Putting people off cruises

In January, in the aftermath of the Costa Concordia cruise tragedy, SodaHead.com – the web’s largest opinion-based community – ran a poll to determine if the general public was “less likely to take a cruise given the incident.”

At that time, according to the SodaHead poll, 27% of respondents said "YES, they are less likely to cruise."

After the recent fire on the Costa Allegra, SodaHead once again polled its members, and the results showed that a startling 47% of respondents were now less likely to cruise based on these incidents, a 20% jump in less than two months.

The age of the respondent played a factor in the results, as 53% of those over 65 are stating that they are now less likely to cruise, while 31% of those between 25 -34 are having second thoughts about getting on a ship.

Click here for the full poll results, with respondent demographics.

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Costa Concordia Tragedy Impact on Cruise Bookings

Some 260 of over 1,000 people polled in the aftermath of the running aground of the Costa Concordia off the coast of Tuscany say they are “less likely to take a cruise given the incident”, according to the web’s largest opinion-based community, SodaHead.com.

The results, says SodaHead, demonstrate that the disaster may have a deep impact on the cruise industry. To put this in perspective, with an estimated 18.8 million people cruising in 2010, if 26% were going to change their cruise travel plans based on this disaster, that would mean the industry would see 4.9 million fewer cruisers.

Full results of the poll are available at SodaHead Costa Concordia poll

Of course, voting “less likely” doesn’t mean they won’t be on a cruise this year. A large number of them, come what may, will be will be packing their glad-rags for the usual reasons and head for the Caribbean, Alaska and elsewhere. But the repercussions for the cruise industry are ugly no matter how few decide against a cruise.

Additional findings of the survey show that the respondent’s age had an impact on their vote. While only 14% of respondents between the ages of 25-34 said the tragedy might impact their future cruise plans, a striking 34% of those over the age of 65 said that they are now less likely to cruise and many of the traditional cruisers are from this age group.

With cruise ships becoming ever bigger (some now carrying 6,000 passengers), the tragedy has focused attention on the International Maritime Organization’s new rules for passenger ship safety. A comprehensive package of amendments to the international regulations affecting new passenger ships came into force on 1 July 2010. Increased emphasis is now placed on reducing the chance of accidents occurring and on improved survivability, embracing the concept of the ship as “its own best lifeboat”, capable of returning to port in the event of a major mishap.