Joy - concierge class thoughts?

[All-ready2cruise]

I'm interested in the Concierge Category as well since I don't really require/want the services of the Butler.  I hope this category is as it is stated, concierge service, private restaurant, priority boarding and a few other little perks. The price seems quite good IMO.  I'm considering a short cruise to try this new category out. 

Cheers

[Snagler]

On 4/7/2019 at 12:48 PM, janice2348 said:

Looks something like this

 

So is the virtual window an actual live feed from outside? 

 

[janice2348]

1 hour ago, Snagler said:

So is the virtual window an actual live feed from outside? 

 

I believe so. 

[quercus alba]

Good pix of inside concierge suites in posts from TheDougOut over in the "Everything Joy..." thread--https://boards.cruisecritic.com/topic/2647600-everything-norwegian-joys-westernization-2019/?do=findComment&comment=57355600

Edited April 27, 2019 by quercus alba

[david_sobe]

The website says "private breakfast" and not a private restaurant.  Any idea what this is about?  Where is the private breakfast?  And its only breakfast?  The rooms get everything the haven gets except the private area?

[Snagler]

1 hour ago, quercus alba said:

Good pix of inside concierge suites in posts from TheDougOut over in the "Everything Joy..." thread--https://boards.cruisecritic.com/topic/2647600-everything-norwegian-joys-westernization-2019/?do=findComment&comment=57355600

Yes thank you! I’ve been following Doug’s post all weekend. He posted the exact pics I was looking for and so much more. 

[BuckeyeFan03]

On 4/26/2019 at 1:16 PM, Snagler said:

So is the virtual window an actual live feed from outside? 

 

We sailed in a Harmony virtual balcony and it was a live feed from outside. It was pretty cool and it could definitely trick you for a minute here and there before you remembered it was "virtual."

[valleyvillage]

6 hours ago, david_sobe said:

The website says "private breakfast" and not a private restaurant.  Any idea what this is about?  Where is the private breakfast?  And its only breakfast?  The rooms get everything the haven gets except the private area?

Yes, it used to say "private dining" but no longer. 

[arpie05]

On 4/27/2019 at 10:17 PM, valleyvillage said:

Yes, it used to say "private dining" but no longer. 

I've noticed it depends where I look.  Under general cruise accommodations it says: With plenty of room to relax, our beautifully appointed, luxury suites offer some of the grandest accommodations, available on board Norwegian Joy. Feel pampered with 24/7 concierge service, available to help with everything from booking shore excursions to arranging customized experiences. Private dining, priority embarkation and disembarkation, and special perks round out the exclusive experience.

Under Joy accommodations it says:Finished with the finest touches, our concierge category features spacious, luxury accommodations, concierge service, and private breakfast.

 

[Sara_smile]

16 minutes ago, arpie05 said:

I've noticed it depends where I look.  Under general cruise accommodations it says: With plenty of room to relax, our beautifully appointed, luxury suites offer some of the grandest accommodations, available on board Norwegian Joy. Feel pampered with 24/7 concierge service, available to help with everything from booking shore excursions to arranging customized experiences. Private dining, priority embarkation and disembarkation, and special perks round out the exclusive experience.

Under Joy accommodations it says:Finished with the finest touches, our concierge category features spacious, luxury accommodations, concierge service, and private breakfast.

 

LOL that is even more vague. Private dining can mean in-suite dining or free room service.  Notice it does not say private RESTAURANT.   IMHO the private breakfast/dining is free breakfast room service.  I am skilled at understanding NCL slick language. Since so many are on the Joy now, don't you think the "private restaurant" for these cabins would have leaked by now?

[arpie05]

2 minutes ago, Sara_smile said:

LOL that is even more vague. Private dining can mean in-suite dining or free room service.  Notice it does not say private RESTAURANT.   IMHO the private breakfast/dining is free breakfast room service.  I am skilled at understanding NCL slick language. Since so many are on the Joy now, don't you think the "private restaurant" for these cabins would have leaked by now?

I feel like I saw earlier today where it still said Cagneys for breakfast and Lunch but couldn't find it.  I also think the speculation about free room service should be true. No one knows I'm sure until They've done a few sailings.  They charge "service charge" same as Haven. They list it with the Suites. They refer to them as suites. And there is still one place that says Suites don't pay for room service.

It is annoying how vague it is!  We don't sail until July.

[valleyvillage]

A post from a cruiser this weekend: "For those sailing on Joy in Concierge Class suites, breakfast and lunch will be available for you in La Cuccina"

[Hollyann]

We just got off the Joy yesterday. We were upgraded to concierge class for no extra costs - due to the prices dropping. We booked directly through NCL and they were nice enough to do it after our final payment.

We had a family concierge balcony suite. It was by FAR the largest cabin we have ever sailed in and was quite nice - we are spoiled now. We did a cabin crawl and saw two haven suites and I thought our cabin blew theirs away.  They did not have as big of a balcony. They put the master bathroom as 1/2 of their balcony so that you could bathe and look out of the window. While it was a deep tub, it had no jets, no shower massage to rinse off. We would not have used it very much - if at all.  We liked being able to lay in our beds and look out.  Haven did have the other amenities - private bar, observation deck, pool.  That was of course better.  I do not know how I would use a butler.

We did have free movies which was nice. They had pretty new movies - A Star is Born, Crazy Rich Asians, we watched the Kevin Hart one - The Upside.

I forgot to check about Room Service. We usually like to order it, but that is on RCCL when we can open bottles of wine in our room and eat cheese trays.

No butler, but a concierge.  A couple of times we called and he was on break and it went to the front desk - after many rings, but he was able to get us into dining times that we were unable to book ourselves. (example - we could not book a 5:30 dining time when we had 7:30 shows booked).  He also got us into comedy clubs and the galaxy pavilion.  It was nice not having to try and figure out how to do that.

I really liked being able to eat at LaCuccina for breakfast and occasionally lunch.  It served the same food other places have on the ship, but was never crowded so we could sit right down and get our order in - a big plus.  They had the eggs Benedict, french toast, pancakes, scrambled eggs, etc. Then as soon as you ordered, you could walk up to an area and pick up a variety of fruit cups, yogurt, sliced fruit, etc. A great way to get some delicious healthy food in.

We found a lot of the food all over the ship to be barely warm most times.  This was disappointing.

We were able to book 3 comedy shows - I did some of this at the Social immediately upon boarding - was surprised that they let us do that. But they were 3 different shows. We really liked Mike Burton. We ended up canceling the one with Todd?? Simmons because he did not look that funny when we saw him other places.

 

 

 

[jvsnana]

37 minutes ago, Hollyann said:

We just got off the Joy yesterday. We were upgraded to concierge class for no extra costs - due to the prices dropping. We booked directly through NCL and they were nice enough to do it after our final payment.

We had a family concierge balcony suite. It was by FAR the largest cabin we have ever sailed in and was quite nice - we are spoiled now. We did a cabin crawl and saw two haven suites and I thought our cabin blew theirs away.  They did not have as big of a balcony. They put the master bathroom as 1/2 of their balcony so that you could bathe and look out of the window. While it was a deep tub, it had no jets, no shower massage to rinse off. We would not have used it very much - if at all.  We liked being able to lay in our beds and look out.  Haven did have the other amenities - private bar, observation deck, pool.  That was of course better.  I do not know how I would use a butler.

We did have free movies which was nice. They had pretty new movies - A Star is Born, Crazy Rich Asians, we watched the Kevin Hart one - The Upside.

I forgot to check about Room Service. We usually like to order it, but that is on RCCL when we can open bottles of wine in our room and eat cheese trays.

No butler, but a concierge.  A couple of times we called and he was on break and it went to the front desk - after many rings, but he was able to get us into dining times that we were unable to book ourselves. (example - we could not book a 5:30 dining time when we had 7:30 shows booked).  He also got us into comedy clubs and the galaxy pavilion.  It was nice not having to try and figure out how to do that.

I really liked being able to eat at LaCuccina for breakfast and occasionally lunch.  It served the same food other places have on the ship, but was never crowded so we could sit right down and get our order in - a big plus.  They had the eggs Benedict, french toast, pancakes, scrambled eggs, etc. Then as soon as you ordered, you could walk up to an area and pick up a variety of fruit cups, yogurt, sliced fruit, etc. A great way to get some delicious healthy food in.

We found a lot of the food all over the ship to be barely warm most times.  This was disappointing.

We were able to book 3 comedy shows - I did some of this at the Social immediately upon boarding - was surprised that they let us do that. But they were 3 different shows. We really liked Mike Burton. We ended up canceling the one with Todd?? Simmons because he did not look that funny when we saw him other places.

 

 

 

Thank you for that review and glad you were able to upgrade for no additional costs!

Can you tell me who your Concierge was?

We keep going back and forth from Concierge Class to Haven....this info helps alot!

[Hollyann]

2 hours ago, jvsnana said:

Thank you for that review and glad you were able to upgrade for no additional costs!

Can you tell me who your Concierge was?

We keep going back and forth from Concierge Class to Haven....this info helps alot!

It was Reynaldo Villazor - the same that was reported on the other Joy post.  If you are looking for a good cabin, I would highly recommend Concierge. If you want the private observation deck and private pool, then you would probably prefer Haven.  I do not believe the pool had a view though. Plus when we were doing our Cabin crawl, I only saw a couple of people using it. - JMO.

 

If you don't want to fight for a seat on the observation desk, Haven would be nice. 4 of the 5 of us probably spent about 1 hour total on the observation deck. We used our balcony mostly for site seeing because we did not want the glass between us and the view.  My 26 yo son did like sitting there. Personal preference.

 

Edited May 26, 2019 by Hollyann
more personal opinions

[kitty-sail]

On 4/29/2019 at 5:28 PM, valleyvillage said:

A post from a cruiser this weekend: "For those sailing on Joy in Concierge Class suites, breakfast and lunch will be available for you in La Cuccina"

Can you tell me what 'room service' means? I know Concierge class does not get a butler, but if I ordered room service, is there a charge or is this class exempt?

[Canbylancer]

Yes there is a charge for room service in concierge.  I was just on the last sailing, off on March 15th.

[bowerboys]

So had my cruise on the encore cnx for may this year and we have rebooked for may 2021 we had booked a mini suite and going for the same on the joy (12218) cabin on 12th deck but is it really worth the money compared to a normal balcony cabin ???

Edited April 7, 2020 by bowerboys

[TheDuckmom]

8 hours ago, bowerboys said:

So had my cruise on the encore cnx for may this year and we have rebooked for may 2021 we had booked a mini suite and going for the same on the joy (12218) cabin on 12th deck but is it really worth the money compared to a normal balcony cabin ???

Mini suite compared to balcony=. No

[htnut]

14 hours ago, bowerboys said:

So had my cruise on the encore cnx for may this year and we have rebooked for may 2021 we had booked a mini suite and going for the same on the joy (12218) cabin on 12th deck but is it really worth the money compared to a normal balcony cabin ???

 

No, as I recall it's just a larger bathroom.

 

The big step up from balcony is a concierge CB or CC.  Those are fabulous rooms for so many reasons.

 

Happy research, happy cruising, and remember to washy washy!

[kitty-sail]

On 4/5/2020 at 10:10 PM, Canbylancer said:

Yes there is a charge for room service in concierge.  I was just on the last sailing, off on March 15th.

Canbylancer: Thank you for your input.  Haven prices are getting out of my budget and Concierge seems like a nice downgrade.  Don't mind not having a butler but I do like help with dining and show reservations. Did you get afternoon snacks?

[omarchs]

FYI, 

I was looking at the Joy next spring out of NY and all the Concierge cabins are showing as sold out. Wonder if NCL is removing their classification during the downtime to make the ship consistent with the rest of the fleet or could just be another glitch?

[All-ready2cruise]

4 minutes ago, omarchs said:

FYI, 

I was looking at the Joy next spring out of NY and all the Concierge cabins are showing as sold out. Wonder if NCL is removing their classification during the downtime to make the ship consistent with the rest of the fleet or could just be another glitch?

I'd say it's a glitch or due to them changing the category colours of the differenct Concierge categories. All concierge cabins on all sailings out of NYC are sold out so doubt that's even possible right now. 

[Canbylancer]

1 hour ago, kitty-sail said:

Canbylancer: Thank you for your input.  Haven prices are getting out of my budget and Concierge seems like a nice downgrade.  Don't mind not having a butler but I do like help with dining and show reservations. Did you get afternoon snacks?

Yes we did get snacks.  Not everyday.  The breakfast and lunch at La Cucina was fantastic.  The concierge would walk around those times to see if he could help with anything.

[kitty-sail]

8 hours ago, All-ready2cruise said:

I'd say it's a glitch or due to them changing the category colours of the differenct Concierge categories. All concierge cabins on all sailings out of NYC are sold out so doubt that's even possible right now. 

I hope they are not raising the prices while cabins are blocked out.