Getting outpriced, am I the only one?

We were going to have our very first Disney Cruise experience Oct of this year as we booked the Panama Canal EB sailing on the Wonder. Unfortunately, after being excited about it for the past 10 months we had to cancel our trip and replace it with another RCL sailing. We had an unexpected 6k in medical bills last month and had to cut back on how much we spend on vacations this year because of it. This Disney cruise was already stretching our vacation budget so we had to cancel this 14 day trip to Panama canal and book a RCL 7 day Southern Caribbean trip instead but for only about 1/8th of the cost. It's the first time I ever had to cancel a cruise due to cost related issues but we will probably try booking another Disney cruise in a year or two. Hopefully price comes down a bit.
 
We have loved our Disney cruise vacations. But with increasing cruise prices and increasing costs at our house with my daughter off to college in the fall we may be able to pull of a four day but not likely going on the seven day Alaska and Caribbean cruises we've done in the past. Still have to sail during expensive summer season due to my youngest starting high school and not wanting him to miss a week of class. Appears my kids spring breaks will line-up in 2019 and there is a four day on the Magic that may work with the budget. We've never been to Miami, Key West or on the Magic so going to put down a deposit and hope it works out. Four days better than nothing and it will be fun to try a new ship.
 
Somebody mentioned that they think the prices have increased to pay for things like the refitting of the older ships, adding the scrubbers which can be expensive, and to pay for the new ships. I wonder if there is any truth to that.
 


Somebody mentioned that they think the prices have increased to pay for things like the refitting of the older ships, adding the scrubbers which can be expensive, and to pay for the new ships. I wonder if there is any truth to that.

Based on historic practices regarding price increases by Disney, as outlined by Jim Hill, prices are always increased to fund future projects. This has been standard practice since late 70's according to Jim. So, we (those of us who cruise on DCL...) are in fact funding the new ships and future refurbishments.

A lot of companies will raise prices to pay expansions or upgrades after completion. Disney, because they have such a loyal following, (and can get away with it...) raises prices prior, so they are not borrowing to fund future projects.
 
Based on historic practices regarding price increases by Disney, as outlined by Jim Hill, prices are always increased to fund future projects. This has been standard practice since late 70's according to Jim. So, we (those of us who cruise on DCL...) are in fact funding the new ships and future refurbishments.

A lot of companies will raise prices to pay expansions or upgrades after completion. Disney, because they have such a loyal following, (and can get away with it...) raises prices prior, so they are not borrowing to fund future projects.

I wonder if they will ever go down then :guilty:
 
Based on historic practices regarding price increases by Disney, as outlined by Jim Hill, prices are always increased to fund future projects. This has been standard practice since late 70's according to Jim. So, we (those of us who cruise on DCL...) are in fact funding the new ships and future refurbishments.

A lot of companies will raise prices to pay expansions or upgrades after completion. Disney, because they have such a loyal following, (and can get away with it...) raises prices prior, so they are not borrowing to fund future projects.

I think we are all still paying off Shanghai...
 


Based on historic practices regarding price increases by Disney, as outlined by Jim Hill, prices are always increased to fund future projects. This has been standard practice since late 70's according to Jim. So, we (those of us who cruise on DCL...) are in fact funding the new ships and future refurbishments.

A lot of companies will raise prices to pay expansions or upgrades after completion. Disney, because they have such a loyal following, (and can get away with it...) raises prices prior, so they are not borrowing to fund future projects.

I still call you know what on that. Disney raises prices because people will pay them. It is just economics. They are a large corporation and they fund large projects with bonds like every other large corporation (and gov't). No, they do not listen to Dave Ramsey. Lol. I am under the impression that folks are willing to help Disney fund future projects? Sorry to blunt, but that is called investing and usually there is pay back for the investor. There is no profit for performance from your cruise ticket price. So they may justify ticket price any way they want, but those are just words and they do not make me want to pay double or more for DCL than another cruise line.
 
I hate to say this (since I would love the prices to go down) but I don't see that happening, even with the 3 new ships. Disney is a corporation and it's trying to maximize profits. Why would they spend the money to build 3 new ships if they didn't think that it would increase revenue? If they put them all in the Caribbean going around in circles I could prices dropping some, but not if they actually step up and create some really interesting new itineraries.
 
We were thinking the same thing until we tried Carnival - Breeze (2 years ago) and then Norwegian last month! It is now crystal clear for us, Disney Cruises are worth every penny. We are done trying a cheaper line to see if Disney is REALLY worth it. For us, it is... Better service, better rooms, cleaner and WAY better food! Doing Disney again in January 2019 and we'll NEVER try another cruise line again!

I can't afford another DCL and I would love to but want to go cruising again. I just booked with NCL. Can you tell me why you didn't like it? I LOVED our Disney cruise but now our kids are older and we want to enjoy more adult things. I'm really hoping NCL won't be a bad experience just because it's NOT Disney.
 
I think we are all still paying off Shanghai...
DCL is a separate Disney company with it's own Profit and Loss. It's unlikely that DCL pricing practices are influenced by losses elsewhere at the Disney company. If DCL isn't making it's profit targets, then they would look for ways to improve that.

Disney is a complex corporate network of companies. You may notice the Disney reservation systems look and operate very differently between Cruise Lines, Parks, Resorts, Adventures by Disney, etc. DisneyWorld bookings are handled by Walt Disney Travel Company, which is also a separate Disney company.
 
I can't afford another DCL and I would love to but want to go cruising again. I just booked with NCL. Can you tell me why you didn't like it? I LOVED our Disney cruise but now our kids are older and we want to enjoy more adult things. I'm really hoping NCL won't be a bad experience just because it's NOT Disney.

While I am not the poster you replied to, I'll share my NCL experience with you. We tried them last summer in Alaska on the Sun which is one of their smallest and oldest ships (no bells and whistles). We booked that cruise strictly for the itinerary, and pretty much went into it with limited expectations. Our son was 19 at the time, so had aged out of Disney's youth offerings and we were all also looking for a more adult expereince. Result?

We loved it!! So much so that we have two more NCL cruises booked (and none on Disney - though I'll never rule them out completely for the future). Go into your NCL cruise with an open mind. No, it's not Disney. For us that's not necessarily a bad thing. As a party of all adults, we enjoyed the more adult focussed entertainment, the lesser amount of small children on board and the fact that it wasn't constant Disney, Disney, Disney if you know what I mean. Did we miss the Disney touches?? Meh, maybe a little on the first day as the Wonder was docked right next to us, but we got over it very quickly and had an amazing vacation.

Everyone's different and are looking for different things on their vacation. But I'll just point this out. NCL (as well as Carnival, Royal, Celebrity, etc, etc.) has way more ships than Disney and they manage to fill them every week, keeping people happy. They must be doing something right !!!
 
If you can sail during non-peak times, book when the fares are released, and have an onboard placeholder to transfer, it becomes quite reasonable. We used to sail during the school year, but now that DS is in middle school, that's just too much school to miss. Now we have bitten the bullet and used our onboard booking for a summer time cruise in 2019. It's definitely not cheap, but we figure there's only a limited amount of time to sail with DS when he is still a child.
 
I wonder if they will ever go down then :guilty:
Honestly it is whatever the market will bear. Part of the reason it is extra expensive to book a cruise right now is because the market for cruisers feels like they can afford to treat themselves to expensive vacations, and there are enough of them/us to fill the ships, even if we do so on a less frequent basis.

If the economy tanks, the prices will go down. It may go down in the form of heavy discounts for cruises that people cannot afford ... but when the ships are booked at only half full, the prices will go down. And not to get too political, but with the current economic policies that have been instituted, its likely that this country will see another recession in the near future, at that point the luxury market for the middle class crowds on the ships will dry up like they did in 2009-2012, when there were some bangin' deals on cruises. I got on several for under $100/person/day.
 
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Honestly it is whatever the market will bear. Part of the reason it is extra expensive to book a cruise right now is because the market for cruisers feels like they can afford to treat themselves to expensive vacations, and there are enough of them/us to fill the ships, even if we do so on a less frequent basis.

If the economy tanks, the prices will go down. It may go down in the form of heavy discounts for cruises that people cannot afford ... but when the ships are booked at only half full, the prices will go down. And not to get too political, but with the current economic policies that have been instituted, its likely that this country will see another recession in the near future, at that point the luxury market for the middle class crowds on the ships will dry up like they did in 2009-2012, when there were some bangin' deals on cruises. I got on several for under $100/person/day.
I certainly wouldn't count on any of that happening, and not worth lower cruise prices if it did.
I'd rather have a strong economy even if means I can't afford DCL. I have bigger things to worry about than taking DCL cruises....like maybe retiring someday.
 
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Honestly it is whatever the market will bear. Part of the reason it is extra expensive to book a cruise right now is because the market for cruisers feels like they can afford to treat themselves to expensive vacations, and there are enough of them/us to fill the ships, even if we do so on a less frequent basis.

If the economy tanks, the prices will go down. It may go down in the form of heavy discounts for cruises that people cannot afford ... but when the ships are booked at only half full, the prices will go down. And not to get too political, but with the current economic policies that have been instituted, its likely that this country will see another recession in the near future, at that point the luxury market for the middle class crowds on the ships will dry up like they did in 2009-2012, when there were some bangin' deals on cruises. I got on several for under $100/person/day.
What will drive prices down is more supply. Not just dcl supply but cruise ships period. I doubt we will have another recession anytime soon. lol.
 
Honestly it is whatever the market will bear. Part of the reason it is extra expensive to book a cruise right now is because the market for cruisers feels like they can afford to treat themselves to expensive vacations, and there are enough of them/us to fill the ships, even if we do so on a less frequent basis.

If the economy tanks, the prices will go down. It may go down in the form of heavy discounts for cruises that people cannot afford ... but when the ships are booked at only half full, the prices will go down. And not to get too political, but with the current economic policies that have been instituted, its likely that this country will see another recession in the near future, at that point the luxury market for the middle class crowds on the ships will dry up like they did in 2009-2012, when there were some bangin' deals on cruises. I got on several for under $100/person/day.

For what it's worth, I've been checking prices for Carnival and Royal Caribbean since the beginning of 2016 and I didn't notice a hike in their prices. They stayed pretty similar. They did cut down on a few things here and there but I think it was a strategy to keep their prices low.
 

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