Harding, the global cruise retail specialist, has signed a 2027 contract extension with P&O Cruises and luxury cruise brand Cunard.
Popular Cruise Line Retails Extends Contracts
As part of the contracts, the Harding internal design team will continue to work in partnership with P&O Cruises’ and Cunard’s award-winning design teams and architects to design, manage and build entire retail environments, creating immersive brand solutions on board their ships, building on their joint success in designing the Iona retail spaces.
For P&O Cruises, in addition to the existing three ships, the contracts include two new flagships; Iona launching May 2020 and its sister ship launching 2022. For Cunard, the contract includes its new ship arriving in 2022.
James Prescott, Managing Director of Harding comments:
“This is a real milestone in the Harding history and I am delighted to confirm our partnership with Carnival UK across both P&O Cruises and Cunard.
“We have worked closely with the senior teams based in Carnival House, Southampton, in a total Trinity approach to deliver the most commercial arrangement and the best products with the right experiences for the customer and destination. We are delighted that the Carnival Corporation has put its trust in Harding here in the UK.”
The contracts follow a 20-year working relationship between the three companies, and encompass eight of P&O Cruises and Cunard ships over an additional five-year period on more than 6,000m² of retail space.
Design and brand choice on board the new ships was also influenced by a survey Harding conducted of 20,500 people – illustrative of the unrivalled cruise market customer insight Harding holds.
Also Read: Carnival Cruise Ship Completes Major Retail Transformation
Much more than just places to buy goods, Harding will offer an impressive mix of tax and duty-free product categories from fine jewellery and fine watches to own-label fashion, fused with lifestyle and experiential activations, carefully curated for the guest by ship and destination. The Logo concepts for both P&O Cruises and Cunard have been exclusively designed by the Harding Retail Logo teams.
Robert Palmer, Vice President On Board Revenue at Carnival UK added:
“We are delighted to have signed this industry-leading contract with Harding.
“Working with one of the leading players in cruise retail to build a strong commercial and branded retail partnership as we enter an unprecedented period of new fleet launches for both our P&O Cruises and Cunard brands is an inspiring milestone.
“Harding have shown that their agility to predict and mirror changes in land-based retail at a branded and experiential level for our guests at sea, undoubtedly gives our guests the best and most inspiring holiday retail experience. “We are looking forward to continuing to work with the Harding team in the coming months and years.’’
Supporting retail activations will include a huge selection of renowned worldwide brands from Dyson and Apple to Jo Malone and Tom Ford. On board Iona alone, an impressive list of first-at-seas will also launch, including Liberty of London, The White Company and Georg Jensen, with Mulberry also launching a first at sea, standalone store.
