Azamara ‘open-minded’ about possibility of new ships

Azamara is “open-minded” about adding new ships to the line, its chief executive has said.

 

Speaking on board Azamara Journey’s Loyalty CEO Voyage, Dondra Ritzenthaler told Travel Weekly she speaks to the line’s board at least once a week about the possibility of a newbuild ship.

 

She added: “I’m open-minded about absolutely all of those things, refurbishments or newbuilds, because you can grow in more than one way. We love our four ships, but we certainly would love to grow.”

 

Ritzenthaler said the “desire” would be for the capacity of any new ship to be kept below 1,000 passengers, like the rest of its current fleet, to ensure they can maintain the “destination immersion” and small port access advantages.

 

She said while she did not have a commitment from the board yet, they had “tremendous confidence” in the line, its forward bookings and trade commitment.

 

“They’ve told me to keep doing what I’m doing, and that’s when we will have real conversations and real commitments about newbuilds,” she said.

 

Now six months into the role, Ritzenthaler added she had “a much better understanding” of what it was going to take for a new ship to be approved, including a successful wave period, with promotions starting on December 11.

 

She revealed the line had “the best Black Friday in our history” which was “a strong indication” that wave sales would be buoyant.

 

Azamara is ahead of target for 2025 bookings at the turn of year, Ritzenthaler revealed, with more than 60% of cabins across the fleet booked.

 

She said the line was targeting 96% occupancy for 2025, up from an average of 91% in previous years.

 

She underscored the line’s commitment to travel agents, stressing it was upping investment and headcount for trade support where other lines were doing the opposite.

 

“Travel advisors will continue to be our primary way we’re going to get business. They book about 86% of our product which is huge,” she said.

 

She revealed Azamara had spoken to 1,200 agents in 12 months in “listen, learn and link together” sessions to help steer changes for the line.

 

Ritzenthaler promised to “reimagine” entertainment and dining across the fleet, with more changes to come following these feedback sessions.

 

Azamara’s deployment for the rest of 2026 and 2027 will go on sale from December 20, including a 188-day World Cruise which Ritzenthaler said would be the “best world cruise in the industry”, plus another brand-new itinerary for the line.

New website commitment

Azamara is “100% committed” to changing its website after customer and trade feedback.

 

Speaking at a Q&A session on board with passengers, where issues with the line’s website were raised, Ritzenthaler responded: “We need a website to be much easier to work with.

 

“But these things do not happen overnight and it’s never on budget or on time in my 40 years of doing this.

“We’re 100% committed and we agree with you 100% that it has to change.”

 

Ritzenthaler added there was money set aside in the 2025 budget to “absolutely fix the end-to-end customer journey” and the line’s next step was “eventually” to develop an app.

 

When asked another question about whether it would be better to book direct if the Azamara system was not compatible with travel agents’ systems, she said: “That is not the solution. We need, love and value travel advisors. It needs to be frictionless for them as well.”