As we approach the end of 2024, let's have a final look at some of the top stories over the next few days which shaped our year in cruise retail. First up, new shops!
BEST NEW SHIP LAUNCHES - OUR TOP THREE
There were a lot of exciting new cruise retail launches in 2024 which gave us a glimpse into some of the great new concepts, ideas and innovations that the main cruise retail operators have bought to life. We have bought you inside most of the new ship launches across the year in previous blogs, so lets rank our top 3 new shop launches. We looked through all of the new and refurbished ships which launched this year across different cruise lines, different size ships, different canvases. We looked at the layouts and the use of space. We looked at the guest experience and we concluded what we believed to be the best new cruise retail offerings launched this year.
3rd place - QUEEN ANNE (Harding+)
The beautiful shopping environment onboard Queen Anne was a masterpiece in experiential and elevated retailing. The first new ship launches from Cunard in 14 years there were high expectations of maintaining the heritage of the line whilst also offering something new and distinctive for the Queen Anne guest.
The high quality design coupled with an intuitive and well laid out flow allows the Queen Anne guest to really get an immersive shopping offering across many different product categories seamlessly offered together. The boutiques are really nicely positioned wrapped around the Queen's Room on Deck 3 with a well located welcoming positioning allowing a good deal of both passing guest foot flow but also increased dwell time from the curiosity factor being next to the Queen's Room. With nice features such as the Experience Lounge and the Cabinet of Curiosities perfectly designed to accompany the adjacent space, alongside some excellent brand expositions, this is a really strong retail offering from the team at Harding+ and perfectly captures what an elevated reimagined Cunard retail experience should be.
(Photos: Christopher Ison)
2nd Place - SUN PRINCESS (Harding+)
The opening on the Sun Princess at the start of the year bought forward a new era for the retail setup on Princess Cruises, as the first new ship opening managed by Harding+ since the tender win in 2021. It is fair to say that historically Princess ships retail offering was very much a 'cookie cutter' setup with a traditional, well established setup. But for Sun Princess retail offering, there is a real change in approach and this has been created with 2 distinct experience areas. On Deck 7 are the fashion accessories, logo, sunglasses and duty free boutiques. On Deck 8 are the beauty, fine watches and fine jewellery stores. The immersive nature of the 2 guest flow spaces on both decks going towards the main restaurants at the aft of the ship from the atrium / theatre at the front means that on both decks the shops are really well located, captivating and visible. Not only this, the way of capturing attention is pretty unique in our industry with an open plan fine watches space on deck 8 and fully accessible fashion and sunglasses spaces on deck 7. This really helps to show a transition from the traditional cruise ship set-apart retailing into something much more intuitive for guests. Strong marketing activation, clear brand installation and easy to shop spaces make this an excellent retail offering - well done team!
(Photos: Steve Millay / Princess Cruises / Harding+)
1st Place - AROYA (Heinemann) - NEW SHIP OPENING 2024
In top spot for our new ship openings was the final new ship launch of 2024, Aroya. This project was really not an easy one - converting the existing retail space of a former ship (World Dream) which was designed for the Asian market and then converting it completely into a bespoke designed offering for the brand new Saudi Arabian cruise market. Not only this, but then creating the largest retail offering ever developed for a cruise ship at over 1,600 m2. This is truly an ambitious, challenging and extraordinary project. But then, to bring to life a really interesting, thoughtful and well designed retail offering is really incredible. The needs and requirements of this market mean that this retailing cannot simply be a 'Copy / Paste' offer. Heinemann has done a great effort in tailoring a truly new offer, a design, a brand selection to this distinct market in a really unique and well mastered way. Congratulations to all of the Heinemann team - our worthy new ship opening of 2024!
(Photos: Heinemann)
Well done to all the cruise retail operators for pushing the boundaries of what has been possible across this year. We love great design, great innovation and great guest experiences!
2025 looks to be a really exciting year of new ship launches with plenty of amazing new spaces coming to some fantastic new ships.
Do you agree with our favourites? Tell us about your favourites in the comments below. We would love to hear your opinions also!
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