Disney Cruise Line special????

So the Disney Cruise Line sprang their big new, never before offer this morning…  and when I read it this morning, all I could think was

bwah?  Surely you jest!

But no, no jesting here.  Up to 3 kids go free with two adults (you still pay fuel charges and taxes on them) for 3 night cruises.  Interesting, but not INTERESTED. 

Why you say?  We’ll let’s see Mom and Pop, ‘if you pull your kids out of school for a Thursday and Friday to come and cruise they can go for free’.  But I have a 1 year old, who hardly has to worry about school and grandparents on either side that don’t either.  But we didn’t get anything from this deal.

Don’t get me wrong, I LOVE the Disney Cruise Line.  The 4 day we took last year was one of the most relaxing vacations I’d taken in quite some time.  And I WANT to go again, SOON!  Especially on another 4 or 7 night cruise.  I should have held onto that onboard booking we did with the 10% discount last year.  But there are just a few things holding me back from booking again…

And it’s NOT time off from work …  It’s flat out the price. 

There are some decent deals on 7 night cruises for instance, with prices for the Western itinerary starting at around $700 an adult for Category 12.  However, the difference between a Cat. 12 and the lowest price portal view room (that’s ocean view for you land lubbers) is a Category 9, with a per stateroom price that is over $1000 more!   10 Benjamin's, and the room is no different, you just get an outside room with a view. 

I have to tell you, in my honest opinion, and I’m trying to be objective here, that Tom McAlpin and his crack team that run the Cruise Line missed the pier on this one.  There is a FANTASTIC opportunity here to leverage the other P&R promotion ‘What Will You Celebrate?’  Other ideas like:

• ‘Book a Cat.12, get another for half price (bring the Grandparents)’
• ‘Book a cruise get a one category upgrade for free (good for Cat. 12 to Cat. 8)’
• ‘Take a 3 night cruise at 10% off the cruise price, plus pay for 2 nights at a Disney hotel and get 2 days for free’

Maybe DCL’s bookings are holding up better than the ones at the Parks, which Tom Staggs reported the other day were off as much as 10% but have rebounded to being down only 6% since they announced the latest deals.  That 6% down is still apparently enough to be indicative of drop at the other BU’s for the company.  So much so that they are heavily contemplating layoffs across the company.  Attendance is off only about 4%, which means that locals are still turning out pretty well as best I can tell.

Apparently there are still enough people who can afford to plunk down more than $2,500 to keep the discounts restricted to the weekly 3 nighters.

Something for the rest of us please????  I wanna go!