Case study: CroisiEurope
How CroisiEurope’s exceptional river cruise service and foresight helped it to take advantage of the global post-pandemic recovery.
CroisiEurope’s comprehensive structure and timely preparedness enabled it to withstand pandemic pressures and reinvest in its own business.
Who we are?
As the European leader in river cruising, CroisiEurope is an independent family-owned travel agency and tour operator that runs maritime and river cruises around Europe and across the globe. As cruise specialists and pioneers in the boat construction industry, CroisiEurope welcomes nearly 200,000 passengers a year on its 55 small-scale ships in rivers, seas, and canals.
The company takes a true end-to-end approach with the services it offers. From start to finish, everything is managed by CroisiEurope, this includes the design and upkeep of its ships, the marketing of its cruises, including production, hotel and commercial management and finally maintenance. Operating on a wide array of waterways, including the Rhine and Danube rivers in Europe and the Mekong in Southeast and East Asia, CroisiEurope is truly committed to respecting the environment and culture in which it operates.
As the European leader in river cruising, CroisiEurope is an independent family-owned travel agency and tour operator that runs maritime and river cruises around Europe and across the globe. As cruise specialists and pioneers in the boat construction industry, CroisiEurope welcomes nearly 200,000 passengers a year on its 55 small-scale ships in rivers, seas, and canals.
The company takes a true end-to-end approach with the services it offers. From start to finish, everything is managed by CroisiEurope, this includes the design and upkeep of its ships, the marketing of its cruises, including production, hotel and commercial management and finally maintenance. Operating on a wide array of waterways, including the Rhine and Danube rivers in Europe and the Mekong in Southeast and East Asia, CroisiEurope is truly committed to respecting the environment and culture in which it operates.
“With the current climate and stress levels at an all-time high, holiday time has become so much more important in people's minds. While people are willing to pay more than they did before the pandemic, they also want completely worry-free trips in return. Saftey, personalization, physical presence and accompaniment throughout the trip make all the difference.”
CroisiEurope distributes as both a travel operator and travel agency and works directly with customers while also offering its products to other travel agencies. The two arms of the operation give it complete control over all aspects of the trip and enable it to deliver unbeatable value for money. While mainly specialising in leisure, CroisiEurope also caters to business. For instance, in November 2023, the company is organising a large medical conference in South Africa which involved accommodating the guests in a luxury lodge, organizing safaris, and relaxing with boat trips on the lake.
Due to its unique business model and structure, CroisiEurope doesn’t really have any direct competitors. Most standard travel agencies work with cruise providers to deliver the service but CroisiEurope owns and manages the entire network. This network ensures there are no weak links in the trip that could lead to cancellations or customer issues.
What are the fundamentals?
Headquarters
Industry
Plan
Website
croisieurope.be/fr/destination/croisieres‑cotieres
What was the challenge?
When the COVID-19 pandemic hit, as with most travel providers, our entire business came to a halt for a period. As the crisis persisted, there was a noticeable shift to online channel by those travelers still booking trips (during lockdown people couldn’t go out, avoiding contact, etc). This was OK for the online giants but affected smaller agencies hard. However, for us at CroisiEurope, even though we suffered the COVID-19 difficulties too, we were hit less hard than our peers because of the very niche service we offer (river cruising). This isn’t readily found online, so customers still had to make the effort to come to us as specialists in this area.
Also, the lack of support around delays and cancellations experienced by many travelers during the pandemic, further caused customers to move towards booking their travel with physical agents. Coupled with our tailored, in-person service, this put us in a good position to prepare for recovery and helped attract new customers during lockdown.
“With every low there is always going to be a high so it’s important to use the down-time to carefully plan a strategy for bouncing back. Look for all the new opportunities that are presenting themselves today and take them without reserve.”
Lastly, due to our unique structure, our business perhaps had an advantage over travel agents and tour operators with a more standard model. At CroisiEurope we own the majority of our own ships, this meant that we had a strong base to pay back loans and didn't have to rely so much on financial support. Having control over our own assets also enabled us to restart our operations shortly and quickly after restrictions were lifted.
Our dedication to our customers was compounded by a 75% customer return rate. A true testament to the passion and effort our team put into the business.
How did Amadeus support?
CroisiEurope is in control of most of the service we offer once customers board our ships until the end of the cruise. However, the transport by plane, train and other ways has become much more important after COVID-19 to ensure a total holiday experience to customers. Many of them lost a lot of money with schedule changes or cancellations through online bookings. Therefore, we needed the latest information on availability and prices, something we could find easily and precisely in Amadeus.
What did you reimagine?
"CroisiEurope predicted that travelers were going to spend more after the pandemic due to the strong appetite for‘revenge travel’
that built up over lockdown. That’s why during the pandemic, we took the opportunity to audit our contract and supply chains as well as review and update our IT systems. These actions allowed us to prepare for when restrictions were lifted and take advantage of the pent-up demand for travel.
Most of our clientele is within the 45-80 age group. As a result, many of the more senior customers were worried that if the pandemic persisted, they wouldn’t be able to travel again. So when the recovery started, they flocked back and we made sure we were ready for this surge.
“Too many TAs have all the customer data to hand but don’t do enough with it to offer that personalised experience. CroisiEurope even personally accompany customers on certain cruises. In terms of customer satisfaction, it doesn't get better than that!”
We also conducted a detailed review of how we could improve our customer experience. As sustainability is rightly becoming increasingly important to customers, we have taken steps to go above and beyond in our commitment to the environment. During the lockdown period, we started to change some of our ships’ engines to reduce the carbon emission using LNG fuel. The roll out is ongoing to other ships with a view to receiving the “Greenship” label. We also implemented new and strict regulations with regards to all waste (water, food, oils, etc.) to obtain a higher percentage of recycling. Wherever it is available, our ships hook up to the shoreside electricity of ports so that the ship engines can be shut down.”
Results
- The average shopping cart has increased despite increased fuel prices. The average spend before the COVID-19 pandemic was 900 EUR, now it’s risen to 1,200 EUR
- CroisiEurope is currently looking to expand even futher into the Netherlands, Scandinavia, Italy, and Israel with an eye on further expansion in Asia after that
- Cruise represents only 1% of all global travel, the majority of which is maritime. So River cruising has great potential.
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