With my recent incorporation into the BC Group last week, it exciting and great to back in the operations and passengers handling side of the cruise business. BC Group have a dedicated team of professionals responsible for providing Ground Operations, Port Agency and Shore Excursions to the various cruise lines. I thought it would be great to give you my personal view of the industry having recently worked for a luxury expedition ocean and river cruises company.

There are many areas where the cruise lines really rely and entrust their port agents, ground operators and shorex providers to deliver an outstanding and high class service like they provide their guests onboard the ships.This may be mainstream, ultra luxury or expedition cruise line who together in any one day have a larger volume of guest ashore and these large volumes sometimes up to 25k pax in one day is a huge challenge and puts a lot pressure on the different providers and the infrastructure.
This can really be challenging depending on the country, port as since the pandemic we faced in 2020/21many things have changed and the landscape is different to prior the pandemic so even a greater emphasis is now put on the stakeholders to provide a first class service to its principals.

One of my areas of focus in my new role will be to analyze what challenges the various teams have faced and to look at each individual port and work with the local authorities and partners to try and overcome some of the challenges that have been faced since the pandemic.
Below I have listed some of the challenges that I have witnessed that the various DMC’s and tour operators the operators have been facing since the restart of operations post the pandemic:

1) Lack of qualified tourist guides, many of the guides during the pandemic found themselves out of work for up to two years with no or very few cruise ships visiting their port/city. This still remains a challenge as a lot of the guides had to find new careers etc thus leaving a shortage of official guides in many destinations.

2) Many local suppliers went out of business during the pandemic so consequently new suppliers enter the market who don't have the same experience as in previous years so it's now a matter of training and educating them on the cruise industry and what services that various brands and their guests require.

3)Transport suppliers. As BC Group is part of the Alsa Group we have a lot of knowledge on the transport business and again during the pandemic a lot of smaller suppliers went out of business thus meaning a lack of coaches and drivers in many destinations. This also has an impact on the prices that the operators were paying the coach suppliers as with the lack of coaches and drivers the companies can now pick and choose what services that they want or demand higher rates due to the lack of coaches/drivers and also increased fuel prices.

4) Overcrowding and responsible and sustainable tourism. This was a challenge that we were starting to see arise before the pandemic in some key cities and ports in various countries where authorities were limiting the number of vessels etc to the port. This is an ongoing issue and will only get worse as we see more and more larger vessels enter the market. This really means that that all the stakeholders need to work closely together with the local stakeholders and associations such as CLIA and Medcruise as examples and importantly the local communities and stakeholders to find solutions.

5) Emissions and reducing the carbon footprint on the environment.This is not only from the cruise lines but with all our suppliers, this could be transport providers, local restaurants or excursion venues etc so we all need to work together to find sustainable solutions.

By no means is the above list complete as for sure there are many other points that I have not mentioned but hopefully this gives us some good food for thought as to how we all as an industry need to work together closely to overcome and address some of the challenges as "working together" is better than working alone for the benefit of the industry.

At the BC Group we will have a strong focus on the above points and many more of the changes that we are all facing in this ever changing and exciting world we work and live in and work with all the stakeholders to ensure the least impact on the cruise industry.

By no means is the above list complete as for sure there are many other points that I have missed, hopefully though this gives us so good food for thought as how we as an industry all need to work together closely to overcome some of the challenges as "working together" is better than working alone!