If You Could Talk To Stein Kruise's ...

[RevNeal]

If you could sit down with Stein Kruse, President and Chief Executive Officer of HAL, and talk honestly, frankly, and person-to-person with him for just 10 minutes, what would you say??? What would you tell him? What concerns would you share? What would you ask him to justify, explain, or defend?

 

ANYTHING goes.

[ekerr19]

Good question Greg.

 

Used to be, you could get a response from Kirk Lanterman... In fact, I probably have one or two.... Back in the day (under Lanterman) things were different and the company had different priorities and a much different focus.

 

I'm not sure having a discussion with Stein Kruse will net you much. One look at his employment history was all I ever really needed to see.

 

Kirk Lanterman was at the helm of HAL for a very long time - if I am not mistaken, from the old Westours days. He had a vision and was very well respected. When he stepped down, the changes began... and they will continue, regardless of customer satisfaction.

 

I guess if I could sit down with Stein Kruse, I'd ask him what was "really" wrong with the way things used to be???? ... it wasn't like they were losing money or anything.

[kryos]

If you could sit down with Stein Kruse, President and Chief Executive Officer of HAL, and talk honestly, frankly, and person-to-person with him for just 10 minutes, what would you say??? What would you tell him? What concerns would you share? What would you ask him to justify, explain, or defend?

 

ANYTHING goes.

I would simply tell him what a great cruise line HAL is and how much I enjoy sailing it. I would ask him to keep new and interesting itineraries on the drawing board and offer some of the more popular longer cruises at different times of the year. I notice that the Hawaii/South Pacific one will be offered twice in 2008 ... once in the normal month of January, and then again in the month of September. This sort of thing is good since it allows people to take their "dream" cruises, even if one time period is not possible due to scheduling difficulties.

 

I would also tell him that he's got a very, very loyal Holland America following ... people who won't sail another line ... and he needs to take care of them. Those people and their descendents will be HAL's bread and butter for a long time to come. Many of them are older, have more discretionary income and time, and will be far more lucrative to the line than the occasional seven-day sailor. Hence it is these customers' needs and desires that need to also be considered whenever HAL contemplates a change in fleet policies ... such as the current dining experiments.

 

But other than that, I think Mr. Kruse would enjoy his "sit down" with me ... because I really wouldn't have any complaints at all. HAL suits me just fine.

 

Blue skies ...

 

--rita

[Jade13]

I would ask for some more shorter cruises (10-12 days) with exotic itineraies. Some of us are still working and can't get off work longer than 2 weeks at a time. Even 10 days ends up being two weeks with an overnight flight and a couple nights in the first port prior to the cruise.

 

There are so many places that I want to go but would need an "Around the world voyage". Some of the shorter ones I'd like to do, do not fit my travel time.

 

Ex. It looks like only one cruise next year on the Prisendam (Oct 2008) stops in Israel, and that month doesn't work for me. I want to go on a Panama canal cruise but have already been to Costa Rica, Aruba, San Juan, St. Thomas. I see there is a Lima Peru through the canal (I love the itinerary) but I won't miss Thanksgivng with my family. Why is this not offered at other times? Why don't they have a 7 day Mexican cruise from San Diego that stops in the port for the Copper Canyon. I'd like to go to Mexico but only on a 7 day (not 10), so I can spend time at the San Diego Zoo and California.

[ciska40]

Well I just may get that chance. I am invited to the opening of the new europe office in Rotterdam on the 28th of februari. Stein kruse will be there.

 

Ciska

[kryos]

I would ask for some more shorter cruises (10-12 days) with exotic itineraies.

I think the problem there is that those exotic itineraries take more than 10-12 days. For the shorter cruises, HAL generally sticks to Alaska or the Caribbean ... with more "standard" itineraries ... or Europe, but then you have to deal with the time and expense of an international flight.

 

I too work ... and plan to be working for a long time. I did some shorter cruises and one long HAL cruise (30 days). I found I like the longer cruises much better as there is an entirely different ambience onboard. So, what I am doing now is planning just one cruise a year ... a longer one ... rather than a couple of shorter ones.

 

Maybe one day you'll accrue more vacation time and then be able to take advantage of HAL's exotic offerings. Thank God I have 28 years service with my company and that's the only reason I can do longer cruises.

 

Blue skies ...

 

--rita

[jhannah]

Well I just may get that chance. I am invited to the opening of the new europe office in Rotterdam on the 28th of februari. Stein kruse will be there.

Fantastic, Ciska! You can be our mouthpiece!

 

I would tell Mr. Kruse that HAL offers something very special to many, many folks ... including my DW and me. We appreciate the fact that their ships look like ocean-going vessels, not floating theme parks. We enjoy the crew who work so hard to provide us with a wonderful vacation. Then I'd ask him when he was going to take his cotton-pickin' hands off the whole dining program and leave fixed seatings alone! We all have ample choices onboard to dine "as we wish," and with other lines if we want the anytime route full-tilt. As it is, he and his marketing department are alienating many faithful Mariners by making it harder to experience what they've come to love about cruising with Holland America.

[Krazy Kruizers]

Bring back all traditonal dining.

 

Improve itineraries. We are presntly looking at some Princess 10 day itineraries that include St Kitts, Nevius, etc. HAL's have become too boring and we are finding it harder and harder to do 10 day back-to-back cruises on HAL with different itineraries.

 

Go back to better quality of meats.

[Sea King]

Greg

 

interesting thread

 

since you have 6,000+ posts and I only have about 265, I'd be interested in learning what questions you'd like to ask Mr. Kruse

 

better yet: why try an open letter on the board and see what, if any response, there is .. if as everyone seems to think Seattle reads CC, why not give it a try

 

what's to lose?

[bankerbabe]

As one who was caught in the middle of the Noordam pricing fiasco - I'd have plenty to say to Mr. Kruse about his company's handling of the situation. I certainly would like to hear an honest explanation from him, supported by the numbers that went into the decision. But I doubt I would get a straight answer, or at least one that would satisfy me. So I'll just stick with counting down the days to my cruise (65) and hope it was worth the extra cost.

[Schplinky]

I'd say that I am a "young" person who some of the new changes (come when you want dining) are supposed to appeal to and they don't. I'd ask him to turn his stereo down on the pool deck and to turn up the volume on the very thin activity schedule on our 7 day cruise to the caribbean. I'd say that the entertainment needs to be better staged and executed and that live musicians would go a long way to making it look less theme-parkish.

 

I'd thank him for the wonderful food and great staff and would plead with him to fire any cruise director or comedian who make fun of the staff during their schticks.

 

I'd beg him to get rid of Steiner and then staff the spa in-house. How hard can this be? Every interaction I've had with Steiner on three cruise lines has been negative. Maybe it's time for HAL to be an innovator and ask Aveda to be their spa brand?

[Schplinky]

I'd say that I am a "young" person who some of the new changes (come when you want dining) are supposed to appeal to and they don't. I'd ask him to turn his stereo down on the pool deck and to turn up the volume on the very thin activity schedule on our 7 day cruise to the caribbean. I'd say that the entertainment needs to be better staged and executed and that live musicians would go a long way to making it look less theme-parkish.

 

I'd thank him for the wonderful food and great staff and would plead with him to fire any cruise director or comedian who make fun of the staff during their schticks.

 

I'd beg him to get rid of Steiner and then staff the spa in-house. How hard can this be? Every interaction I've had with Steiner on three cruise lines has been negative. Maybe it's time for HAL to be an innovator in this area and bring Aveda to the sea.

[bepsf]

10 minutes? Is that all???

I'd ask him why he's trying to remake HAL into Princess or NCL with the dining situation. No matter what he does, those two lines will always be at an advantage because their new fleets were designed for Freestyle/Personal Choice from the get-go. No matter how much he tries, HAL will never work as well "Freestyle" with the current fleet of ships.

In addition, I'd remind him that his existing repeat clientelle - the best percentage of repeat clients in the business, and the envy of all other lines - are very happy with the traditional way of things. At the rate he's going, he's going to alienate his repeat clients by trying to make HAL into NCL & Princess - a grave risk since the existing HAL fleet is severely under-equipped to compete directly with those lines for new cruisers. By putting his brand in direct competition with Princess, he risks losing his niche and competing with a corporate cousin-brand more than he needs to - a bad thing for CCL. (Look at what happenned to GM when all their products looked & felt the same...)

He needs to view Celebrity and possibly MSC as his competition - both being "upscale" lines against which HAL is well-equipped and fairing rather well profit-wise.

[rkacruiser]

Question #1: Heaven forbid, but what would be the plan if a Star Princess-like situation would develop on a HAL vessel and passengers had to remain at their muster stations for as long as the Star Princess passengers did. Would we be left standing out on deck under the lifeboats for hours? (I asked Mr. Kruse this question last April at the CCL Shareholders meeting and he did not have an answer for this at that time. He did say that the issue was one that was being looked at. Incidentally, I found Mr. Kruse very easy to talk to and he is a most pleasant gentleman.)

 

Question/Comment #2: I would suggest that they re-think the plan to alter the Crow's Nest on the current Vista Class vessels, as shown in the most recent deck plans in the brochures, by adding the Explorations Cafe to the starboard side of the Crow's Nest--as is planned for the Eurodam.

 

Question #3: Why is the Signature Class vessels being considered a new class of vessels? It seems to me that they are simply a second generation Vista Class.

[gizmo]

Brian,

 

Well stated. :)

[RevNeal]

Greg

 

interesting thread

 

since you have 6,000+ posts and I only have about 265, I'd be interested in learning what questions you'd like to ask Mr. Kruse

 

better yet: why try an open letter on the board and see what, if any response, there is .. if as everyone seems to think Seattle reads CC, why not give it a try

 

what's to lose?

 

You are correct in that there is nothing to lose. And that is precisely the reasoning behind this thread. By many people offering their thoughts on what they would say to SK in such a situation, I'm in hopes that SK -- among others -- will read it.

 

And, yes, HAL executives, mid-level management, land and sea-side employees, officers and crew DO read this board. We know this because they tell us so, and remark about things they have read here. I've been told this aboard ship on more than one occasion and by more than one person. I also know this based upon what I have experienced while aboard ship. On one cruise, from which I reported on this board on a regular basis, my reports were being printed and posted in Crew Country with remarks written in the margin and praise highlighted in one color, while criticisms were highlighted in another color. I know this because (1) the HM told me about it, and (2) the Captain came up to me and thanked me for the frankness and fair honesty with which I reported onto the internet from his ship. I've had officers (Hotel Mangers, Dining Room Supervisors, Guest Relations Managers, Masers of the ship, etc) , whom I have never met, stop me in the hall to introduce themselves, call me by my screen name, take down my cabin number, and ask me to stop by and "do lunch or dinner with them" in order to talk about my impressions on the state of the ship, etc. I've had staff members come up to me and tell me that they read such-and-such post of mine and that they appreciated the input, the feed back, the critical and yet supportive remarks. So, YES ... this board is read in Seattle, and aboard the ships of the fleet.

 

Sometimes I suspect our remarks do some good, but most of the time I fear that our criticisms go right in their eyes and our the back of their heads, without striking a neuron en-route. In the very least, I don't think that HALHQ gives a hoot about what we think with regard to the future plans of the line, etc. Their demographic studies, market studies, and other forms of "expert" advice are what they're looking at when they make such plans. When we report problems aboard ship, service failures, mechanical issues, and other such matters we DO get attention ... but those are more "tangible" and appear to catch the eyes of the Administration more than when we pontificate on how we prefer "Traditional" dining and "Formal Nights."

 

As for an "Open Letter." I could write one, but coming from just one person like me -- a no-body in the grand scheme of things -- my remarks are quite limited in impact. But if 20 or 30 people post what they would say to SK in a 10 minute, no-holds-barred conversation, THAT might have a bit more weight. And, yes, I'll post what my own conversation would be ... and I'll do that tonight. Right now, I'm enjoying reading what other people are saying. As is frequently the case, Brian expressed some of my thoughts quite nicely. Others have, too. And post-count totals are unimportant in terms of opinions that one might have ... be it 100 or 1000, I want to hear what you have to say.

[kakalina]

Great thread Greg. I too have enjoyed reading the thoughts of others.

 

First and foremost I would have to tell SK how very happy I am with his product. HAL has carved a special niche in the industry and supplies me with what I want/need to have a great vacation experience.

 

As Greg and others have mentioned the superior service and the friendliness of the on-board crew and staff is probably the main reason I sail with them consistently.

 

I would like him to explain the thinking behind the change in the dining venues. I would like to thank him and ask him to continue HAL in the extraoridinary service oriented way it has always been.

[Atomica]

I would ask him this:

 

-Where's the marketing? Here in Canada, there's virtually nothing, unless you buy a US magazine.

-Why the need to play 'catchup' to NCL/Princess

-If NCL jumped off a bridge, would you?

 

OK, so the last one is a bit of a joke, but I have to agree with Brian's prior post - I'm of the opinion that Celebrity, MSC and to a certain extent perhaps Oceania are more directly on par with HAL than NCL and Princess. I love HAL dearly, but in a word, these last few months could be described as "confusing".

 

NCL is certainly innovative if nothing else, and by introducing Freestyle it managed to pull itself from the brink of oblivion and live to sail another day. However, it also has an extremely loyal following - moreso perhaps than it's pre-Freestyle days - and my worry is that SK believes that he can actively draw from that crowd and make them into potential HAL passengers.

 

One last point: Royal Caribbean has been innovating like crazy these last few years (I'm not sure what to think of the FlowRider!) but the one area it hasn't even attempted to dabble in is dining: it's fixed. Set seating. Want do dine when you want? Great -here's some specialty restaraunts. Here's the buffet. Go nuts. Want traditional dining? Great. See you at 6:00.

 

Hmmm...all that would probably take more than 10 minutes. Anyone want to give me theirs? ;)

[Tricia724]

I would ask him to seriously review staffing levels. The cutbacks....both in the dining room and cabin service....that transpired shortly after 9/11 are still fairly obvious to anyone who took cruises prior to that time and the crew is still struggling.

 

Having enjoyed a few cruises with the HAL of old....when the stewards weren't so stressed out trying to take care of more tables or more cabins....the obvious changes are sometimes painful.

 

We had a great cabin steward on our last cruise, but the poor guy was absolutely exhausted. We felt really bad for him because we could see that he was just hanging on. We asked him at different port stops whether he went ashore, and he told us that when he had time off, he just slept.

 

Same thing for our dining room stewards....they were scurrying around so fast that they didn't have a minute to just stop and talk to us. I remember when your dining room steward could take a few minutes at the end of the dinner service to talk....perhaps demonstrate napkin folding or do a trick or just talk about his family. That hasn't happened to us for quite a while.

 

The Indonesian and Filopino crew is one of HAL's biggest assets and contributes greatly to the ambiance onboard, and I don't think many of them are nearly as happy with their jobs as they once were.

[dougnewmanatsea]

those two lines will always be at an advantage because their new fleets were designed for Freestyle/Personal Choice from the get-go. No matter how much he tries, HAL will never work as well "Freestyle" with the current fleet of ships.

That is certainly true in NCL's case, but Princess ships weren't designed from the ground-up for Personal Choice. There is no real difference in the way the dining room arrangement is set up on the pre- and post-PC ships (if you look at ships that were built for Princess - that is, you include the ones bought from other lines, which have one dining room and still offer traditional dining only).

 

Look at GRAND PRINCESS - which is nine years old and designed in an era when no major cruise line, Princess included, had "open seating" - and then at their newest ship, CROWN PRINCESS. For all intents and purposes, they're the same. I guess GRAND is as different from CROWN as EURODAM is from the Vistas which is to say, not much at all.

 

Princess did re-design two ships for Personal Choice - DIAMOND and SAPPHIRE. These two had two of the three main dining rooms divided in half, to create four main dining rooms. The one big one, the "traditional" dining room, stayed the same, but the other four, the "anytime" ones, got themes (Italian, Asian, etc.) and offered special themed menus in addition to the regular nightly menu. It didn't work and before long, they axed the whole thing and did away with the themes and built the next ships with three dining rooms, just like the pre-PC ships.

 

Also keep in mind that the three former R ships (and, for now, REGAL PRINCESS, while she's still in the fleet) still don't offer Anytime Dining.

[dougnewmanatsea]

As for what I'd say to Mr. Kruse - I'd say I think he has a very nice cruise line and does a good job running it.

 

I'd tell him to remember that HAL is supposed to be a cut above the mass-market lines, and to keep trying to find ways to make sure that they are.

 

I'd tell him that I think EURODAM is a silly name. I'd also tell him that it doesn't really matter.

 

I'd tell him that I don't like really big ships and ask him to please not build ships bigger than the Signature-class.

 

I'd suggest that after EURODAM and her sister, he might want to build some smaller ships - say, the size of the R-class ships - but that I know that's probably not realistic.

 

I'd tell him that he should buy this and display it on a HAL ship.

 

I'd tell him to read Cruise Critic and to pay attention to what our members think, since many of them are his best customers.

[InTheWASide]

The rest of the Europe sailings haven't yet been released, so the Prinsendam is the only one that currently shows on the web or via phone calls. Expect Europe 2008 to be out in about 1-2 months

 

 

 

Ex. It looks like only one cruise next year on the Prisendam (Oct 2008) stops in Israel.

[ciska40]

If I get a chance I will tell him that the fooks I meet at te CC board loves his cruiseline and that most of us think Eurodam is a silly name. I agree on that.

 

I love to be your spokesman so if there's anything urgent let me know and I will fit it in my confersation if I get the chance. Maybe he is only there for the speech I don't know but if I get the chance whoooooooo I will let him know.

 

;) ;) ;)

 

Cis

[Atomica]

I'd tell him that he should buy this and display it on a HAL ship.

 

I agree! That would look beautiful.

[dougnewmanatsea]

I agree! That would look beautiful.

Unfortunately, HAL has already made it clear to my friend (who owns it) that they do not want it :( .

 

Since it was originally from an indoor pool space, I think it would look great in the hydrotherapy pool area on EURODAM (or any dam ship).