P&O Cruises president Paul Ludlow has insisted having one main market to source cruise passengers benefits the line.
During a Travel Weekly webcast last Friday (January 20) Ludlow admitted the line “pretty much exclusively” sourced passengers from the UK market.
He confirmed the line’s target market was “mainstream British passengers” as he dismissed concerns how low pricing currently offered by the line would attract different passenger demographics.
“I actually think it’s a real strength of ours [sourcing from the UK],” he said. “I think the fact that we pretty much exclusively source in the UK means that we can tailor experiences that we know our guests are going to love.”
He highlighted how cruise accounted for 3% or 4% of the UK package holiday market. “Our opportunity in the UK is to find more people who want to come and cruise with us is massive,” added Ludlow.
“We’ve only scratched the surface.”
Ludlow revealed how some past passengers initially had reservations about sailing on the line’s new Excel-class ships – Iona and Arvia – but now had changed their minds.
“When we introduced the concept of by Iona and Arvia, some of our most loyal past guests said to us ‘well, we’re not sure that’s for us’.
“But of course, many of them travel on these ships, and actually now tell us that they don’t want to go back to some of the other ships in the fleet.”
He added: “We take nearly million people a year on holiday.”
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