MSC Cruises Addresses Growing Pains
by Cheryl Rosen /
It’s one thing to sell a European product to Americans headed for Europe in search of an immersive experience. But it’s something else to sell a European product to Americans headed to the Caribbean.
That’s the first lesson MSC Cruises has learned in its 18-month leap from having one ship homeported in the U.S. to having four. And, to its credit, the line's executives got in front of the issue at the launch of its newest ship, MSC Seaview, in Genoa this past weekend.
With $10 billion worth of new ships coming, and its eyes squarely focused on North America as its next great market, the Italian shipping and cruise giant is prepared to do whatever it takes to win over U.S. and Canadian customers.
MSC is hardly a novice at growing into new markets — and its aggressive growth plan demands that it means business here. With 11 ships now on order, the $25-billion company has filled every available slot at every shipyard in the world for the next eight years, controlling 25 percent of all new capacity between now and 2026.
“We have a very deep knowledge of this environment and a $10 billion investment plan, the biggest in the world,” MSC’s Head of Commercial Services Achille Staiano told Travel Market Report in an exclusive interview on the Seaview.
Seaview is the sister ship to MSC Seaside, the first MSC ship to come directly from the shipyard to the U.S., sailing from Miami. Over the next 18 months, she will be joined by three more. Seaview, meanwhile, will sail the Mediterranean during the summer months and then “follow the sun” to Brazil during our winter, which is summer there.
After getting its start in shipping, where it is the world’s second-largest player, MSC has been rapidly growing in the cruise sector. The cash flows are fast here, Staiano said, but the customers are more demanding — and every nationality demands something different.
Fine-tuning the details for Americans
When your average seven-night cruise carries customers from 177 different nationalities, it’s all about “extreme fine-tuning of details.”
As it branched into cruising and the tourism market, “we made a couple of mistakes,” acknowledged the company's Executive Chairman Pierfrancesco Vago at the press conference. “We didn’t know how to serve coffee — but we do know how to run ships.”
And now, launching in the American market, the learning curve was equally steep. “What Americans want in Europe is not what Americans want in the Caribbean,” Staiano said. “We are a different model, and it has taken us a bit more time to fine-tune the product for the North American market. But we look at the reviews over the past couple of months and the feedback is rapidly improving as people are getting acquainted with us.”
As the leading cruise company in Europe, South America and South Africa, MSC is determined to do whatever it takes to win over the huge North American market, Staiano said. It began with customer-service training, teaching staff to offer friendlier service than many Europeans are accustomed to — to be “friendly, but not too friendly.”
“Being a very young organization in a very sophisticated market, we know very well there were issues we needed to solve,” he acknowledged. To that end, MSC has hired Massimo Bergamaschi as VP of the contact center. And for the trade, a new position, senior vice president for strategic sales and groups, was filled last week by Lori Sheller, former vice president of cruise development for Tourico Holidays; she will work alongside Joe Jiffo, senior vice president of field sales.
Travel agents at the heart of the business
"With our anticipated increased capacity, we’ve also taken a new look at our sales structure to see how we can best meet the needs of our existing valued travel agent partners as well as develop relationships with new travel agents,” MSC Cruises USA President Roberto Fusaro said.
Meanwhile, Staiano said that if he had one wish to share with the travel agents who sell his product, it would be that they “see how much we are listening and understand the passion and attention we are expending on them. Travel agents are the heart of our business, and 85 percent of our customers come from that partnership. No matter how much things change, our core focus will always be on the trade.”
In short, he vowed, “We will succeed in North America. And travel agents will be part of our focus always.”