After Flight Centre Travel Group (FCTG) announced Cruiseabout’s comeback in Australia last week, FCTG Global Leisure CEO James Kavanagh has told Karryon the first physical Cruiseabout store will open in Sydney, followed by locations across Australia.
Kavanagh said that after the Cruiseabout Sydney store opening, FCTG would use data “to inform where all the locations are going to be”.
“We have a history of knowing which locations perform really well – and we think that all the major capital cities will be represented,” he told Karryon in an interview.
“Sydney is our first priority right now. Thereafter, we’ll just make sure that we get the recipe right and then rapidly grow in the right locations.”
In terms of what Cruiseabout 2.0 will look like and how it will differ from the previous Crusieabout brand, Kavanagh said there would be an increased focus on the digital space and getting that right.
“We’ve really modernised the approach … from a technology perspective, as well as actually having a retail presence across the country, and that will be backed by a really strong call centre,” he remarked.
“The channel optionality will be a little bit different for our customers … but also we’ll be thinking a lot about the product range – and it’ll be very much a cruise-first, product-focused business that will really focus on the flight/cruise market.
A big ocean
Kavanagh is convinced that there’s a space for the brand “with the amount of ships that are on order”.
“Australians actually love to cruise. Some of the stats show that one in 17 Australians cruise and we’re now the fourth largest source market,” he said.
“So with all the growth that’s coming in, we think it’s time to really bring back the Cruiseabout brand; to modernise it with increased assets and a much stronger product range – to be able to be a serious player in the segment.”
While the return of Cruiseabout to Australia marks a significant point in FCTG’s commitment to the cruising sector, Kavanagh said the revived brand would not negatively impact the group’s other cruise retailers.
“Flight Centre still will sell cruise; Travel Associates are well located and they focus a lot on luxury cruising,” he remarked.
“So we’ll make sure that the network is complementary to our existing assets. And this will be very much product-focused and exclusively on the cruise customer.”
Kavanagh is also quick to draw a distinction between Cruiseabout and FCTG’s My Cruises brand.
“The difference between My Cruises and Cruiseabout is that My Cruises is actually a product line that is very much a holiday in a box,” he explained.
“And while we have some choice in terms of potentially changing some things, it’s very much a prepackaged holiday, whereas the Cruiseabout business will be the opposite of that, which will be tailor-made cruise holidays that provide a lot more choice for the consumer.”
Bright future
Overall, Kavanagh is confident about the future of the cruise sector down under.
“If you can match the right customer to the right cruise product, and with that real core expertise, it’s certainly going to be a segment that’s going to grow even more,” he said.
“And a lot of the research shows that once people have cruised, the likelihood of them cruising again is like 80-odd per cent if they’re matched to the right cruise, so we’ll be really intentional about the expertise here to make sure that we can match the right customer with the right product.”
Beyond Cruiseabout
Meanwhile, FCTG also announced that it would be launching a new dedicated wholesale cruise division.
“Essentially, the purpose of this is to make sure that wholesale is packaging up the right product to be able to stock on the shelves of not just the Cruiseabout business, but also the rest of our brands. And we provide product to a lot of the independent agents in the marketplace,” Kavanagh said.
“So the wholesale there will be really serving the Australian travel community.”
The FCTG Leisure boss said there would be updates about the wholesale arm as well as Cruiseabout leadership announcements in the coming weeks.
But one thing he did rule out was the return of any other former FCTG brands.
“We definitely feel that the brand portfolio that we have now is perfect for the Australian marketplace … and the value proposition of each of those brands really speaks to the entire marketplace. So no plans for other brands.”
