Empress of the Seas No Diamond Event

[Phillip Diamond Plus]

Will Royal Caribbean start having the nightly Diamond Event on Empress, now that they may need help on promoting this smaller ship?  (We noticed on our Cuba sailing that there was a mostly unused lounge space before dinner times which would be perfect for the event.) 

[KathyC]

Pinging @twangster to answer this for you.  Did you happen to read his live blog?  He just got off a back to back sailing on her...two full weeks.  And I am pretty sure he had his diamond drinks every night.  There is just not dedicated Diamond Lounge. 

[YOLO]

@Phillip Diamond Plus  Welcome to the RCB forums!

Geeze, I didn't know there was a RCCL ship out there that didn't server Diamond Drinks in some sort of lounge.  @twangster  What do you say about Empress?

[L454S]

Was on the Empress about 18 months ago. No Diamond Lounge, but every night the Viking Crown Lounge had open bar for Diamond + and Pinnacle during happy hours. I know this has been discontinued.

Twangster is onboard now, and will check in I'm sure. I'll be boarding Saturday for a couple weeks.

[twangster]

Empress and Majesty both don't have a Diamond Lounge and I doubt they'll add one or a nightly unlimited happy hour event.

Each ship offers 3 diamond happy hour drinks loaded on the SeaPass card.

I don't think they need to add unlimited happy hour drinks to sell the ship.  Her new itineraries do that very well.  

On any given cruise typically 1/3 are return cruisers.  Of those a small percentage are diamond or higher.  There are exceptions of course, transatlantics, longer itineraries, etc tend to be more top elite heavy.

For the last 14 nights I "survived" without unlimited drinks.  The other top elite I would run into time and again weren't complaining either.

If anything I think it's more likely that unlimited drinks in the Diamond Lounge on other ships may go away at some point.  With growing numbers of top elite it doesn't scale to continue offering unlimited drinks.  

Consider ~70,000 guests on Royal Ships every night.  If an average of 8% are happy hour eligible, that's 5,600 people every single day drinking happy hour drinks.  Some don't drink, some drink well more than 3 drinks.  Within two years there will be >80,000 guests and maybe by that time 10% will be happy hour eligible so that's 8,000 people every single day of the year.  Fast forward 5 years.  As they add more ships there will be 100,000 guests on Royal ships every night.  Let's say by that time 15% are happy hour eligible.  Now there are 15,000 people every single day of the year potentially drinking happy hour drinks.  While I don't know the exact forecast for the coming years, at some point in the future it won't be viable to offer unlimited happy hour drinks.  

Years ago they offered free wine in the MDR at dinner.  Ships held a few hundred and there were two or three ships.  Just like complimentary dinner wine had to go away, so will unlimited happy hour drinks.  Neither scale to more and more ships and more top elite numbers unless other changes.

[CruiseGus]

My understanding is Majesty doesn't have a Diamond Lounge but that it does have a nightly unlimited happy hour event every night the Viking Crown Lounge for Diamond and above.  Will know for sure this coming February when I sail her from NOLA.

I agree I do not remember an event on Empress when we sailed her to Cuba about a year ago, just the 3 drink coupon on your card

 

[Mclmclmcl]

On 8/4/2019 at 6:57 PM, twangster said:

Empress and Majesty both don't have a Diamond Lounge and I doubt they'll add one or a nightly unlimited happy hour event.

Each ship offers 3 diamond happy hour drinks loaded on the SeaPass card.

I don't think they need to add unlimited happy hour drinks to sell the ship.  Her new itineraries do that very well.  

On any given cruise typically 1/3 are return cruisers.  Of those a small percentage are diamond or higher.  There are exceptions of course, transatlantics, longer itineraries, etc tend to be more top elite heavy.

For the last 14 nights I "survived" without unlimited drinks.  The other top elite I would run into time and again weren't complaining either.

If anything I think it's more likely that unlimited drinks in the Diamond Lounge on other ships may go away at some point.  With growing numbers of top elite it doesn't scale to continue offering unlimited drinks.  

Consider ~70,000 guests on Royal Ships every night.  If an average of 8% are happy hour eligible, that's 5,600 people every single day drinking happy hour drinks.  Some don't drink, some drink well more than 3 drinks.  Within two years there will be >80,000 guests and maybe by that time 10% will be happy hour eligible so that's 8,000 people every single day of the year.  Fast forward 5 years.  As they add more ships there will be 100,000 guests on Royal ships every night.  Let's say by that time 15% are happy hour eligible.  Now there are 15,000 people every single day of the year potentially drinking happy hour drinks.  While I don't know the exact forecast for the coming years, at some point in the future it won't be viable to offer unlimited happy hour drinks.  

Years ago they offered free wine in the MDR at dinner.  Ships held a few hundred and there were two or three ships.  Just like complimentary dinner wine had to go away, so will unlimited happy hour drinks.  Neither scale to more and more ships and more top elite numbers unless other changes.

With over 80% of diamond guests returning for another cruise giving well drinks and inexpensive wine for free is actually a money maker for royal