
Tom Wolber, CEO
Founded in 1989, Crystal
Cruises is a luxury line that has been owned by Genting Hong Kong since 2015.
Its current fleet includes two ocean ships, five river ships and one yacht, with
three new vessels in the works. According to
Phocuswright, the cruise sector grew 5% in 2017 to surpass $17 billion.
Tom Wolber became
president and CEO of Crystal Cruises in September 2017, following a
three-decade career with Walt Disney Company, including 10 years with Disney
Cruise Line where he was senior vice president of operations.
The
distribution landscape is different for cruises than for other sectors of
travel. According to Phocuswright, traditional agents account for 66% of cruise
bookings, and that number is expected to inch up to 67% by 2021. What elements
would need to be improved online for a consumer to feel as satisfied with
booking via the web as they would via an agent?
It’s a very, very hard question to answer in
the large context because it is one statistic that you are going off. Even
within the travel industry outside cruising the numbers vary greatly. For simple
transactions - hotel booking or airline booking - the direct booking numbers
are through the roof. But the more complex the booking gets, the more that
number drops because people will always look for assurances and help in
navigating through a purchase decision.
That is not necessarily because they
couldn’t do it online, it’s because they want the reassurance, and they want to
have a complete package put together for them.
And cruise is one of those products that is relatively
complex. It is for most Americans an international transaction or international
trip they are booking. Those typically require more agent help, so the online
numbers for international [travel] go down anyway.
I think that as we continue
to make our web better accessible, our online booking experiences easier and more
convenient, we will continue to see an uptick to that online booking number.
But the agents’ role will never disappear and will always be there in the cruise
industry.
It’s interesting - we just did a market study
that revealed the fact that the younger consumers, the consumers between 35 to 55,
are actually more prone to use an agent than the older consumers. So it is not
just a technology issue, it is also an issue of having time available,
convenience and assurance and that is just where an agent comes into play and
provides that. It’s that human interaction, that human element that people are
still looking for.
Website
www.crystalcruises.com
Do you think chatbots will play a role - given that
voice and interaction is such an important part of the cruise planning process?
It’s a tool, and it’s a tool that - as it improves - will start
to play a role. But again it is a tool. That is one of the most important
things to stress for me and for us: Technology is not a driver in and of
itself.
No one is ever going to book a cruise because the technology is so
fantastic. Technology is going to enable the experience and enable the transaction
in ways that consumers want.
Chatbots are just one of many evolutions in that
ongoing quest of making things easier, more accessible. It’s a tool in the
toolbox. We will embrace that once it gets to a point that it is useful.
What role does technology play in the cruise
experience?
Cruising by and large is a leisure-based activity.
It’s not a business activity. So where hotel chains and other travel providers
are playing a dominant role in the business travel realm, technology there has
a different role than in the leisure side of the business.
When you think about
Crystal and about cruising, the technology divides in a number of categories: You have service-enabling technology like the profiles you have, the
information you have on guests and how you make that available to the people onboard that are actually interacting with the guests. [You have] technology back
of the house to streamline things, make it more efficient, eliminate lines.
Those are all very important in enabling an experience that is seamless and of high
value to the guest.
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The other part of technology that is really important
in the cruise business is communication and enabling people to stay in contact
with their homes. The technology started many years ago when we started having Wi-Fi
on our ships. And with every evolution, with every time we improve our delivery
of Wi-Fi, the market has already caught up with us with the demand of streaming
more and faster data because people share more and more and larger and larger
files.
So keeping up with the latest technology when it comes to Wi-Fi and internet
access for our guests is a key important factor for the experience and
something we invest quite a bit in like every other cruise line.
Then it’s
truly all the entertainment technologies on a ship. I think when it comes to
technology as an enabler of a great onboard experience or a great leisure vacation
experience, the cruise industry as a whole is probably on the cutting-edge of
technology development.
Crystal is recognized as a leading cruise operator and
has a loyal customer base, some that have been cruising with you since the
brand launched 29 years ago. But how do you attract new customers to cruising?
The way we attract new customers to our brand is making
sure that we talk to people in a way so that they recognize themselves in the
brand experience we offer and make them want to travel in the embrace of Crystal.
It is about getting the brand proposition of Crystal across to consumers that
haven’t cruised with Crystal yet. I think some of the new products we have
launched - like the river cruising, the expedition cruising soon to come, the
yacht cruising with Crystal Esprit - those are products that are very attractive
to a somewhat younger clientele or different clientele than what we’ve traditionally
seen on our ocean ships.
And that plays out - about 50% of the people that go
on these experiences are new to Crystal. Then we hope to bring them onto the
ocean-going experiences as well.
There’s a number of ways to attract new customers or
new guests to the Crystal brand. And again technology is an enabler of that.
Making sure people can connect when they are onboard and stay in touch is
crucially important. But we’re not going to be leading with, “Come book a Crystal
cruise because of our internet access.” It’s kind of a given these days.
When we talk about future growth in the travel
industry, all eyes turn to China. It has one of the world’s fastest-growing
economies, and its travel market is projected to grow 9 to 11% annually for the
next several years. What are your plans for the Asian market in the coming
years?
We are owned by an Asian company - Genting Hong
Kong - and we have an office in Hong Kong that is exploring that market. We’ve
been fortunate that since the beginning we have been very present in the Asian
market because the previous owners were Japanese. So we’ve always had a core base
of Asian customers on our ships. That continues to be strongly present.
We are, with the new products - the river cruising
and the expedition cruising - going to be focusing on that market. We
already have product available on our ships that is very attractive to the
Asian travelers. Our menu options, our restaurant options - we have choices to make
Asians travelers feel more at home.
On our ocean-going vessels we have Asian
hosts and hostesses that can help them with language issues. We are prepared
for that. We continue to look at ways as to how we can evolve that.
You have a new expedition yacht, the Crystal
Endeavour, in production for delivery in 2020, with another one planned for 2021
and the first Diamond Class ocean ship slated for 2022. Can you tell us how are
you are incorporating the latest technology into these new products?
I cannot do that yet, because we are in the
midst of developing that and I don’t want to tip my hat in a field that evolves
rapidly. But there are going to be again enabling technologies on the ships that
will bring that guest experience to a whole new level.

I think as a leader you need to be endlessly curious. You need to be always asking why and how.
Tom Wolber - Crystal Cruises
It’s all about
eliminating pain and pressure points for the guest, and technology is changing
so rapidly that we know what we want to do, but we will continue to validate
that almost until the moment that we deliver the ships so we can be ready with
whatever the best technology available at the time is to deliver what we want
to deliver.
Excursions are an important
element of the cruise experience. How does your company work with local
operators, and do you think this will change as third-party sites such as
GetYourGuide, Viator, Expedia et al gain a higher profile for tours and
activities?
It’s one of the reasons why people use agents so
much still in the cruise industry, because of the complexity of the product.
People like to book their excursions well ahead of their voyage so they can be assured
that they can have the experience that they want to have when they are visiting
a port. We do work with local operators in all the markets, and we carefully
design experiences that are unique for our guests that they can’t just purchase
anywhere off the shelf.
There is another element to it that is different
than the providers like Expedia can play, and that is the all-inclusive piece of
the business. For our river ships and our yacht, the shore excursions are
included in the up-front pricing, so people just have to select what they want
to experience so that kind of eliminates that piece of the market for local
competition.
The main reason that people work through tour operators that are
vetted through us and work with us in building these products is that they know
it has the Crystal stamp, so there is the security and the safety aspect of the
tours that are being vetted that you don’t know if you go on your own and
purchase.
Lastly when you are on a Crystal-sold excursion,
the ship will wait for you if there is a delay in your bus or whatever, because
they know there is a Crystal excursion group coming back to the ship. If you do
this outside of the cruise line, that guarantee doesn’t exit. We have no
visibility of what you are doing and where you are doing it.
In September it will be one year since you
became president and CEO of Crystal Cruises. What’s been your biggest challenge
in year one?
I don’t know if it’s a challenge or just an opportunity
to embrace and work with, but Crystal, when I got here, was in the midst of a
massive expansion phase that necessitated a lot of back-of-the-house
improvements, technology improvements.
So while you are bringing out new
product in the market, and you are changing your back-of-the-house systems and some
of the office setups and procedures around it, you just have an awful lot of
swirl going on.
Getting that settled and getting that calmed down and at a pace
that is predictable and inspires confidence has been the major part of the work
this year, and I think that is succeeding.
What is in the works for Crystal Cruises in
the next three to five years?
We’ll continue to fine-tune the existing
products – the river product, the yacht product and of course the ocean
product. But we are now turning our eyes back on the ocean, and we’ll be preparing
for the delivery of the expedition vessel - the Crystal Endeavour - and then
we’re going to be in the midst of planning the itinerary of the second Endeavor, and then the planning and design for the new ocean-going ships.
Those are future-going
strings of work that are out there for Crystal. On top of that is just
growing the customer base and preparing the market for the arrival of all these
new products.
Prior to joining Crystal, you had been with
Disney for nearly 30 years, 10 of those with the Disney Cruise Line. What is it
about the cruise industry that appeals to you?
I think it’s an absolutely unique industry.
No matter how big it gets, it’s a very small industry. Everyone knows each
other. It’s an industry that is very international and dynamic in nature, and that
appeals to me because I really don’t like to get bored.
I think from a product point of view, the
opportunity that the cruise industry gives to establish a relationship with a
guest and make that a relationship that endures over years and years and turns
that guest into a repeat guest is unique.
The embrace of the experience in the
cruise industry is deeper and more profound than in any other industry that
I’ve seen. You have your people onboard with you on an entire voyage from
start to finish.
Yes they go off and do shore excursions and shore products and
window shopping, you name it, but the amount of time we spend with our guests
compared to the amount of time that someone in a typical hotel spends with the
hotel staff or even less in a theme park - that experience translates in great
opportunities to build memories, to build relationships that endure over time.
And I think that is very appealing.
How do you motivate your team?
Probably not enough. But the way I try to
motivate the team is letting people know that they are appreciated and that
their role is important in the overall Crystal experience.
To that point, I
think it is very important to create a culture where everyone feels part of
one Crystal family, one company that has a certain feel, that stands for
certain values. That we’re not just having one product and a product
delivery for our guest that is completely separate from how it feels to work within
the brand.
What we deliver to our guests, our staff and our crew members should
feel when they are here as well. Again it is allowing people to do their
jobs, it’s about appreciating people and it is about communicating with people.
Faced with two equally qualified
people for a senior role, how do you select the one to hire?
If they are equally qualified, it
means they have similar experiences, similar technical profiles that enable
them to do the job. Then it really comes back to the read you get from a person
when you talk with them about the role and how they would fit into the company
culture that we have.
People can be completely equal in qualifications, but one
person may be better suited for the insurance industry and another to the
hospitality industry. It’s really about which of the two persons fits better
into our Crystal culture.
What are one or two characteristics that you believe
every leader should possess?
I
think as a leader, you need to be endlessly curious. You need to be always asking
why and how. I think a natural curiosity is a great, great asset in a
leader.
The second one would be the ability to make a decision and be comfortable
with the fact that every decision has a certain risk that comes with it. You can
be right, you can be wrong, but 90% of decisions can be later adjusted or changed.
So being able to make a decision is another trait that is very important for a
leader.
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