On Board The New Viking Star, Torstein Hagen Welcomes Travel Agents And Outlines Plans

Viking Cruises chairman Torstein Hagen.

Viking Cruises debuted its first ocean cruise in the North American market last week—serendipitously, on the anniversary of the Norman Conquest of 1066, when the descendants of Norwegian raiders changed history by wreching control of England from the Anglo-Saxons.

Onboard the Viking Star, Viking Cruises chairman Torstein Hagen outlined a plan of conquest of his own: to grow the company’s North American presence on the Mississippi and possibly beyond; and to rely on the travel-agency channel to explain a complicated all-inclusive product that pays among the highest commissions in the industry.

To kick it all off, Viking will enter travel agents into a drawing whose winner will take home a cool million dollars. Agents first must be registered at vrc.com/million to be eligible; once you do, every Viking cruise you book between October 17, 2016, and March 31, 2017, will earn one entry into the contest. The winner will be chosen at random in April.

The news was well-received by travel agents aboard Star, which set sail on Friday with a guest list comprising 650 press (including TMR editor-in-chief Cheryl Rosen), travel agents, and a smattering of paying guests. It is sailing from New York to San Juan, Puerto Rico, and then will embark on a 10-day Caribbean itinerary.

Speaking to the group on Saturday, Hagen scoffed at those who had pooh-poohed Viking’s plan to “reinvent ocean cruising” with a more small-ship, all-inclusive model that eschews casinos and art auctions and children, and instead gives guests one price that includes free wine, liquor, specialty restaurants, wifi, gratuities and shore excursions—and pays travel agents commissions on all of the above. “We believe that’s the trend in the industry, and we want to lead that,” he said. “There’s nothing more pleasant than proving naysayers wrong.”

Viking’s move into ocean cruising was precipitated by customer surveys that found they spend four weeks on ocean cruises for every week they spend on rivers, Hagen said. That interest, combined with a recent infusion of $500 million from two financial firms in exchange for 17% of the privately-held company, has Viking building four more ocean vessels and two more river ones designed to offer a “small-ship experience at a large-ship cost”—and more. “Rest assured, we have money,” he said. 

Hagen announced new itineraries to the Far East and Australia for winter 2018, and Alaska for 2019, as well as a 93-day Viking Spirit itinerary that will sail from Auckland to Sydney, Singapore, Bangkok, Hong Kong, Busan, Tokyo, Petroplavosk, Seward and Vancouver, from February to May 2019.

Travel agents have a huge role to play in explaining this complicated all-inclusive but fairly priced product, where the included options have a value of $203 a day, he said. Pricing on Viking “is not [a list price of] $2,000 and then another $2,000” that customers are not expecting. Including air—on which Viking offers “great deals”—the all-inclusive price of $6,194 on one tour, for example, would yield agents $904, or a 14.6% commission rate. (“I find it incomprehensible that port fees are not included” in other companies’ prices, he said, unless the point is to artificially lower the price shown to customers and the commission paid to agents.)

By 2019, Viking will have 5,580 beds—and all new ships, including Star, built in 2015; Sea, built in 2016; Sky and Sun, coming February and October 2017, respectively; Spirit, coming June 2018; and one as yet unnamed, coming March 2019.

In the North American market, “we continue to have ambitions of being on the Mississippi” but have been thwarted by the “damned Jones Act,” Hagen said. Now, though, “I think we have found a solution” by partnering with a U.S.-based company.

“I learned in business school that nothing is impossible,” he said. “It’s a product guests want, but we have to make sure we can deliver it at a price that makes sense.”

Meanwhile, Cruise Industry News last week reported that Viking has filed for patents not only for the name “Viking Mississippi,” but also for “Viking Coastal Cruises.” Asked directly about plans to sail other U.S. rivers, Hagen said only, “let’s crawl before we run.”

Penthouse junior suite on Viking Star.