If you are one of those people who need tangible evidence to back up the phrase, "pent-up demand," this is for you.
Cruise industry bookings have risen so high that some cruise lines just don’t have the inventory to meet the demand.
"We're now significantly ahead of the same time last year by about 10 [percentage] points, and well ahead of where we were in 2019," Carnival Corporation president and CEO Josh Weinstein said. "…Our booked position is as far out as we've ever seen it."
In fact, he hinted that wave season might never have ended. It might just flow into wave season of 2024.
"Wave was the longest wave in history," Weinstein said. "And I'm not sure when we're ever going to call it because we broke the record in Q1. We then broke that record in Q2, which never happens. We just hit a record in Q3. And when you look at the first four weeks of September, actually, we're up very nicely as well."
This demand has forced some cruise lovers to take alternative measures because they can’t find the cabin that they originally wanted. It’s already booked.
Carnival Miracle. (photo courtesy of Carnival Cruise Line)
Carnival Corporation is the parent company of Carnival Cruise Line, Princess Cruises, Cunard Line, and six other cruise lines. Carnival, Princess and Cunard are each adding a new ship over the next several months with a combined capacity of 15,000 more rooms.
Bookings are going so strong that even that might not be enough. Weinstein even acknowledged that a lack of inventory might slow down the industry.
"The only slowdown we see is as we're running out of inventory, it has to slow down," he said.
Royal Caribbean Group president and CEO Jason Liberty said as much during an earnings call in July of this year.
"Booking volume since our last earnings call have continued to accelerate, both for 2023 sailings and even more so for 2024 as the majority of the bookings we are currently taking are for next year's sailings," Liberty said.
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