Tackling the Greatest Challenge facing Cruise Retail > People

This was my 7th time at the always enlightening and insightful DFNI Cruise Retail Conference.   My thanks to Kapila Ireland, Felix Barlow and the DFNI team for continuing to champion our sector so well.

After listening to all the panelists and speakers across all the conferences from Rome back in 2018 to Istanbul this year, I have reached the same conclusion. The empowerment of people is our top priority and also the biggest challenge in our industry. At times, it seems like we are stuck in a repetitive cycle, discussing these issues without making real progress. This year's conference emphasized this recurring theme more loudly and urgently than ever before. Operators, brands, and the market are facing increasing challenges that we must prioritize and address. Recruitment, retention, training, and adaptation were the four recurring words highlighted by many of my respected colleagues and industry leaders.

(image: DFNI)

Having sat on the other side of the table for many years, I also fully understand these topics, why they are bought to DFNI Cruise conference and also why they are continued high priority.

But how do we solve it collectively and do what we all say that we want to do, put it into action?

I don’t propose to sit here and know all the answers, but I have thought long and hard about how to help us move out of this ever repeating cycle and try to at least move forward the discussion into creating tangible solutions that I hope can benefit everyone, learnt from my own experience and now applied into practise.

3 words are at the heart of our idea.   Training, Support, Recruitment

1.    Training

For brands, operators and onboard professionals alike, training is a key logistical and systematic challenge that simply cannot cover enough people with enough consistency.  With over 14,000 crew changes alone this year in cruise retail, huge parts of our operation are missing out simply because they are in the wrong place at the wrong time.  So, can we use the digital world to connect us together efficiently and effectively?

2.    Support

The cruise retail world can be daunting, complex and challenging for brands and invidivuals to enter and then stay consistent within.  The support that is needed not only to connect to others in the industry, but also to understand the ever changing and evolving industry is all of paramount importance.  How can we provide that helping hand and expertise to those who need it? How can we create a cruise retail support community?

3.    Recruitment

The way we recruit and then retain our staff continually presents a challenge for operators. The external market challenges, the logistical challenges, the growth of cruise, the specialisms and economic requirements make a never ending to do list for cruise retailers. 

So, to be succinct, our plan is to combine these 3 challenges together into the core of what the Cruise Retail Academy is all about.  An integrated approach to support the industry on training, and recruitment in order to provide solutions, improvements and new approaches to the sector.  It is not going to be a magic bullet to solve all these issues, but I would love to partner in different ways across the sector with many of the key players to help them improve their performance.

We will provide free access to shoppies across the sector to our Cruise Retail Academy, and then work with brands and partners to provide strong content for them in terms of training and development.  We then provide a tailored recruitment solution that is able to work hand in hand with the needs of operators working back into the core of the Academy. 

Doing this digitally using different means across web, apps and social media will mean we can share success, engage consistently and provide quick reaction to needs.

It is the start of a long and challenging journey, but this is one I am personally really motivated to go on. I hope one that when we meet together at DFNI 2025 will have shown that we are able to start to move the conversation forward in a positive way.