Jun 8, 2007
The large new cruiseships have opted to be merchandise marts of products and services
What is the general level of culture aboard the giant new cruiseships designed to house from 2,500 to 3,000 passengers? In a word: dismal. Having just returned from one of those ships, and heard from a great many travelers commenting on others, I can confirm that the ships' operating companies have quite obviously resolved to cater to the lowest intelligence and taste.
The largest single area on the mega-ships -- a vast expanse -- is the casino, where various thousand-dollar jackpots and other windfalls are marketed to pitiable addicts of the slots and tables; they're found there, glassy-eyed and silent, at 3am and later. The runners-up in size are the shops -- not simply a few of them but whole arcades duplicating a suburban mall. Every day at sea, leaflets are slipped under your cabin door advertising various sales and mark-downs, and tables of bargain-priced merchandise are placed in the public corridors, under signs urging you to buy, buy, buy! Most afternoons, heavily-marketed art auctions (more leaflets slipped under your door) are scheduled to fool various innocents into believing they can pick up a genuine work of art.
In marketing and sales, no one matches the ocean spas. Their leaflets are found everywhere on the vast ship, promising through cellulite treatments to reduce your waist size by one inch. Aboard one of the mega-ships, the most heavily promoted treatment is a $175 massage involving large, heated stones placed atop your back. Not to be outdone, the managers of various optional, extra-charge, restaurants stand at the entrance to the main dining room displaying menus and exhibits of the gourmet delights that can be yours by agreeing to a $30-per-person cover charge at their snooty eating places.
I'm sorry to have burdened you with this detailed listing of pricey vulgarity, but the massive marketing aboard these mega-ships would hardly be believable without an actual inventory of excess. That astonishing commercialism is totally at odds with the better traditions of ocean travel, and a vast disappointment to those of us with cherished memories of previous trips at sea. As to the lectures and other presentations aboard, they have been limited -- in my experience -- to the most trivial of topics that mostly consist of diet discussions ("a flatter stomach in two weeks'), cooking demonstrations, beauty and make-up advice.
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The largest single area on the mega-ships -- a vast expanse -- is the casino, where various thousand-dollar jackpots and other windfalls are marketed to pitiable addicts of the slots and tables; they're found there, glassy-eyed and silent, at 3am and later. The runners-up in size are the shops -- not simply a few of them but whole arcades duplicating a suburban mall. Every day at sea, leaflets are slipped under your cabin door advertising various sales and mark-downs, and tables of bargain-priced merchandise are placed in the public corridors, under signs urging you to buy, buy, buy! Most afternoons, heavily-marketed art auctions (more leaflets slipped under your door) are scheduled to fool various innocents into believing they can pick up a genuine work of art.
In marketing and sales, no one matches the ocean spas. Their leaflets are found everywhere on the vast ship, promising through cellulite treatments to reduce your waist size by one inch. Aboard one of the mega-ships, the most heavily promoted treatment is a $175 massage involving large, heated stones placed atop your back. Not to be outdone, the managers of various optional, extra-charge, restaurants stand at the entrance to the main dining room displaying menus and exhibits of the gourmet delights that can be yours by agreeing to a $30-per-person cover charge at their snooty eating places.
I'm sorry to have burdened you with this detailed listing of pricey vulgarity, but the massive marketing aboard these mega-ships would hardly be believable without an actual inventory of excess. That astonishing commercialism is totally at odds with the better traditions of ocean travel, and a vast disappointment to those of us with cherished memories of previous trips at sea. As to the lectures and other presentations aboard, they have been limited -- in my experience -- to the most trivial of topics that mostly consist of diet discussions ("a flatter stomach in two weeks'), cooking demonstrations, beauty and make-up advice.
Write and read comments about this post.
Labels: cruise
Fifty years ago, 
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