Cruises are still having a moment, despite recent headlines, mostly because travelers choose based on cost, convenience and the 'hassle factor'.
Despite recent negative headlines, the cruise industry appears buoyant. Cruises are undergoing continual reinvention, but the latest trends are for more time in port, more overnight stays at destinations, better food, less well-known places, and wind power. Crucially, they're as appealing to retirees as to Gen Z.
As Bloomberg reports, the cruise industry seems pretty solid, even in the face of recent negative headlines when passengers were forced to remain onboard the Hondius cruise with the hantavirus—cruises, it says, seem to be immune to bad headlines.
Indeed, Viking holdings shows just how resilient the industry is right now, with the company reporting that it is currently making more money from each passenger per day at sea than ever before and its finance chief told Bloomberg that Viking had not seen a "meaningful increase in cancellations, global geopolitical upheaval notwithstanding."
Viking may be a luxury cruise company but everyone is climbing aboard. According to The New York Times, 35 million people went on a cruise in 2024. That's up 5 million from pre-pandemic figures in 2019.
