2025 will be a bright year for cruises, just like 2024
2025 will be a bright year for cruises, just like 2024
"The number of ships and passengers boarding at our ports is increasing"
The Turkish cruise sector is closing 2024 with a growth of over 30 percent. Noting that Celestyal regularly visited Turkish ports in 2024 and organized over 100 trips, bringing over 100 thousand cruise passengers, Özgü Alnıtemiz said, "Our country is an important hub for cruise giants, right in the middle of the 7 seas. We are an indispensable destination for giant ships. The number of ships will increase even more, the target is 1800 ships in 2025. The target number of passengers is 2.3 million. The advantages of cruise travel are being discovered more and more each passing day, and cruise awareness is also increasing in our country. The number of passengers boarding our ports on incoming ships is also increasing, and the number of incoming ships will continue to increase in parallel." The cruise industry is closing the losses of the pandemic process, 2024 was a year when cruise ships shined again in the world and in our country. Özgü Alnıtemiz, Turkey Director of the cruise company Celestyal, which comes to Turkish ports uninterruptedly and regularly, made the following assessment of the sector for 2024: ‘’We are closing 2024 with good developments both in the sector and brand. As of the end of November, a total of 1167 cruise ships have arrived at Turkish ports in 2024. Especially with Galataport, Istanbul has become an important hub for giant cruise ships again. The total number of cruise passengers arriving at our ports was 1 million 854 thousand 364. This increase in the number of passengers; compared to the previous year, shows that especially larger capacity ships have come to our country. From Celestyal’s perspective, we have carried out over 100 regular trips, and the total number of passengers we carried in these trips, mostly American and European, exceeded 100 thousand. A Celestyal ship came to Kuşadası port 3 days a week throughout the summer. 100 thousand cruise passengers entered our ports.
2024 was also a successful year in terms of outgoing passengers. We boarded 20 thousand passengers from Turkish ports to our ships. 12 thousand of them were Turkish and the others were foreign guests. We not only hosted them on our ships, but also provided them with the opportunity to discover our country. We organized tours where they could visit nearby regions before and after, and created opportunities for them to stay in our country, thus providing added value to the economy. A cruise operation does not only include a cruise tour package. We create value-added programs for every cruise tourist who embarks and disembarks at our ports, and we also bring them to our country's tourism. Therefore, 2024 was a profitable year in this respect as well.’’
Destination and satisfaction are in our DNA
Celestyal Türkiye Director Özgü Alnıtemiz; He also noted that Celestyal made a move in 2024, added another important destination such as the Arabian Gulf to its program, and opened this route to the Turkish market by creating air packages, and said: ‘’Celestial, which spent the stagnant process of the pandemic with investment plans, has been reaping the rewards for the last two years. Our fleet has been renewed, and the new ships added to the fleet have been completely renovated. Finally, our Discovery ship has entered service with a completely new design with the addition of the number of floors and balcony suites. Celestyal, which has embedded enriched experience, destination-focused motivation and high satisfaction into its brand DNA, is a beloved cruise company in all markets and Turkey. We are now carrying our expertise in the Greek Islands to our new routes, the Arabian Gulf and Adriatic programs. We plan to extend the Arabian Gulf program to 12 months in 2025.’’
Targeted number of passengers is 2.3 million!
Celestial Turkey Director Özgü Alnıtemiz shared his 2025 estimates based on the sector and brand as follows: ‘’As of November 2024, we closed 50 percent of our targets in the early booking period we opened. We aim to reach 70 percent by the end of February-March 2025. Our 2025 targets are to be able to create the same figures in the Turkish market for Celestyal. We also expect developments in the Turkish cruise market. The total targeted number of passengers is 2.3 million. There is a very serious growth in the cruise sector in the world, the total number of passengers is expected to reach 40 million. The advantages of cruise travel are being discovered more and more each day. Because there is a cruise program that you can go on every season. Awareness of cruise travel is increasing. Those who travel on a cruise ship once want to board again with a rate of over 80 percent. Early planning is always more advantageous in cruise. We recommend that our guests depart early to take advantage of our advantageous rates.’’
About Celestyal
Award-winning, year-round cruise line, Celestyal offers unmissable travel experiences in the Greek Islands, Adriatic and Arabian Gulf. Built on Greek heritage, the company provides true cultural immersion both on board and ashore. Operating two brand new ships with a capacity of 1,260 passengers each, Celestyal welcomes over 100,000 passengers annually from over 130 different nationalities, creating a high-end environment and prioritizing highly personalized service