This was arguably the most shocking announcement of the night. Walt Disney Company D23 Fan Event Last night in Anaheim, California, wasn’t about an amusement park (although there was ton of those things too).
Instead, we now know that Disney Cruise Line’s recent rapid expansion, from just four ships in operation in about 10 years to a total of nine ships currently operating or under construction, is just the beginning.
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Disney Cruise Line will welcome four more adding five more ships to the fleet currently in service and four already announced and under construction in the coming years, bringing the fleet size to 13 ships by 2031.
This is essentially three times the number of ships the country had on the water for many years, until Disney wishes departing in June 2022.
Disney announced that while the ship names and itineraries of the four newly announced ships are still in development, they will welcome them between 2027 and 2031.
For those counting at home, Disney Treasures will officially set sail later this year as the company’s sixth ship.
Then, in 2025, two more ships will join the fleet. Disney’s Fate will depart from Florida’s Port Everglades. Disney AdventureA 9,000-person mega-ship that Disney Cruise Line acquired from Asia-based Dream Cruises while it was still under construction will depart from Singapore.
And then there’s what we think will be the ninth ship, a ship based in Tokyowas just announced a few weeks ago and will begin construction in Germany in 2025 and set sail in 2029.
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But with the newly announced timeline for four additional ships starting in 2027, it looks like at least one of those ships, if not more, will be ready before the previously announced Japan-based ship being built in conjunction with Oriental Land Company. TokyoDisney.
There’s a lot we still don’t know about these four newly revealed Disney Cruise Line ships, including their sizes, whether they’ll be using new or existing footprints, and where these additional ships will be homeported and headed. There are currently several U.S. ports, such as GalvestonThis route is only open at certain times of the year.
However, Josh D’Amaro, president of Disney Experiences, may have teased some plans for at least some of the ships, saying, “Expanding our fleet will give more people, in more places around the world, the opportunity to experience a vacation at sea like only Disney can provide.” Perhaps hinting that the ships will serve some areas of the world that Disney Cruise Line doesn’t yet serve. For example, the line currently doesn’t sail to or from South America, an important market for the company in many ways. In fact, the first D23 fan event to be held in Brazil will take place there in November.
Disney has also shared Current vessels are in high demand and have high satisfaction rates, reaching 97% occupancy by Q2 2024.
For comparison, Royal Caribbean currently has 28 shipsSo while 13 ships is still a significantly smaller fleet than Royal Caribbean, a line that also caters to families, it puts them in a much more similar position in terms of fleet size than they were when they had just four ships a few years ago.
On a call with investors a few days ago, a Disney executive shared that cruise ships tend to “pay back very quickly,” and it’s clear that Disney is betting big on the seas and on its ability to attract “tourists” to its ships for decades to come.
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