Last Cruise Ship of the Season

Dunedin (Friday, 10 April) – Today’s visit by the Sea Princess marks the end of a successful 2014/15 cruise ship season for Dunedin. The Sea Princess also began the season with a visit in October.

A total of 76 cruise ships visited Dunedin this summer. Although weather and other issues caused the cancellation of four ships during the season, the city also benefitted from two ships staying overnight, with passengers and crew enjoying two days of access to Dunedin’s attractions, retail and shopping.

Over the course of the season Dunedin hosted approximately 131,000 passengers and 58,000 crew. Final confirmed figures will be available from Cruise New Zealand soon. This season was expected to be about 1% less than 2013/14, however with fewer cancellations it appears there was around 5% growth. Next season 13% growth is predicted.

DCC Business Development Advisor (Visitor Industry) Sophie Barker says the cruise visitors provide a large boost to the visitor industry at a time when visitor arrivals to New Zealand are still suffering the after-effects of the Global Financial Crisis, the strong New Zealand dollar and the Christchurch Earthquake.

“On average each passenger spends around $125, bringing in an estimated $30 million, which is a very welcome contribution to our city’s economy. The beautiful summer we have had has helped get the cruise passengers off the ships and out spending their money in our attractions, shops, cafes and tours.

“Cruise has grown to be approximately 8% of visitors to Dunedin. Dunedin ordinarily averages 5500 visitors per day. On a double cruise day our cruise visitors can easily equal that. The cruise visitors are a very visible tip of the tourism iceberg which overall contributes well over $200 million to the Dunedin economy”.

Director Enterprise Dunedin John Christie says Dunedin is consistently rated as one of the top ports for cruise ship visitors in New Zealand. “One of the themes in our Economic Development Strategy is to showcase Dunedin as a compelling destination and satisfied cruisers provide great word of mouth for the city. The Council works hard with our partners on destination management to ensure we deliver the best visitor experience. Continual improvement of experience during a period of exponential growth of visits and passenger numbers is imperative to maintaining Dunedin’s reputation as a quality cruise destination”.

Ms Barker says a huge amount of effort from all the Dunedin stakeholders goes into Dunedin’s visitor experience delivery. “A Cruise Action Group with representatives from Dunedin City Council, Port Otago, Dunedin Host, University of Otago and Otago Chamber of Commerce meets regularly and works together to invest in the cruise visitor experience. Visitors certainly don’t see all the hard work that goes on behind the scenes, but they are very much appreciative of their great time here”.

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