Royal Caribbean CEO Adam Goldstein, speaking to Travel Weekly on Allure of the Seas's debut, says that the performance of the United Kingdom market is now a vital factor in the overall success of Royal Caribbean.
“The market must come through for us on these types of initiatives. It’s not like 25 years ago when we were interested in the UK but in the final analysis the US performance would determine the company’s performance. We are now reliant on the UK to perform overall. When you must perform for the company to perform it’s a very different environment that it just being something nice to talk about."
Royal Caribbean will become the biggest cruise ship operator in Europe in 2011, in terms of the number of beds available. Royal Caribbean will pass Italian-style Carnival brand Costa Cruises. Royal Caribbean believes the international nature of its product is unrivalled and it will soon have 50% of guests sourced outside of the core US cruise market from 40 different nationalities.
“Royal Caribbean’s versatility is unmatched in the world of cruising. Anywhere we go with our 22 ships, it’s identifiably a Royal Caribbean experience and only we are able to flex our product so consumers of all nationalities are really pleased by what they are experiencing,” said Goldstein.
