

 

I think that they do show that there is a market for non-smoking cruises, despite Carnival's experience with the Paradise and that trend may well be more pronounced in the future. Certainly the majority supports more restrictive smoking policys than those which are now on the books.

 

Perhaps Oceania is worth a look.

[dkjretired]

Three words

 

Supply and Demand

[CruznTom]

Boy, is this topic getting old or what?

[hdawson]

Greeneg. Not only Carnival but also Renaisance Cruises tried to prohibit smoking and also kids and also travel agent representation. They are bankrupt. How in the world do you propose group bookings or incentive sales of a cruise that eleminated 26% of the US population and about 36% of Europeans from the market? Cruising is a business; not a social experiment as Carnival learned. Plenty of families have at least one smoker. BTW those percentages are not changing alot. Polls on websites are not anywhere representative of the cruise market. Most cruisers don't use the internet and those that do post are the ones most vocal and most against smoking that tilts the results.

[WeBeCruisin']

It's interesting that in virtually every poll, such as smoking, dress code, chair hogs, etc., those in the minority make the most noise and post a disproportionate number of posts, and with the most anger and hostility?

 

Allen

[greeneg]

With all due respect, and no intent to create any sort of controversy, I have to state that the poll numbers are the poll numbers and the fact that they have been consistant over a relately long sampline period makes it much more likely that they, in fact, do represent the population as a whole, rather than not.

 

I cannot accept the statement that the "numbers are not represenative", because you can't do statistics that way. The numbers are what they are and as such not subject to interpretation. Now what those numbers MEAN, of course, is where interpretation comes into the process.

 

If the smoking poll numbers are not representative, then how do you explain the skew in this poll which is much more pronounced?

 

If the non-smoking population increases, while the smoking numbers decrease ( as seems likely given current trends), then there is always the risk that catering to the minority might just drive more business away than it brings in. Certainly that is a situation that Celebrity Managment will keep an eye on: I am sure that they will be well aware of ALLfactors which might impact their bottom line. Right now cruising is highly competitive and very much in demand; however, when cruise pricing hits the point at which people are driven to look at alternatives, or competitors, then the smoking situation just might prove to be the deciding factor between choosing one line over another.

 

BTW,thanks for the tip about Radisson, didn't know that they were also more restrictive about smoking.

[hdawson]

greeneg. Keep in mind that non-smokers will still sail a ship with limited smoking allowed. Smokers will NOT sail a non-smoking ship. 26% of the American market. CArnival tried it and according to Bob Dickinson, on the Paradise, in addition to lower per diems, both bar and casino revenue was the lowest of their large fleet. Again, it's a business and primary responsibility is to maximize revenue and share value for the stockholders.

[Rence]

Actually the most figure that I saw indicates that it is down to 23% of Americans that smoke and this is likely to continue to drop. As states implemement higher taxes and greater restrictions on smoking, the percentage of smokers drops sharply. Utah is down to 12% and I believe that California is just over 15%. As the percentage of smokers drops, it will be less and less necessarily for businesses to accomdate a dwindling percentage of the population. With the cruise lines this may not mean non-smoking cruises, but it may mean fewer and fewer on-board smoking designated areas.

 

One of the real problems with a cruise line is not the percentage of people who smoke, but the percentage of parties that include a smoker. You may have a husband and wife traveling together and only the wife smokes. They would not book a non-smoking cruise line. Four couples want to vacation together, one wife smokes, those 8 people will not go on a non-smoking cruise line. A company wants to book a group cruise for 300 people (incentive trip for employees, church group, special interest club etc.) There may be a small number of people in the group who are smokers, the organizers will steer clear of a non-smoking ship.

 

So a non-smoking ship or cruiseline would not lose 23% of the population as potential customers, in fact it would be far greater as they would lose out on all smokers plus all who would travel with smokers. It would almost eliminate any group cruises which is a substantial part of a cruiseline business.

[hdawson]

Rence. Actually the numbers I've seen over the past few years fluctuate between 24 and 27% and they have fluctuated possibly on who is reporting the numbers. But the numbers do go up and down in that range. I think Utah is a bit unique and a poor example. And I have no idea how many from Utah take cruises compared to other states. Probably the lowest coffee consumption too. Maybe coke and pepsi too.

[Rence]

The CDC shows 23.3% for smokers for 2000, 22.8% for 2001, estimate for 2004 is 22%. For many years the smoking rate hovered right around 25% with some up years some down years, but more recently with agressive anti-smoking compaigns, the trend is downward.

 

The CDC has an initiative to drop the smoking rate in the US to 12% for 2010, though they admit that it is not very likely. That's the reason I knew about Utah, because thus far Utah is the only state to hit the goal. Utah is at 11.7%. This would make sense because of the lifestyle choices of the predominate religion in Utah. On the otherhand, tobacco friendly states, such as Kentucky, still have relatively high smoking rates (Kentucky is 34.2%)

 

California was a bit of a surprise, but they did see a dramatic drop in smoking rates after the indoor smoking ban went into effect. With Utah and California having lower rates, one might expect to see less smoking on west coast cruises.

 

The evidence suggests that higher taxes, smoking restrictions and anti-smoking campaigns are having an effect. In addition as more and more methods are developed to make quitting smoking easier, more and more smokers will take advantage of it. A large number of smokers indicate that they would like to quit. In 2000, 41% of smokers stopped smoking for at least 1 day in an attempt to quit, however only 4.7% of these smokers were sucessful in quitting smoking for 3 months. There are a lot of treatments in development that will help people quit. For example a nicotine vaccine was recently announced that is in testing which blocks nicotines effect on the smoker, making quitting easier. One would think that a large number of smokers try to quit each year, once there are treatments that help a smoker quit, a larger percentage will be successful.

 

So with everything that is currently taking place, the percentage of smokers is likely to continue to decline.

[Bruin Steve]

California was a bit of a surprise, but they did see a dramatic drop in smoking rates after the indoor smoking ban went into effect. With Utah and California having lower rates, one might expect to see less smoking on west coast cruises.

California shouldn't be that much of a surprise...

We've always been a little different than a lot of the rest of the country...a little more health conscious, more into sports and fitness...

(Check out all of the various Sports rosters and note where an overwhelming percentage of athletes come from...it's way out of whack even on a per capita basis)...We are on our own wavelength politically, culturally and more...the rest of the country is merely catching up with us...

 

And, the health conscious trend setters we are, we were the FIRST state to enact tough anti-smoking laws...we have not allowed smoking in bars, restaurants, workplaces and other public places for a long time now...

 

It is a total shock when I travel out of state to places that actually have such a thing as a "Smoking Section" (like the air in the smoking section stays in the smoking section)...

 

They've banned smoking in bars and restaurants long ago and none of them seem to have gone out of business on that account...

 

The fact that there may be 15% of the population here who are smokers is probably, in great part, due to IMMIGRATION...Yeah, as a major port of entry, we probably have more new arrivals from other parts of the world...including parts that seem to smoke heavily, like Asia...This skews those numbers a bit...BUT, give us some time...we will work on those new arrivals...

 

Our goal is ZERO...

 

And yes, I've been on cruises out of LA or San Diego where I don't think I've noticed ANYONE smoking...even in the "Smoking Sections" in the lounges...And, believe me, I DO NOTICE anyone smoking...I am asthmatic and even a trace of smoke bothers me to no end...

 

When I've been on cruises in Europe or on the East Coast, I need to carry my inhaler and have difficulty breathing on some parts of the ship...

 

Another reason I'll never move away from SoCal...

[canderson]

Fact: Whatever the stewards use to clean and disinfect the cabins really works. In 18 cruises, I've never encountered the smell of smoke in my cabin.

No kidding. I'm a smoker, but leave my habit to the veranda. My wife isn't, and really fusses about it when we get a hotel room that was supposed to be non-smoking but hadn't been treated that way. She's never said a peep about any of our cabins in all of our many Celebrity cruises. We sail in cabins with verandas, though, and I don't know if the insides work as well in this regard. I voted "Yes", all the same.

[hdawson]

Since the vast majority have reported that the smell of stale smoke hasn't been a problem in the cabins, I'm wondering why so many feel that there should be no-smoking cabins? I give the stewards alot of credit for doing such a good job in almost all cases. I haven't forgotten nor am I ignoring flagglers experience and of course nothing is 100%.

[flagger]

I could be hypersensitive, but it was in the pillows and in the curtains definitely.

[hdawson]

flagger, next time just ask the steward to replace the pillows and bed linens. They usually are happy to make you comfortable. I'm not doubting you at all.

[kayr2]

I have been on 3 cruises on the Norwegian Wind and as I recall, one side of the ship was smoking cabins and the other non-smoking. We booked non-smoking but walking down the hallway, you could always tell where the cheaters were.

 

On Celebrity, smoke in the cabins has not been a problem for us but smokers on the balconies has been. We had a cigar smoker above us and could always tell when he lit up. Cigarette smoke also was noticeable.

 

I have never been a smoker but both my parents were and I grew up accustommed to it. However, the older I get, the more sensitive I get. My grandfather started smoking Camels when he was l2 and they finally got him at 85. If some one wants to smoke themselves to death that is his or her right. I don't feel I should be included in their painful sucide plans. Just one of those facts of life.

 

Kay

[xynewbie]

I could be hypersensitive, but it was in the pillows and in the curtains definitely.

 

How do I construct a time until cruise avatar as on your profile?