Posted on September 2, 2005 - by Ralph Grizzle
A Princess In Her Prime
Celebrating 40 years of operation, Princess Cruises awaits its new crown.
Ten years ago, Princess Cruises was gearing up to introduce the 1,950-passenger Sun Princess. The new ship, which made its debut in December 1995, trumpeted not only the start of the race to build ever bigger cruise ships (Sun Princess would be the world’s largest cruise ship to date) but also the dawn of a new era: the birth of the balcony stateroom.
While other cruise ships could boast balcony staterooms (after all, Princess pioneered balconies with the introduction of 150 on Royal Princess in 1984), never before had cruise ships seen balconies in such abundance. On Sun Princess, 70 percent of its outside staterooms featured cruising’ newest luxury.
The line’ ground-breaking efforts reinvented balconies as an affordable pleasure for many passengers instead of a luxury for just a few. By the end of 2006, the company’ worldwide fleet will feature more than 8,000 cabins with balconies (more than 54 percent of the fleet’ total outside cabins).
While some might argue otherwise, some key executives say that Princess’ introduction of balcony staterooms was the greatest thing the company ever did. “The greatest advantage we ever had is we started the balcony revolution,” P&O Princess CEO Peter Ratcliffe told Cruise Week last August. “It’s the best thing Princess ever did. And with the Sun, we started this idea of having alternative dining and small spaces. So we don’t need to spend anything on retrofits, because the ships are very consistent. Literally, you can go from ship to ship, and they have the same theme. There’s always that small ship feel.”
A Princess Is Born
Princess Cruises’ modern balconied fleet is a far cry from the cruise line that started life with a single 6,000-ton ferry chartered from the Canadian Pacific Railway. During the winters of 1965 and 1966, Princess “Pat” operated cruises to Mexico’s West Coast. Those proved wildly popular, despite a few hiccups. On the ship’s inaugural cruise, for example, passenger laundry went shoreside in Acapulco, because the ship wasn’t large enough to have its own laundry on board. The laundry left the ship carefully tagged and bagged but was returned in bulk with only one name on it: “Princess Patricia.” The crew had to set up tables in the lobby to display the laundry so that passengers could claim theirs.
Princess Cruises’ Founder Stanley B. McDonald had chartered Princess Patricia and liked the name so much so that he named his fledgling new cruise company Princess Cruises. The run to Mexico proved to be popular, and after two seasons, Princess chartered an Italian newbuild (the builder went bankrupt; Princess chartered from the controlling bank), naming the ship Princess Italia. Business chugged along, and Princess chartered another ship that it named Princess Carla in 1968.
All the while, Princess was establishing a brand identity, at least on the U.S. West Coast. The logo for the company – a character with a sombrero painted on the stack – fitting for the Mexico focus of the cruise line but not for a focus that would soon include the Panama Canal (1967) and Alaska (1968). So in 1968 McDonald commissioned an artist to develop the seawitch that still characterizes the Princess brand today.
Barely a decade old, Princess was attracting attention when in 1974, the company entered into negotiations with London-based Peninsular and Oriental Steam Navigation Company, the world’s largest and oldest shipping company. Those negotiations culminated in P&O’s acquisition of Princess.
The Love Boat
Much of the company’s success, however, – and indeed the cruise industry’s success – can be attributed to a single event in Princess’ history: the long-running television series, The Love Boat, a moniker that today is still synonymous with the company.
The series began when television producer Douglas S. Cramer, who had created the popular television series Love American Style, decided to transfer his popular comedy vignette series from its studio setting to a cruise ship. The weekly hour-long series was launched on September 24, 1977 and aired every Saturday night until 1986.
At the height of the original Love Boat’s popularity, Princess built Royal Princess (1984), with all-outside cabins and an unprecedented 150 balconies. Two years later, the addition of P&O’s Sea Princess expanded the Princess fleet to five ships. That number would surge when in 1988, Princess acquired Sitmar Cruises and with it, Fair Princess, Sky Princess and Dawn Princess.
In 1989 Star Princess, which was originally under construction for Sitmar, joined the Princess fleet, and in 1991, the line’s Sea Princess was returned to parent company P&O to serve the European cruise market.
The introduction of two new 70,000-ton “superships” — Crown Princess in 1990 and Regal Princess in 1991 — launched yet another era of sea-going innovation, with their distinct dolphin-like exteriors designed by the renowned architect Renzo Piano, of Pompidou Center fame.
This new spate of shipbuilding ushered in a modernization program that saw a number of changes to the fleet, including ships that were retired or reassigned. In 1993, the chartered Golden Princess joined the Princess fleet, replacing the retiring Dawn Princess. Its sister ship, Fair Princess, left the Princess fleet following its 1995 Alaska season and was repositioned to P&O Australia. Golden Princess was retired from the Princess fleet in 1996. In fall 1997, the line’s popular Star Princess was renamed Arcadia and turned over to P&O for British market cruising. In Spring 1999, Island Princess was sold to enter the Asian cruise market, and the original Pacific Princess left the fleet in 2002.
Bigger, Better, New & Improved
In 1995 the line entered a new era of innovative ship design. A new concept in cruising, introduced as Grand Class Cruising and subsequently named Personal Choice Cruising, redefined the idea of a cruise vacation by offering passengers a greater range of dining and entertainment options, introducing the concept of 24-hour dining, and making the luxury of a private balcony an affordable amenity for all.
Beginning with the 77,000-ton Sun Princess, the company began introducing ships featuring multiple dining and entertainment venues and hundreds of balcony staterooms. The shipbuilding program continued with a number of sister ships, including Dawn Princess in 1997, Sea Princess in 1998, and Ocean Princess in 2000.
The most dramatic step in the line’s newbuild program came with the 1998 introduction of the 109,000-ton Grand Princess, which debuted as the world’s largest and most expensive cruise ship. The ship featured three main dining rooms and entertainment lounges, a greatly expanded number of alternative dining venues, and an array of new features, including a wedding chapel, a dramatic nightlclub 15 decks above the ocean and more balconies than on any other cruise ship. This ship proved popular and spawned a new class of ships that incorporated these features — Golden Princess (2001), Star Princess (2002) and Caribbean Princess (2004).
The Princess fleet expansion continued with the introduction of two new ship designs based on these models but on smaller vessels that could transit the Panama Canal: Coral Princess (2003) and Island Princess (2003) were conceived to offer many of the Personal Choice features of Grand Princess. The Grand Princess design also inspired Diamond Princess (2004) and Sapphire Princess (2004).
Princess’ fleet also saw the addition of two smaller vessels, Tahitian Princess and a new Pacific Princess, which were purchased in 2002. Formerly sailing for defunct Renaissance Cruises, these 670-passenger ships diversified the Princess fleet.
During this period, several Princess ships, including Sky Princess, Crown Princess, Sea Princess and Ocean Princess were moved to other companies within the P&O corporation, giving Princess its current fleet of 14 ships. In 2005 another ship, Royal Princess also moved to P&O Cruises and Sea Princess returned to the Princess fleet.
In 2003, Princess’ corporate ownership changed with the merger of parent company P&O Princess Cruises, plc (which had de-merged from the Penninsular & Oriental Steam Navigation Company in 2000) and cruise giant Carnival Corporation. With this new chapter, Princess joined the ranks of the “World’s Leading Cruise Lines.”
Looking Ahead
Celebrating 40 years of operation this year, the Los Angeles area-based company ranks as one of the largest cruise lines in the industry. Highlights for 2006 include a new ship, Crown Princess; a new embarkation port (Red Hook, Brooklyn), a new Caribbean port of call (Turks and Caicos), and new itineraries.
For the first time, Princess will offer 10-day roundtrips from San Juan, nine-day cruises from New York, and 11-day cruises from San Francisco. 2006 also sees Princess largest deployments ever in Asia and in the Caribbean.
A new generation of ships isn’t on the horizon until at least 2010, but don’t expect anything too dramatic. The company has gone on record saying that Princess will not compete in the battle to boast the biggest ship. Expect an evolution, not a revolution. Why change ? Princess is in her prime.
