Cruise Lines International Association (CLIA) Australasia and its member cruise lines and agents have labelled the region’s third Cruise Week a phenomenal success.
CLIA Australasia General Manager Brett Jardine said he had been inundated with positive feedback from agent and cruise line members in the wake of the third annual promotion.
Staged in the lead up to another record summer cruise season, Cruise Week, which ran from September 1-8, featured special deals with CLIA member cruise lines, only available through CLIA accredited cruise consultants.
For the first time, the campaign also included prominent mainstream print coverage including a national cruise magazine and a $100,000 promotion.
“Each year Cruise Week is making a bigger splash and with a focus on new-to-cruise this year, the campaign helped spread awareness among a broader range of consumers,” Mr Jardine said.
“When we launched the event in 2012, we knew it would take a few years for the industry to get onboard with the concept. The vision is a lot stronger now than two years ago and we still have a lot of room to grow. As cruise lines and retailers make a greater effort to support the national campaign, we’ll see more and more positive results.”
National Marketing Manager Cruiseabout, Monique van Gelder, said Cruise Week was a great promotion.
“We saw a dramatic increase in enquiries with 30 per cent more traffic to our website during Cruise Week. We have definitely seen an increase in bookings as well and we had record numbers to our events,” Ms van Gelder said.
Princess Cruises Vice President Australia & New Zealand Stuart Allison said it was a bookings boon.
“Monday was one of our biggest booking days on record. The awareness amongst the trade is better than ever,” Mr Allison said.
Uniworld Boutique River Cruises General Manager John Molinaro said Cruise Week was always a strong sales week and this year proved no different.
“Monday and Tuesday were extremely lively with a great number of enquiries and bookings for 2015. Additionally, we’ve also had many agents enquiring about 2014 space for clients who are planning travel from October onwards,” Mr Molinaro said.
Cruise Week is set to run again in early September 2015.
For more information visit www.cruising.org.au
SOURCE CLIA