“The World’s Largest Cruise Company” is growing even larger, introducing a new class of ships that hold 8,000 passengers each – and ordering three of them for Carnival Cruise Line from Italian shipbuilder Fincantieri.

At 230,000 gross registered tons each, and with more than 3,000 guest staterooms apiece, the new ships will be the largest in the Carnival fleet when they arrive in 2029, 2031 and 2033. They will be powered by liquefied natural gas (LNG) and feature advanced energy efficiency, waste management, and emission reduction technologies.

Carnival Cruise Line earlier this year placed its first newbuild order in five years, for two more Excel-class ships scheduled to join the fleet in 2027 and 2028. In addition, five vessels are being transferred over from sister brands between 2023 and March 2025.

When you’re on a roll, said Carnival Corporation & plc CEO Josh Weinstein, you stick with it. And so the company is “doubling down on the growth of Carnival Cruise Line – our highest-returning brand – to keep up with the incredibly strong demand we continue to see for the world’s most popular cruise line. At this point, our newbuild pipeline is just one delivery in each of 2025, 2027, 2028, 2029, 2031 and 2033. We continue to take a disciplined approach to growth, strategically directing new capacity to the areas of highest demand at a rate of one to two new ships per year.”

Carnival Cruise Line president Christine Duffy, meanwhile, promised “innovative guest experiences that will take Carnival Cruise Line into the future with new FUN features and excitement that we know our guests will LOVE.”

With five years to go until the ships debut, the company did not yet share details on the ships’ designs or itineraries.

It takes a village to launch a new cruise ship. Last week, 1,000 travel advisors, reporters, financiers and cruise-industry executives were joined by Jay Leno, Emeril Lagassi and Carnival Cruise Line president Christine Duffy to welcome the new Carnival Venezia to its homeport at the Manhattan Cruise Terminal.

Are you ready for a Shark Tank-like opportunity to present your business plan to top financial experts, get free professional feedback, and potentially win thousands of dollars in prizes?

The cruise line’s eight-part Your Winning Plan program will bring in experts in small business and entrepreneurship from the Small Business Administration, CLIA and ASTA, plus Carnival’s own business development team, to help you build a winning business plan you can then enter into a nationwide competition. If you make it to the finals, Shark Tank’s own Daymond John may just present you with the grand prize.

The event will take place live in seven cities (San Jose on June 23, Detroit and Las Vegas on July 7, Nashville on July 14, Denver on July 19, and Richmond, VA, on July 28) as well as virtually on August 5. The grand finale event will be held in Houston on Sept. 27.

One semi-finalist will be chosen at each event and receive a $2,500 prize to use toward implementing the winning business plans, plus a trip to the final event in Houston. The grand prize winner there will receive $5,000.

Any travel advisor in the United States, Canada or Puerto Rico can register, at GoCCL.com.

One good thing about a week-long conference on a cruise ship is the opportunity to sit and chat about how we all got to where we are. I did that recently with the smart and businesslike folks who own Dream Vacations and CruiseOne franchises. And so I thought I’d share a few of the tales of how to succeed in business and how to just love what you do that I heard there.

The cruise line’s guests will pay more for its popular beverage deal, along with its gratuity fees starting next month.  Effective on May 1, 2022, an increase will be added both to its pre-cruise and onboard prices.

Starting May 1, 2022, the price will be $59.95 USD, per person, per day pre-cruise and $64.95 per person, per day if purchased on board. In addition, Carnival is also increasing the service gratuities from $13.99 to $14.50 per person per day for most cabins and from 15.99 to $16.50 per person, per day for suites.

Most analysts anticipated increases across cruise lines as travel recovers from a two-year hiatus which damaged the companies’ balance sheets. Although Carnival’s price increases are getting the most coverage other cruise lines such as rival Norwegian Cruise Line have already raised items like their gratuities per day, per person and Norwegian’s drink packages are higher than the new Carnival costs.

It’s been more than 60 years since cruising to Cuba ceased. President Kennedy imposed the embargo because Fidel Castro seized American-owned hotels and gambling casinos.

The Cuban seizures were legal under international law, if equitable financial compensation is paid. Yet, every American President and Congress has kept the cruising embargo in place because of failure to compensate the injured parties. As reported in Hotel Hotline, the latest glitch that’s prolonging the cruising embargo is a lawsuit by the heirs of Meyer Lanksy, saying they too deserve compensation. The Bay of Pigs debacle also fueled enthusiasm to keep the embargo in place.

With this backdrop of more than 60 years of retribution, let’s look ahead to what may be in store for the Russian government now that their invasions of Ukraine have already created close to two- million refugees and thousands of deaths Read the rest of this entry »