What is up with Celebrity? Negative threads seem to have disappeared

[cgolf1]

We are back to mainline Celebrity early next year and our last main line X cruise was at the worst of the food cuts in 2023, no prime rib, buffet very repetitive, etc but the food still tasted good. This year we did the Galapagos on the expedition and tied a business trip into a trip on the Emerald Princess and honestly loved it.

 

So has Celebrity righted the ship and is the food and the experience back to normal, or have some of the posters just cycled out from this forum and/or the changes are now just accepted.

[TeeRick]

Oh no.  You are going to bring the negative posters out of the woodwork now!  Hold on.🙃

[Jeremiah1212]

My last experience was pretty solid. Yes, it's changed over the years, but what hasn't? Food was pretty decent, options were plentiful, service was great. 

 

Some people probably needed to move on from both Celebrity and these boards. Popping in every thread to announce you no longer cruise XYZ line or you are "done after your next cruise" is only beneficial to your post count. There are lots of options and price points out there. Go find something that fits. Just don't expect a letter from the CEO begging you to come back. 

[pete_coach]

Food and dress are the most debated topics on all the cruise line forums.

There will always be folks that hate the food.

There will always be folks that dislike what others wear.

 

There will always be folks that dislike anyone that criticizes their favourite cruise line.

Hence, you should take all reviews and comments with a grain of salt and realize the comments are personal in nature and something set them off.to make them. 🙂

[Liao]

31 minutes ago, Jeremiah1212 said:

My last experience was pretty solid. Yes, it's changed over the years, but what hasn't? Food was pretty decent, options were plentiful, service was great. 

 

Some people probably needed to move on from both Celebrity and these boards. Popping in every thread to announce you no longer cruise XYZ line or you are "done after your next cruise" is only beneficial to your post count. There are lots of options and price points out there. Go find something that fits. Just don't expect a letter from the CEO begging you to come back. 

Boy oh boy, you hit the nail squarely on the head!!

[PhillyFan33579]

1 hour ago, cgolf1 said:

We are back to mainline Celebrity early next year and our last main line X cruise was at the worst of the food cuts in 2023, no prime rib, buffet very repetitive, etc but the food still tasted good. This year we did the Galapagos on the expedition and tied a business trip into a trip on the Emerald Princess and honestly loved it.

 

So has Celebrity righted the ship and is the food and the experience back to normal, or have some of the posters just cycled out from this forum and/or the changes are now just accepted.

I don’t think the food and experience on Celebrity has changed much over the last few years. I have been on 5 Celebrity cruises this year and my experience has been very similar to cruises on Celebrity in 2022 and 2023. Keep in mind all my cruises on Celebrity have been in the Caribbean. The experience might be different in other areas around the world. 

[canderson]

8 minutes ago, PhillyFan33579 said:

I don’t think the food and experience on Celebrity has changed much over the last few years. I have been on 5 Celebrity cruises this year and my experience has been very similar to cruises on Celebrity in 2022 and 2023. Keep in mind all my cruises on Celebrity have been in the Caribbean. The experience might be different in other areas around the world. 

The exception (on the + side) seemed to be our restart cruises on Constellation out of Tampa in December 2021.  Apparently they had a different purveyor for meat on those early cruises.  I couldn't have bought better at my favorite local butcher shop.  15 nights of thick tasty filets you could cut with a fork and pork chops most of an inch thick that you could cut with a fork. Better than what we'd ever had on X pre-COVID.

 

I write it off to a supply chain issue that perhaps caused Celebrity to go to a better supplier.  Tampa was also a new home port for them.  Perhaps their new supplier just wanted to impress?

[hcat]

Be careful what you ask for!

[Ex-Airbalancer]

Everyone on the zip tired thread complaining about reclining your seat on an airplane 

[cgolf1]

1 hour ago, canderson said:

The exception (on the + side) seemed to be our restart cruises on Constellation out of Tampa in December 2021.  Apparently they had a different purveyor for meat on those early cruises.  I couldn't have bought better at my favorite local butcher shop.  15 nights of thick tasty filets you could cut with a fork and pork chops most of an inch thick that you could cut with a fork. Better than what we'd ever had on X pre-COVID.

 

I write it off to a supply chain issue that perhaps caused Celebrity to go to a better supplier.  Tampa was also a new home port for them.  Perhaps their new supplier just wanted to impress?

 

Our Feb 2022 Cruise on the Connie with say 600 people, the buffet selection was top notch and the MDR food was amazing. That was a once in a lifetime amazing trip on what felt like a private yacht experience with so few people.

[cgolf1]

40 minutes ago, hcat said:

Be careful what you ask for!

 

I hope not lol, Just trying to get a feel for what has been happening lately. Going on our first S class, Eclipse, for I believe 10 nights. Looking forward to it, and wish my wife had more vaca time so we could cruise this fall.

[newtocruiseinblue]

We loved both of our celebrity cruises to the Mediterranean in 2022 and 2023 on the Reflection and Infinity…

[canderson]

3 hours ago, cgolf1 said:

 

Our Feb 2022 Cruise on the Connie with say 600 people, the buffet selection was top notch and the MDR food was amazing. That was a once in a lifetime amazing trip on what felt like a private yacht experience with so few people.

Yup.  There weren't any cruises long enough to interest us, so we took the first two out of Tampa as a 5+10.  There were about 1500 on the 5, but that dropped back to about 750 on the 10, and as you say, it was like sharing your private yacht with a few friends.

[cruisetonowhere10]

Just cruised Edge.  We thought the food (MDR and buffet) was solid, service excellent.  Obviously subjective, but I also appreciate that I’m not making 3 meals a day so I’m sure even average food might be appealing. 😂

[Karen450]

19 hours ago, canderson said:

The exception (on the + side) seemed to be our restart cruises on Constellation out of Tampa in December 2021.  Apparently they had a different purveyor for meat on those early cruises.  I couldn't have bought better at my favorite local butcher shop.  15 nights of thick tasty filets you could cut with a fork and pork chops most of an inch thick that you could cut with a fork. Better than what we'd ever had on X pre-COVID.

 

I write it off to a supply chain issue that perhaps caused Celebrity to go to a better supplier.  Tampa was also a new home port for them.  Perhaps their new supplier just wanted to impress?

I was on that cruise! And yes, the meat was great! But getting wine from the premium package was another story! 😃

[Veinless]

They’ve burned us too many times so they aren’t our first choice for cruising any longer. 

[Saturngrl]

A few post-COVID changes have been made since Celebrity's return.

• Boarding is no longer by class or loyalty level.  Now it's in order of Retreat, Premium, physically-challenged, then everyone else. 
• They no longer give you a welcome glass of bubbly when boarding the ship.  You may have to go to Cafe Al Bacio to get that.  We always enjoy our free glass at the Concierge Welcome Luncheon. 
• The little slices of cucumber with salmon mousse or cream cheese/chive toppings are no longer offered at breakfast in Oceanview. 
• English back bacon is not offered every day in Oceanview, but is on the MDR breakfast menu. 

 

None of these tiny little changes is a deal breaker for me.  We love all the perks Celebrity offers for Elites, the cloth towels in public restrooms, the non-smoking casino and the wonderful service! 

[WrittenOnYourHeart]

3 minutes ago, Saturngrl said:

English back bacon is not offered every day in Oceanview, but is on the MDR breakfast menu. 

 

It was every day on the 7/27-8/4 Beyond cruise.

[ISABELLA]

I will say that any food opinions will be subjective, where good or bad service will be most objective. Being Elite + ( many Celebrity cruises experiences) in MHO - overall food taste and quality in the past few years are not what we experienced on right after pendemic cruises.

Service still was very good. We tried Princess this year for 2 weeks in Europe on new ship -

Food in MDR was similar to Celebrity quality and choices. We found in Eatery ( buffet) there were more choices, even it was somewhat repetetive. Coffee is much better on Celebrity.

No matter how good or not some issues are, some people get used to it, others moved on to other forms of vacation. And, absolutely, there is always something to complain about.

 

[Lena11033]

48 minutes ago, WrittenOnYourHeart said:

 

It was every day on the 7/27-8/4 Beyond cruise.

 

I came to say the same thing with Apex.

But also every cruise I've done they had English bacon (trust me I don't eat American so I specifically look for English bacon)

[cgolf1]

57 minutes ago, ISABELLA said:

We tried Princess this year for 2 weeks in Europe on new ship -

Food in MDR was similar to Celebrity quality and choices. We found in Eatery ( buffet) there were more choices, even it was somewhat repetetive.

 

 

We did Princess this year and really enjoyed the ship, food, and service. What we found with Princess is that it has a lot of the stuff we liked on Royal, mini golf and some of the shows, and also had the goods of Celebrity, less kids, food, service. We ended up booking a 16 night in 2026 on the same ship, Emerald ,,and are really looking forward to it. I would agree with your assessment of their food offerings on Princess. To me Princess sits in between X and Royal, and after sailing HAL last year, they are just different than all 3 of those, for us not in a good way other than the awesome ship design.

 

Really looking forward to seeing what the S class ships have to offer.

Edited August 23 by cgolf1

[Nashna]

In January 2023, we were on back-to-back X Edge and Apex cruises and were subjected to their "new" menus.  No prime rib, tough beef dishes, and casseroles that offered very little meat.  We switched to Viking, Oceania, and Azamara.  All of those lines have excellent food quality and selections.  While we enjoyed our other sailings, we miss the varied entertainment we found on Celebrity. Over time, I've noticed an improvement in the Celebrity food posts since January 2023. We are returning to X this January.  We don't like sailing in the Infinity staterooms, so we chose the sunset verandas on Edge and Apex.  The problem is, we missed Aqua class.  We are trying the Eclipse in Aqua class and hoping the recent food reviews have been accurate.   

[phoenix_dream]

To my knowledge Celebrity has not made any recent adverse changes to things like they were regularly doing in recent times.  Some of the bad changes were reversed. For many of them the complaints have been said (often multiple times) so there is no need to keep repeating them.  Some of the most loyal cruisers have, sadly, felt the need to move onto other cruise lines.  I think all of these have led to a reduction in negative posts recently.   One other point is that due to marketing changes like 3 and 4 night cruises and the status match with Royal, it has brought over new cruisers to Celebrity who have no idea that some things aren't as nice as they were several years ago.  So it's still a very nice product, just in some cases not as nice as it used to be (and often way more expensive, but they don't realize that either)

Edited August 23 by phoenix_dream

[ISABELLA]

3 hours ago, Nashna said:

In January 2023, we were on back-to-back X Edge and Apex cruises and were subjected to their "new" menus.  No prime rib, tough beef dishes, and casseroles that offered very little meat.  We switched to Viking, Oceania, and Azamara.  All of those lines have excellent food quality and selections.  While we enjoyed our other sailings, we miss the varied entertainment we found on Celebrity. Over time, I've noticed an improvement in the Celebrity food posts since January 2023. We are returning to X this January.  We don't like sailing in the Infinity staterooms, so we chose the sunset verandas on Edge and Apex.  The problem is, we missed Aqua class.  We are trying the Eclipse in Aqua class and hoping the recent food reviews have been accurate.   

We will be trying  Ascent next year in Sunset veranda ( IV is not for us) - will see how that will work out. For a different experience, we tried NCL Haven - absolutely loved it. Food and service were superb. Didn't care for the rest of the ship - felt too crowded, but we enjoyed exclusvity and benefits of Haven. This December will try MSC YC. Next spring we will be coming back to AQ - hopefully food is improved in Blu. Last cruise in AQ was in 2019 - food  was just OK. 

Still cruising, and if something we don't like - we find another cruise line to try. 

[Nashna]

You will love the Yacht Club.