Pricing by State

[MrBill64]

Thanks West Coast for the 1.41 tip. I too thought it had to be CAD from the web site but after reading the fine print it did say US dollars. And guess what, if you multiply 1.41 by the cost of a balcony cabin price from NY, MA, CT you get.....$2536.

 

Bill

[Flintstone]

I just checked the prices for both our upcoming cruises (Alaska & Eastern Car) and used Detroit, Dallas, Ft Lauderdale & New York and all the prices were equal. I wonder if this only occurs on certain sailings?

 

 

Deb

[dosi]

I do think it is wrong, but am not at all surprised. I pay alot for gasoline...if I drive up to Oregon I pay much less. I live in an area with lots of apple orchards so apples are cheap here. I can bet you the orchards charge more to other states than they do locally. When I bought my house and needed lots of new things I went on a huge shopping trip to Reno.....we all just know that the Mervyns and Macys in Reno are significantly cheaper than the same stores in Sacramento. I think regional pricing is a fact of life in all markets....it is just very seldom we buy a loaf of wonder bread or a gallon of milk in five or six different states, so we don't face the price differences in our normal day to day lives.

[cruiseco]

I just checked the prices for both our upcoming cruises (Alaska & Eastern Car) and used Detroit, Dallas, Ft Lauderdale & New York and all the prices were equal. I wonder if this only occurs on certain sailings?

 

Deb

 

The number one reason for the hit-and-miss nature of the resident's promotions is that they don't feel they need to extend any additional discounts on every particular sailing to fill the available space. Cruise lines only offer extra discounts if they feel it's necessary.

 

One other reason that was run by me involves contracted air space. What an industry exec told me is that they pre-contract for a certain number of seats out of each of the major gateway cities. If they end up not using those seats they have to pay for them anyway. So, if they're looking at forfeiting the cost of a bunch of air seats out of Pocatello they might run an Idaho residents promo. They'll give up a few bucks on the cabin fare in the hopes or getting some value out of the $400+ air seats that are worthless otherwise.

 

Not only do they have to practice "yield management" on their cabin bookings but also on their air/sea arrangements.

 

Don't know if that's true or not but the guy was usually pretty reliable.

[kruisey]

What would I do without my CC friends I am learning so much from you all and also have had a great giggle e.g( What does princess do with its Dead). Hope to meet you all in the future on board.....

[CruiseMark]

There is the potential here that Princess is engaging in discriminatory pricing practices. The Robinson-Pateman Act states that a supplier engaged in interstate commerce must sell the same item to all customers at the same price (assuming the same purchase quantity). Since there is no variation in the same cruise booked by someone in Maine verses California (assuming no airfare) regional pricing would be hard to justify. It's likely that Princess found a loophole in the legislation, but the line between what are legal pricing variations and illegal ones is very thin.

 

Laura

 

Not to get off on a rant here Laura, but the Robinson PATMAN act (not Pateman) does not imply anything of the sort when it comes to the same company pricing things differently across the country.

 

The act says: [t]he major legislative purpose behind the Robinson- Patman Act was to provide some measure of protection to small independent retailers and their independent suppliers from what was thought to be unfair competition from vertically integrated, multi-location chain stores.

 

In other words, small business should have access to the same pricing as the large retailers of the country from the providers of the product. We've seen many cases of this now being self-enforced by the cruise lines so that mom & pop agencies can compete with the larger agencies. It has nothing to do with that one retailer selling things for different prices across the country.

 

Unfortunately, the Justice department has a policy to not enforce this act. In my opinion, it would be viewed as "anti-business" by the politicos if it ever did start enforcing it, and that would lose them votes. Plus the act, whose origins were in 1914 then ammended in 1936, could never have imagined something as wild as the Internet and all of the new territory in encompasses when it comes to business rules, taxes, etc.

 

:D :D <end of rant> :D :D

[MrBill64]

Here is my take on this. It appears that cruiselines do regional pricing based on economics 101, supply and demand. I believe they have a model based on past year's data that shows roughly how many cabins should be bought by residents of each state for a particular cruise. As the cruise date approaches they check to see how a cruise is selling by state and offer discounts accordingly.

 

Example: Say the cruise data program at Princess shows that the 7 day Eastern Caribbean cruise on CB for 2/19 should have NY residents buying 500 cabins at this point when they actually have bought 700 cabins. Meanwhile the data shows that this cruise should have 300 cabins bought by residents from CA but only 50 are sold thus far. Hence the discount offered to residents from CA. This is probably even broken down further by category of cabins bought by people from each state thus the fluctuation of pricing not only by state but within cabin category. (Not only by state, but I am sure by country too).

 

And Mark, thanks for the clarification of the Robinson PATMAN act. I think I have learned more from these boards than 4yrs in college :D .

 

Bill

[tweetybird]

Not to get off on a rant here Laura, but the Robinson PATMAN act (not Pateman) does not imply anything of the sort when it comes to the same company pricing things differently across the country.

:D :D <end of rant> :D :D

Mark, the Robinson Patman Act has been enforced thousands of times since it was enacted in 1936. And yes it does cover this type of pricing scenario. A search on www.ftc.gov will give you a better understanding of this legislation.;) I'm sure CCL (who owns Princess) being part of the cruise industry oligopoly has done extensive legal research into anti-trust pricing ramifications.

 

Laura