Why Cruise Lines Don’t Really Want Single Travellers

Amongst my regular customers I have quite a few who travel solo. Some choose to do so as their ‘significant others’ have other things planned or can’t get time off work.  Some have either split up from, or have lost their partner and have no choice but to travel on their own. Some go with friends, but want to have the privacy of their own cabin to sleep in.

Cruise holidays are a perfect option for people who travel alone. You can have plenty of ‘me-time’, but you will always have someone to have a chat with over dinner. This often leads to meeting up for a coffee or a drink later in the cruise. Some people hook up and go on shore together, saving taxi costs etc.  Some cruise lines arrange get-together’s for the solo travellers on board and on some of NCL’s ships they even have their own lounge.

When it comes to prices, however, the cruise lines (with the odd exception) seem to do everything they can to dissuade single passengers from travelling. More often than not there are no more than a handful of dedicated single cabins on each ship which seem to book up as soon as they go on sale. This usually leaves a solo traveller in a double cabin paying almost the same price as 2 people would. I have even seen some special offer cabins that they will only sell to 2 people, effectively making it cheaper to pay for 2 people than 1! I have to say sometimes I feel embarassed about some of the single prices I have to relay to people.

There’s only 1 person eating the food, watching the entertainment and sleeping in the cabin, so why charge for 2??? Well, this is where we get to the nitty gritty of it. To us our holidays are wonderful memory-making experiences, being looked after by eager staff, eating amazing food and visiting some fantastic destinations. To the cruise companies we are their bread and butter. We are there to make them money. We are there for their profiteering pleasure and to keep the shareholders happy with their annual dividends.

When there’s one person in a cabin even though they may be paying double that still means half the bar profits, half the spa profits, half the excursion profits, half the speciality dining profits…you get the picture. it does seem terribly unfair that solo travellers have to pay so much more, however the bottom line is exactly that!

To my mind the cruise lines offering the best deals for singles are NCL, Fred Olsen, Saga and Cruise & Maritime. Big shout out to NCL championing the solo traveller with their studio complexes. These are available on Norwegian Escape, Norwegian Bliss, Norwegian Breakaway, Norwegian Getaway, Norwegian Epic and Pride of America. Some of the bigger ships boast 128 solo cabins in their own area close to the dedicated Studio lounge.

Click here for some great tips if you are travelling solo and here for our best single deals which are updated daily.