As the busiest shopping days of the year officially get underway, Princess Cruises is already having a very happy holiday season with amazing booking records ever in the cruise line’s history for Thanksgiving week, including Cyber Monday. This bodes well for a profitable holiday season and high demand for cruises into 2024, 2025, and beyond.
Princess Cruises Sets Booking Records
In the week from November 20-27, 2023, including Black Friday and Cyber Monday sales and promotions, Princess Cruises enjoyed its biggest booking numbers ever compared to the same holiday week in previous years.
This demonstrates the continued demand for cruises, including booking vacations further in advance to secure the best itineraries, options, and deals.
“The extraordinary, all-inclusive appeal of a Princess cruise is something that is clearly very attractive to consumers, as is the exceptional value it offers compared to land-based vacations,” said John Padgett, president of Princess Cruises.
Princess Cruises’ Black Friday deals included a 50% off cruise fare promotion, which also applied to the all-inclusive Princess Plus and Princess Premier packages. Depending on which options guests selected, they could save up to 65% compared to non-sale prices for amenities such as WiFi, drinks, gratuities, and more.
More than 330 destinations were part of Princess Cruises’ offerings, with all itineraries up for grabs, including Alaska, the Caribbean, Europe, Canada, New England, transatlantic cruises, and more, including the cruise line’s first sailings from Port Canaveral as a homeport, when Caribbean Princess begins sailing from central Florida in November 2024.
Furthermore, guests were also able to book sailings on the upcoming Sun Princess, which will first debut in Europe in early 2024 and then be homeported from Fort Lauderdale for the 2024 winter season. The first Sphere-class vessel will be offering 5- and 7-night cruises to top destinations in the Bahamas as well as both Eastern and Western Caribbean ports.
“The response has been remarkable and smart shoppers were able to reserve voyages at attractive prices and lock into preferred dates and accommodations they want in 2024 and 2025,” Padgett said.
Cruise Lines Breaking Records
Princess Cruises is not the only cruise line to have set records as the holiday shopping season begins.
Holland America Line also offered incredible booking incentives and saw bookings surge more than 20% higher than 2022 Black Friday sales. Discount fares, lower deposits, prepaid gratuities, and other incentives were all part of the cruise line’s sales offers.
Princess Cruises, however, has seen high demand for unique itineraries all year long. In September, the cruise line released additional Japan itineraries due to high interest in the unique destination, and new 2024-2025 sailings have also been announced for South America and Antarctica.
Alaska remains a high-interest destination and a bucket-list itinerary for many travelers, and Princess Cruises is offering a greater variety of Last Frontier sailings in 2025 with seven ships in the region.
For guests who really want to take a once-in-a-lifetime sailing, the Panama Canal is a top choice, and Princess is offering three ships making such journeys in 2024-2025: Ruby Princess, Emerald Princess, and Coral Princess. Both partial and full transit options are available.
With so many outstanding destinations and sought-after itineraries available, it is no surprise that Princess Cruises is continuing to see high demand and reach booking records for sailings in the coming months.
