What has the cruise industry with luxury fashion
and luster, luxury design and deluxe lifestyle in common?
by Earl of Cruise
In first glance nothing, but looking deeper into
everything, Cruising and Travel is a lifestyle as is fashion.
Roger-Henri Expert - Study for the Ladies Drawing Room and Music Room of NORMANDIE (27,4x37,5cm 10 3/4´´ x 14 3/4´´) 1934 offered at 7000-8000 USD at Sotheby´s
The salons of ss/te NORAMNDIE had been the stage for the international society - digitalized copy of editors collection
Cruising and traveling has become a basic
lifestyle, 25mio cruisers are expected in 2016, after the "so called
democratisation" of cruising and travelling. But with the democratisation
especially the cruise has lost its luster totally. It was known as the art of
travel for the old and rich. Rich you had to be, yes. But old? No! Even in the
heydays of of luxury travel it was quite adventurous and you had to be fit for
different climates and such as a beginner. Then other countries - Oscar Wilde
once wrote: traveling is enriching, and is education. Only if you stay
openminded and not behave as a colonial clerck who is arguing about this and
that, and resonates: at home it is best. Those we find still today, and these
guys should stay at home in bed.
The "democratisation of travel in general
is the shift from small family businesses of beautifully
handcrafted goods or services on board stylish designed ships to global
corporations selling to the "middle market" (mass market) - a shift from
exclusivity to accessibility, from an emphasis on tradition and quality to an
emphasis on growth, branding and profits.
Once, luxury was available only to the rarefied
and aristocratic world of old money and royalty. Even the nouveau rich could not
easily access it. It offered a history of tradition, superior quality, and a
pampered buying experience. Today, however, luxury is simply a product packaged
and sold by multibillion-dollar global corporations focused on growth,
visibility, brand awareness, advertising, and, above all, profits. This profit
is the driving factor for the corporations and not the democracising of travel
or cruising or luxury for the masses. When Kloster and then CARNIVAL were looking
for new clientele, they looked to the lowest end of the food chain (John Maxtome-Graham).
They did tremendously well, but it was a challenge, as this new clientele
was highly volatile - with any threat to a destination they vanish. They naively or don´t know what a cruise is and
believe the sunshine filled broshures and tool legal action for cloudy, rainy or
stormy weather ... Good examples are the babbling
"cruisers" of the ANTHEM of the SEAS or those arguing after being hit
by Hermine ...
queuing to enter a modern cruise vessel
Only seldom is the sea perfectly smooth, the waves are low, and
the sun is shining. Most of time, the sea, and especially the Noth Atlantic is
still today a dangerous area on which to sail. Our oceans are the weather
kitchen, our weather is cooked by temperatures, winds and the ciculation of our
Mothership Earth.
What the cruise lines today in majority are
selling is the image of a sea voyage
and they made the ships the destination and the ports interupt the cruise by
"accident" or only for maintenence, as food, beverage and fuel refilling
stations. This is very similar to what corporations do in the fashion business.
Paul Iribe drawing of the Grand Salon on board ss/te NORMANDIE
The salons and decks of NORMANDIE welcomed the international society with grandeur and offered the stage to be seen and to see, it was in those days a must to be on board the NORMANDIE to be someone - digitalized copy of editors collection
They are selling a brand left to an image of its
former glory and luxury.
The more e.g. Louis Vuitton products are
floating around the less luxury it really is. And it is the same with the
cruise - it is far from luxury in the mass market. And a ship with more than
500 passengers on board is nothing less than a mass market hotel, happening to
sail on the seas.
The award-winning journalist Dana Thomas digs with
her book `Deluxe - How Luxury Lost its Luster´ deep into the dark side of the
luxury industry to uncover all the secrets that Prada, Gucci, and Burberry don´t
want us to know. `Deluxe´ is an uncompromising look behind the glossy façade
that will enthrall anyone interested in fashion, finance, or culture. With globalization, Paris, Milano, Berlin and New York are no longer
exclusive luxury meccas. Take notes of that gigantic 690,000-square-foot "luxury
mall" called Crocus City (featuring 180 boutiques, including Armani, Gucci
and Versace) which is flourishing outside Moscow, and that a group of high-end
boutiques will be part of a luxury complex called Legation Quarter, that opened
in Tiananmen Square in 2006.
“Approximately 40 percent of all Japanese own a Louis Vuitton product”
today, and one recent poll showed that by 2004 the average American woman was
buying more than four handbags a year (poll from 2005). With more people
visiting Caesars Palace’s glitzy Forum Shops each year than Disney World, Las
Vegas has made shopping synonymous with gambling and entertainment, even as
outlet malls have brought designer clothing and accessories within the reach
(and budget) of many suburbanites.
Then there are all those who buy the fakes on beaches or in cities well
known for knock-offs - Athens, Istanbul, Turkish Riviera. Mass market
"luxury brands" are sold at prices, where one must know it IS fake.
The inflationary?? sold LOUIS VUITTON brand made me no longer using my expensive
original items, as I won´t be seen with everybodies "luxury" or fake.
The once high-profile luxury brands Louis Vuitton, Hermès and Cartier and
others were founded in the 18th or 19th centuries by artisans dedicated to
creating beautiful, finely made wares for the royal court in France and later,
with the fall of the monarchy, for European aristocrats, rich the bourgeoise and then prominent American
families. Luxury remained, "a domain of the wealthy and the famous"
until "the Youthquake of the 1960s" (in Germany the 1968 generation) pulled
down social barriers and overthrew elitism, style and good manners (behavior).
It would remain out of style "until a new and financially powerful
demographic -the unmarried female executive -emerged in the 1980s." Also
named as part of the Yuppies or Dinks (double income no kids).
New Orleans Bar on board CARNIVAL TRIUMPH, the objects in the blue reflected oysters - editor with friends
The same happend when liner companies saw their future in cruising, or
established cruise companies tried to find a new clientlel. They "threw out"
the old and wealthy and concentrated on the younger generation with oddly
painted vessels, crazy, shrill interiors and new onboard programs but little
success. They vanished into the history box. These comapnies forgot their old
wealthy clientel that still traveled in style and stayed unserved by the new
emerging mass marketeers as RCCL, NCL and CARNIVAL. With "agressive"
fun oriented marketing and TV commercials Carnival fished in the lower middle
class for its new clientel. After a litterally rocky start CARNIVAL became a
major player and was the driving factor turning the cruise business into an
industry. Old reputated cruise companies as HAPAG LLOYD got the turn into new
times as they had focussed on the German upper market - the old rich. Those
relying on the US market vanished into Nirvana after oil or Dollar decline
crisis. Or had been absorbed be the mass market companies filled with cash and
turned a luxury brand into a me-too mass market appendix. TV shows still
generated the image of luxury even for the low costers.
A similarity can be seen with CUNARD after the purchse by CARNIVAL the once
renown CUNARD brand degenerated into a mass market product that is only an
American image of what Miami think is British, or HOLLAND AMERICA it is turned
into something what is believed to be a Dutch product. All companies bought by
CARNIVAL turned into a streamlined Carnivalesqued product loosing the original
brand indentity.
As both disposable income and credit-card debt soared in industrialized
nations, the middle class became the target of luxury product vendors, who
poured money into provocative advertising campaigns and courted movie stars and
celebrities as style icons. In order to maximize profits, many corporations
looked for ways to cut corners: they began to use cheaper materials, outsource
production to developing nations (while falsely claiming that their goods were
made in Western Europe) and replace hand craftsmanship with assembly-line
production. Classic goods meant to last for years gave way, increasingly, to
trendy items with a short shelf life; cheaper lines (featuring lower-priced
items like T-shirts and cosmetic cases) were introduced as well. In paralell it
happend in the cruise industry. This is also for the interior outfittings of
the modern cruise vessels. It is cheap and in the end plastic, even when
gold-looking. You touch it - you feel it: cheap. When in the end of the 80s the
ships suddenly grew bigger their outfitting became more and more a faked
luxury, and with CARNIVAL openly plastic. I still remember after years the
Maya-Inca-Atztec mixed panelling in the lobby of CARNIVAL TRIUMPH made of
plastic, surounded by black light neonlamps and a topping center yellow bulb
crying out loud "I am plastic but try to imitate a bluish sandstone"
...
CRANIVAL TRIUMPH in New York on the Hudson - Source: Wikipedia
It has to be as tastes change within a far shorter period than even years
before. You can see the wreckage of the outfittings within days on a cruises on
board. A hole here and another one there emerging over night And the Mega
vessels have to be filled each sailing anew with passengers expecting the
latest trends and fashions on board to be amused to death and axious to be
bored. That is giving the cruise companies the advantage of promoting their
makeovers as huge advertisments and declare such an overworked old tincan a new
silverbowl.
Although Dana Thomas quotes in `Deluxe´ Anna Wintour, the editor of Vogue
and Grand Priestress of fashion and style, saying such changes mean that “more
people are going to get better fashion” and “the more people who can have
fashion, the better,” the author reaches a more elitist and pessimistic
conclusion. “The luxury industry has changed the way people dress,” she writes.
“It has realigned our economic class system. It has changed the way we interact
with others. It has become part of our social fabric. To achieve this, it has
sacrificed its integrity, undermined its products, tarnished its history and
hoodwinked its consumers. In order to make luxury ‘accessible,’ tycoons have
stripped away all that has made it special.
“Luxury has lost its luster.”
And it is the same with the cruise. The cruise as is has lost the luster.
Dana Thomas Credit Alice Springs
By Dana Thomas
Illustrated. 375 pages. The Penguin Press. $27.95.
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