Jason Liberty: Vince, thank you very much for that question. I’ve been waiting for about 20 minutes to talk about Icon. First of all, Icon is a product in terms of the design and the focus on multi-generational family and the evolution from Oasis-class. I think what we’ve created really is a game changing hit. I mean, it really is working with customer demographic and it’s really working with our target market. And I think if you’ve got an exceptional product that people really are impressed with, then you’re almost there and we feel like we’ve really achieved that with Icon. It’s epic and you combine that with perfect day and the opening of Hideaway beach, we have a product and a vacation experience for a multigenerational family that truly is the best in the world.
And we’ve made that statement. It’s the best family vacation in the world. So you’ve got to have that foundation. But I would say that in comparison with previous first in class launches, Icon has knocked this just out of the park. We’ve never seen the response that we’ve seen with Icon. It’s been genuinely unbelievable from every single metric that you would want to look at; the bookings have been phenomenally strong. The rate has been unbelievable. The appreciation of the product has been high, the interest from the trade partners, from the consumer, from destinations we’ve never seen. The kind of response that we’ve seen with Icon of the seas, the employee response, the crew response when we opened up and we had our first shakedown cruises has been unbelievable.
We really feel as if this product is absolutely right on the mark and the response has been phenomenal. When we look at the metrics and we have all of these metrics where we compare first in class, Icon has doubled or tripled the response. So volume was X percent with the first in class with Oasis. With Icon, it’s been three times better than Oasis was. Rate has been really high. But when you compare rate with Icon versus first in class in our previous launches, it’s double or triple. It’s been phenomenal in terms of the overall performance and the same seems to be true with the onboard product itself. We do feel that Icon with perfect day, stands shoulder to shoulder with Orlando and Las Vegas, except that we’ve got both. We’ve got the gaming and we’ve got everything that the kids would want to do to have a great vacation.
So we feel like we’ve got it perfectly right. And I think when you look at the lineup that we have for Royal, particularly with the opening of the Royal Beach Club in Nassau in 2025, the introduction of Utopia in the three and four day market out of Port Canaveral to perfect day, we see exactly the same kind of response with Utopia in terms of volume and rate performance versus traditional first in class, three and four day products. We feel like we’ve going back to my earlier comments, we feel like we’ve started this transition from being a traditional cruise vacation to being a world class, multi generational family option that stands shoulder to shoulder with Orlando and Las Vegas and any land based destination experience that you could mention.
We feel like we’re right there with Icon, with Utopia, with Perfect Day. And of course, it’s a journey that we’re on in terms of introducing these new, exciting products year-over-year. And thank you for asking that question. It’s very much appreciated.
Vince Ciepiel: Absolutely. So when you layer in this, it sounds like new hardware is kind of firing at a cylinder that you haven’t seen before. You have the discount to land based and then you have kind of a multiyear stretch of pretty muted industry supply. Is there any reason to think that yield growth couldn’t be at more elevated levels on a multiyear stretch than what you’ve seen historically?
Jason Liberty: Well, I’m the brand guy, so I’ve got to tell you, yes, we live in a very optimistic world, and we are extremely excited with the product and the brand that Royal Caribbean International has now become. So, yeah, I see plenty of upside. Naf and Jason may have a slightly different perspective, but I can tell you we’re very excited with the lineup that we’ve got coming, and we feel unbelievably proud of the performance of Icon to date. So, yes, I see a lot of upside.
Naftali Holtz: Yes, I think we’re all extremely optimistic on the very strong quality demand that we continue to see. And I wouldn’t want to leave the call with anybody thinking that we are not very optimistic about Q2 and beyond. I know Q1 is very high in terms of the overall performance, but the bookings, the level of onboard spend activity is exceptionally strong. I know that there is, I can just tell by the questions there’s some focus on that, but it should only be focused on the opportunity that’s ahead of us.
Operator: Our final question comes from the line of Jamie Rollo with Morgan Stanley. Please go ahead.
Jamie Rollo: Yes. Thank you. Just one sort of follow up, really, on Icon Michael, which you’ll like, I guess, just given the figures you gave then how has that changed the way you think about ordering new ships and also some of the older ships in the fleet? I mean, is this an opportunity to really press your foot down and accelerate this sort of new class of ship, or are you going to carry on perhaps as you were before? Thank you.
