The first episode of the show, which is set onboard Royal Princess in the Caribbean, set Twitter abuzz when it was screened at 8pm last week, with agents and industry figures expressing both positive and negative views.
Paul Ludlow, UK and Europe managing director for Princess Cruises, told TTG he was “overwhelmed” by the response.
“We had a spike in traffic to our website while the show was on, and over the weekend traffic doubled. We’ve also seen an improvement to our booking levels,” he added.
Jon Fletcher, travel consultant at CruiseHolidays.uk, agreed the PR generated from the show had been significant: “I had one client who had sailed on Royal Princess before, who came back to me straight away after the programme to tell me how she now wants to go on it again,” he said.
Other agents, however, expressed concern about the image the documentary had presented.
“They focused on older passengers when the Caribbean typically attracts younger family types. I’m disappointed”
Scott Anderson, Luxury Cruise Company
Scott Anderson, general manager of the Luxury Cruise Company, said: “It’s not a great advert. They focused on the older passengers when the Caribbean typically attracts younger family types. I’m disappointed it didn’t dispel the myths about cruising.”
Go Cruise personal travel consultant Flavia Gray agreed, admitting that although she enjoyed the show, she was disappointed in the choice of guests featured.
She added clients had approached her at a cruise show at the weekend, saying it had put them off wanting to cruise. “But it gave us a starting point to discuss cruise and I could explain to them what it’s really like, whereas before they would probably have walked past,” she added.
Ludlow conceded there had been some negative comments but agreed that the show was a “great conversation starter”.
“When you have such a huge body of people as your audience, there will of course be different views.”
Meanwhile, other lines sought to capitalise on the publicity surrounding the show, with Royal Caribbean using the same Twitter hash tag (#thecruiseship) to highlight its own cruises by posting offers and videos of its cruise ships.
Ludlow however was unperturbed. “From the offset we always said this would be great for the industry and that it would bring awareness of an alternative holiday,” he said.
The show attracted 3.1 million viewers.
