Page 49: of Maritime Reporter Magazine (February 1998)

Peter Bates, executive vice president of Sales and Marketing for Cunard, advised MR/EN to check with parent company

Kvaerner to see if any sales offers were moving forward. Mr. Bates has great expectations for the cruise line, which is newly posi- tioned in South Florida with 80 percent of its 250-person staff hired locally. "The plan was that we would break even in '97. We actually returned to profit in '97," said Mr. Bates, adding that he expected double-digit growth in 1998 to provide momentum going into 2000. "I think you may see us in a posi- tion where we would be ordering a ship," said Mr. Bates, when asked if his company would consider placing a newbuild order before

Kvaerner found a buyer. Mr.

Bates also said that Cunard will increasingly look to globalization, which "is going to be very impor- tant in terms of where passengers want to go and where the business comes from," but acknowledged that Europe would be the likely target. "I think we will find Asia tough in the next year because of problems they're having over there," said Mr. Bates.

New Caution

Investment in Asia was appeal- ing last March, but Carnival

Cruise Lines balked and decided not to reposition Tropicale. Vicki

Freed, senior vice president of

Sales and Marketing, explained the rationale behind the cancella- tion of the Carnival Cruises Asia venture with Hyundai Merchant

Marine. "We had two different philosophies and we just felt that we couldn't go forward with two different views of the market. We may look at that project at a later date. Right now, it's on the back burner," said Ms. Freed.

In terms of activity in already established markets, Ms. Freed reiterated Carnival's welcome greeting to Disney, although she said that Cunard's move to South

Florida would be a non-issue for her company. "It's nice to have another cruise line down here but it doesn't matter if it's New York or

Florida. They're not introducing anything new to the market."

Ms. Freed expects the industry market will undergo further con- solidation in 1998, but explained

February, 1998 that one of Carnival's market strategies will be a renewed focus on travel agencies, since 98 per- cent of her company's business comes through this channel.

Carnival has also made public its intentions to grow by contracting for another group of ships, but Ms.

Freed would not speculate on whether one yard was leading the bidding while negotiations are underway. "We are talking to several yards in terms of a newbuilding program for Carnival Corp.," said Ms.

Freed, who preferred to discuss the upcoming debuts of Carnival's

Elation and Paradise newbuilds.

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