The current low cruise pricing is now projected to continue into 2023 and 2024. Experts blame this on pressure from COVID and the difficulty of attracting new customers to cruises.
With fluctuating jet fuel prices being passed on to airline customers, rising hotel booking fees due to pent-up demand, and spiking gas prices forcing vehicles to spend $5 per gallon, a cruise may be the most cost-effective alternative for a nice trip in the summer of 2022.
Prices on cruise travel “are some of the lowest that we’ve seen in a very long time,” Chris Gray Faust, the managing editor of online industry publication The Cruise Critic, told GMA.
Faust has spotted a five-day cruise across the Caribbean for $500 per person, which means “about $100 per day, including lodging, meals and entertainment. And with the way that land vacations have been … [with] airfares more expensive, you’re really hard-pressed to find a vacation for a similar price on land.”
There are other three- or four-night cruise deals also ranging from $100 to $125 per night. Gray Faust even found a seven-night Alaska cruise for $399 per person with Holland America.
Regarding the stock market, Bank of America analyst Andrew Didora said last week that “we view this as more specific to the cruise industry than a larger read to the leisure consumer given further COVID pressures (testing still required), continued ramp-up in cruise capacity, and likely some difficulty attracting the ‘new to cruise’ consumer,” Didora said.
Carnival’s stock prices fell the most in May compared with Royal Caribbean Cruises and Norwegian Cruise Line Holdings, down 2.6 percent for all periods compared with November.
Carnival’s price weakness is not surprising, according to Didora, given the company’s exposure to Europe, which has been particularly poor due to COVID -19 restrictions and the Ukraine conflict.
Following a 3.6 percent increase in April, Royal Caribbean pricing fell 1.2 percent in May. According to Bank of America, Norwegian prices fell 1.3 percent month over month in May, making it five months in a row that they have declined.
With a 4.6 percent cut in May, Norwegian topped the price declines in 2023. Carnival dropped its pricing by 2.6 percent on average in 2023, while Royal Caribbean cut its prices by 2.4 percent, according to Didora.