Seabourn leasing out their expedition ships?

[Globalia]

Friends and I - all regular SB travellers over many SB ships and years - said at the time when SB decided to launch not one but two new high-cost-per-suite expedition ships, this very likely was one too many in financial and competitive terms and they would likely find the two combo at best not covering the cost of capital and, at worst, cash flow loss-making especially given the high $ price per night per suite they wanted to charge, or simply had to charge, coupled with the newly large number of 'expedition' suite nights they had to sell at these price points.

If this scenario had not eventuated, there is no way SB would revenue share with a mid-market company like APT, no way they would need to cede that material $ yield share and further risk brand damage/market confusion in the process.

Almost certainly the APT deal is a financial damage limitation exercise as SB/Carnival acts to mitigate the financial downside they are almost certainly experiencing with an over-exposure to the high-end 'expeditions' market. This has no doubt been made somewhat worse by the now highly competitive and over-supplied Antarctica market that is core to the annual itineraries of the SB expedition ships.

[SFTraveler53]

This is so strange. We have booked a Papeete to Darwin cruise next year (April 7 to May 10) aboard Pursuit.  Our understanding was that the ship was continuing on The Kimberley itinerary, but we were unable to book it.  The only way we could book The Kimberley with Seabourn was to wait until a May 30th departure.  I was scratching my head about the 20-day gap in the Pursuit's schedule.  So now I'm belatedly finding what I believe is the answer--that time is being filled with two of APT's six 2025 charter sailings with the Pursuit in The Kimberley.

 

No information or redirection from Seabourn when I contacted them initially inquiring about the availability of the May 10th voyage.  Just crickets.  All the Seabourn self-described "new opportunities" seem to also represent a disservice to existing Seabourn customers.  I know it's definitely messing up, and causing us to re-think, our 2025 cruise plans.

[Globalia]

On 4/2/2024 at 3:46 PM, SFTraveler53 said:

This is so strange. We have booked a Papeete to Darwin cruise next year (April 7 to May 10) aboard Pursuit.  Our understanding was that the ship was continuing on The Kimberley itinerary, but we were unable to book it.  The only way we could book The Kimberley with Seabourn was to wait until a May 30th departure.  I was scratching my head about the 20-day gap in the Pursuit's schedule.  So now I'm belatedly finding what I believe is the answer--that time is being filled with two of APT's six 2025 charter sailings with the Pursuit in The Kimberley.

 

No information or redirection from Seabourn when I contacted them initially inquiring about the availability of the May 10th voyage.  Just crickets.  All the Seabourn self-described "new opportunities" seem to also represent a disservice to existing Seabourn customers.  I know it's definitely messing up, and causing us to re-think, our 2025 cruise plans.

Just to add a bit to all this: in conversation with APT today, it was confirmed that if a cruise passenger chooses 'Seabourn chartered by APT' then zero standard SB Club benefits of any kind accrue via this route to an SB Club member whose Club rank entitles them to certain Club-level benefits, eg discounted premium wines, FOC laundry etc., and no SB Club points for future benefits and level enhancement are earned on this type of SB-supplied APT cruise. One positive though seems to be that, when booking this type of chartered SB cruise via APT the deposit required pre c. 120 days pre the cruise departure date is only $A1,000 pp (though this is non-refundable except via a 'deposit protection' option of $95 pp which converts a not-used deposit to a later FCC on APT offerings).

[Globalia]

On 2/22/2024 at 10:13 AM, Corony said:

Seems odd to be leasing these out so soon after building them?

https://latteluxurynews.com/2024/02/21/seabourn-apt-forge-new-expedition-cruise-partnership/

 

From this article, I could not help but notice this gem of revelation from SB's latest President (they have rotated through 3 different Presidents in almost as many years). My emphasis:

"Quizzed how the inaugural Kimberley program this year was selling, Leahy said the biggest opportunity today was for the Seabourn sales team to “drive pricing up,” 

It's clear both Silversea and SB are in fact driving prices (average net USD per suite per day) up big time on all but the most unpopular itineraries. Time will tell if this is a wise commercial decision or merely commercial over self-confidence in cruising's revival post-pandemic.