Cruise homeport selection criteriaCruise

Cruise homeport selection criteria

November 14th, 2020 Cruise, Featured, PortStudies

Latest port study reveals the criteria structuring cruise lines decisions of which port to use for home-porting with input from cruise lines, ports and cruise terminal operators, and stakeholders.

Cruise ports seek to secure cruise calls, with most of them competing to accommodate the most profitable activities of all: home-porting. Meanwhile, the uninterrupted growth of cruise activities until the COVID-19 days was based on the evolution of renewed business strategies that alter home-porting selection criteria.

The latest port study by PortEconomics members Aimilia Papachristou, Thanos Pallis, and George Vaggelas examines the criteria structuring cruise lines’ decisions of which port to use for home-porting.

The port study is published at the well respected scholarly journal Research in Transportation Business & Management and is freely available online until December 26, 2020, in the following link.

The study uses a database constructed with input from 109 cruise lines, ports and cruise terminal operators, and stakeholders. Methodologically, it does so via a survey and the analysis (descriptive statistics, one-way ANOVA, and Kruskal-Wallis non-parametric test) of the 109 replies received. The collected empirical data reveal:

  • (a) the hierarchy of the home-porting selection criteria;
  • (b) the variance of the perspectives of cruise lines, cruise ports, and other stakeholders; and
  • (c) the role of the experience of cruise professionals in shaping their assessment of the significance of each criterion –
  • (d) comparison of the findings with those of past researches identifies the evolution and potential alterations of this hierarchy of home-porting selection criteria.
Facebook Twitter Google+ LinkedIn Pinterest

Aimilia A. Papachristou is Business Consultant on cruise-rail integration in Travel Bureau of the Passenger Services Department of TRAINOSE S.A. A maritime economist, holding a BSc from the Department of Shipping Trade and Transport, School of Business, University of the Aegean, Greece (2002), and a MSc in Shipping Trade & Transport, School of Business, University of the Aegean, Greece (2004). Since 2013, Aimilia was senior project manager at MedCruise, the association of over 100 cruise ports from 20 countries in the Mediterranean and its adjoining seas. She has contributed in re-profiling the Association. The period January-March 2018 she acted as interim Secretary General of the Association, while she will conclude serving the Association at the end of May 2018, due to the relocation of the headquarters to Tenerife, Spain. Before that post Aimilia had been advisor to the Secretary General of Ports and Port Policy, at the Ministry of Development Competitiveness and Shipping of the Hellenic Republic (2011-2012). Under her capacity as Research Fellow at the Business School of the University of the Aegean (since 2009) Aimilia has been also involved - either as research or as administrator - in several port and maritime related research projects funded by the European Union, shipping companies and ports. Her professional experience also includes experience as Lecturer at the Business Administration Department of the Technological Educational Institute (ATEI) of Ionian Islands, Greece. At ATEI, Aimilia was teaching courses in “Marketing Management”, “Human Resource Management”, “Advertisement”, “Market Research” and “International Economic Relations” (2006-2009). A scholar of the Hellenic State Scholarship Foundation (IKY), Aimilia currently works on a PhD thesis examining cruise port governance at the Department of Shipping, Trade and Transport (STT) of the School of Business, University of the Aegean. Greece. Aimilia was elected member of the Council of the Hellenic Association of Maritime Economist (2010-2015). She is a founding member of PortEconomics.eu, advancing since 2008 the web initiative advancing the dissemination of port research and studies and a scientific partner of the consulting company Ports & Shipping Advisory since its establishment in 2016.

Related Posts

Leave a Reply

© PortEconomics 2020. All rights reserved.
Produced by PortEconomics